3.5/5 ★ – Aeroshoot's review of Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order.

This franchise is an interesting thing to say the least. Marvel as a brand has hit its ups and downs in each form of media that it spans across. For every “The Avengers” we have a “Fant4stic”. For every “The Spectacular Spider-Man”, there’s a “Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends”. And for every “Civil War” there’s a “One Day More”. I bring this up because aside from some pretty old games, Marvel has a great gaming track record. (With the exceptions of the MCU tie-ins). You have two amazing LEGO games and a fun to play third one. A series of great fighting games with the Marvel Vs. Capcom series. And then there’s the Ultimate Alliance franchise. This franchise has it’s fans as well as it’s critics. Some calling them engaging stories and a fun time, whilst others call it a slog of repetitive gameplay. Personally, I’m a mix of both. I don’t stay around for the gameplay or the visuals, I stay around for the story. I stay around to see what’s going to happen and how these heroes are gonna save the day. In Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order (which for the sake of you and me, I will call it MUA3 from here on out), you play as a slew of Marvel characters from fan favorites like Deadpool, The Avengers, and Spider-Man, as well as some unfamiliar faces such as Elsa Bloodstone and Moon Knight. In this story you are racing against the mad titan, Thanos, and his children, the titular Black Order, to collect all six infinity stones and save the galaxy. Like I said, the gameplay is not the star of this show, but let’s go over it really quick. It’s the standard MUA formula, you get four different heroes (or villains) to choose from and you can switch between them at anytime to face off against the baddies. A common complaint is that the gameplay is repetitive, but the easy solution behind this should be to switch characters often to keep gameplay lively. The visuals aren’t that great either, it seems like they were trying to go for a Disney Infinity kind of vibe, but the problem is that game was supposed to have the characters as toys. This is a game where they are supposed to be comic characters brought to life. The color pallets of the game are nice though, with each level having a distinct color. However, there can often be lag when you’re pulling off an Ultimate Alliance attack. Causing the screen to be a buggy mess. The Story, is the best part of this game. You have all these heroes, like 30+ heroes and you have to somehow incorporate them into the main story without throwing them in there. The game starts you off as the Guardians Of The Galaxy, after a fight with Ronan The Accuser you get sent to earth, specifically The Raft maximum security prison. There you meet up with Spider-Man and must defeat 5 of his villains in mini boss fights, with the fight against Sandman being a highlight. There we meet more heroes and you see that the other Spider-Men (Gwen and Miles) are there with Ms.Marvel. Every character has a part in this story that incorporates them naturally, and in a creative way. My favorite character introduced in the story was Deadpool though, solely on the fact that he joined the journey all because his Taco Night got ruined by Juggernaut and he somehow ended up in space. If you’re a fan of Marvel, than this game has a great story and some fun character moments right up your alley. If not, well there’s always Iron Man 2 on the PS3.