We’ve been learning about the future of Marvel Heroes in bits and pieces over the last few weeks and this year’s New York Comic-Con was no different. At the show, the Gazillion team was on hand for a panel discussing their plans for the Marvel Heroes 2016 re-brand, but new details were somewhat scant. I’m not sure if the timing of recent events just isn’t lining up with the state of what the team has planned, but I was hoping to see something more substantial at this year’s panel.
Since we’ve already covered a good deal of what’s on the way, we’re going to focus today on the new tidbits and previously covered announcements that may have been a bit more fleshed out at the panel.
An All-New, All-Different Focus
Marvel Heroes 2016 will kick off a new focus on Marvel’s recently launched All-New, All-Different initiative, but Gazillion got started a bit earlier than December’s scheduled rebranding by releasing a slate of new ANAD costumes late last week. Last Friday brought with it the release of Spider-Gwen as a team-up (and enhanced costume for Spider-Man), Jane Foster as Thor, and ANAD themed costumes for X-23 and Scarlet Witch. The team reassured folks in attendance that while they’re looking to incorporate more current events and themes, they won’t be abandoning the classic and iconic Marvel elements we all love and know.
New Costumes, Team Ups, and Visual Updates
Previously revealed Agent Venom and Archangel team ups were highlighted again, though no real details were discussed. Howard the Duck as a team up will be unlocked via an achievement. He’ll have his Quack Fu, and we’re assured his VO will be as amusing as you would expect. Frankencastle will be returning for this year’s Holiday festivities, but in a new form as a team up.
A number of new costumes were shown as well. Highlights include an obscure (but amazing) Taskmaster Avengers World costume for everyone’s favorite mimic, Kitty Pryde’s Age of Apocalypse outfit (with animation switches for her claws), and a pacifist costume for Deadpool (set to arrive with his design review). An enhanced Symbiote Wolverine (complete with animated tongue) is also set for release with this month’s Halloween festivities.
Finally, we got a look at a brand new visual update for Captain America. We were shown Cap’s visually updated default and original (badge shield) costume, but it wasn’t clear if any other Cap costumes were set to be updated. Personally, I just want a Winter Soldier variant without the helmet. Just putting that out there!
Blade & Iron Fist
Gazillion’s Anthony Gallegos gave us a taste of how Marvel’s most badass vampire hunter would play in Marvel Heroes. Anthony emphasized that Blade always looks like he’s having fun, putting some style into his moves. We’ll see this style in his regular moveset, but it sounds like he’s going to really dial it up for his signature and ultimate. Blade’s signature will have him throw a bunch of stakes at his enemies and finish off by tossing a final stake into the air that he’ll leap up and kick into his opponent. It sounds a heck of a lot like the “ice skate” scene from the original Blade film, and that works just fine for me. For his ultimate, Blade will toss his shades into the air, do some work on his enemies, and then catch and put his shades back on. It definitely sounds like Gaz is trying to capture the cool Snipes exuded as Blade in the films. Blade will also have his bouncing glaive attack and make use of a stacking bleed mechanic that will deal more damage as you continually bleed your opponents, but at the cost of your own health, representing Blade’s struggle with his vampiric thirst.
Blade will launch with his modern and original costumes and it looks like Gaz is working on his All-New, All-Different costume as well, so stay tuned for that!
Gallegos also briefly gave us a peek into how Iron Fist will work. There weren’t too many details, but players can expect to do a good deal of stance dancing to modify their attacks with different effects.
Controller Support
As far as we can tell, controller support will be coming with the Marvel Heroes 2016 rebrand in December, and we were given some additional clarity on how it all may play out. The control scheme sounds similar to Marvel Ultimate Alliance or FFXIV: A Realm Reborn’s controller support in that you’ll make use of modifiers on the shoulder buttons in order to expand your selection of abilities to hit. The right stick will also let you snap into mouse mode as a catch all for cases where you feel like having access to a mouse pointer would be more intuitive.
Chapter 10: Secret Invasion
The Skrull invasion will be the theme of Marvel Heroes’ chapter 10 content. We got to see a couple of slides (with amusing narration from the panel) from the chapter 10 cinematics, as well as some renders of the Skrull bosses we’ll get to fight, including a War Skrull mini boss, and even Kl’rt, the Super Skrull, himself!
All in all, there were some decent nuggets of information, but nothing mind blowing shown at the panel. I was expecting something significant on Danger Room and the Savage Land content, but we were only shown a couple of screenshots of each and a short clip we’ve seen previously for the Danger Room. That’s OK, though! We’ll be hosting a Marvel Heroes “Ask Me Anything” Q&A event tomorrow (at 7PM EST) right here on our Marvel Heroes subforums, so if you’ve got any questions for the team, be sure to check back then!
CORRECTION: Looks like I may have heard wrong on the glaive dissolving vampires, as Mr. Gallegos has clarified that this will not be the case. Our apologies for the confusion!
