Avengers Review: 3 Ups & 8 Downs
Avengers has a future, but what's here now is thoroughly disappointing.
In so many ways, what Crystal Dynamics, Eidos and Square Enix have put together is just sad; the product of a devoted creative team with many awesome ideas, forced to bury them under arbitrary loot grinds and a "platform for content" rollout across the next few years.
What's left is a product where you have to actively fight it to enjoy the good parts; actively force various components out of your mind to have a positive time, and something that feels like two separate titles smushed together at every turn.
In so many ways - and you almost can't blame them, given the opportunity - Marvel's Avengers feels like Square Enix trying to strike while the iron is hot. We've not had an Avengers game in over a decade, outside of selecting specific characters in Ultimate Alliance 3, and they've seized the opportunity to monetise hundreds of hours of play-time for years to come.
I have no doubt that Avengers will tweak mission goals, loot drops and reasons to return day after day, but right now it's a premium asking price for very little in return.
First off, though, the positives: