In what is likely one of the most unexpected announcements out of this year’s broadcast of The Game Awards, the long-dormant Marvel: Ultimate Alliance series of co-operative action-RPG’s is making a comeback! In an even more unexpected twist however, the series’ old publisher, Activision, and its subsidiary studios, Raven Software and Vicarious Visions, won’t be returning for the upcoming threequel. Instead, Nintendo will be spearheading the production, serving as publisher while development duties are split between Tecmo Koei and Team Ninja, making Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 3 – The Black Order completely exclusive to Nintendo Switch when it releases next year! This is in stark contrast to the game’s predecessors that were published under Activision, which released for competing PlayStation and Xbox platforms, as well as Nintendo platforms.
As the title suggests, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 3 – The Black Order will incorporate Marvel arch-villain, Thanos and his titular Black Order underlings as lead villains, no doubt piggybacking off of the massive success of this year’s Marvel Studios movie release, Avengers: Infinity War, which incorporated the same antagonists. A reveal teaser shown with the announcement at The Game Awards also teased plenty of other familiar Marvel villains in the game, including Green Goblin, Sandman, Ultron, the Sentinels, and the Kingpin. Many familiar heroes from the former Marvel: Ultimate Alliance games are also set to make a comeback according to the reveal trailer, including Avengers mainstays, Iron Man, Hulk, Thor, Black Widow and Captain America, alongside other beloved favourites like Spider-Man and Wolverine. The game will apparently include quite a few all-new Marvel heroes as well, with the trailer teasing the playable debut of Guardians of the Galaxy members, Star-Lord, Gamora, Groot, Rocket and Drax, Inhumans personalities, Crystal and Lockjaw, and a couple of other New Avengers additions like Scarlet Witch and Falcon.
Considering the visual design of some of the characters, and the heavy emphasis on both the Avengers and the Guardians of the Galaxy in the reveal trailer, it’s unsurprising to see that Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 3 – The Black Order is moving away from the more comic book-inspired template of the previous two games, and is instead taking most of its design inspiration from the ultra-popular Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, making it something of a reboot for the Marvel: Ultimate Alliance series. That said, the game will still incorporate the series’ usual drop-in/drop-out four-player co-op, and can also be played solo, allowing players to assemble their dream team of Marvel heroes in the quest to battle against Thanos and his Black Order! The presence of Wolverine in the trailer would also appear to suggest that Marvel movie personalities that are currently owned by Fox (until New Years Day anyway, when the Disney-Fox merger is scheduled to be completed), namely X-Men/Deadpool personalities and the Fantastic Four, won’t be excluded from Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 3 – The Black Order, as they infamously were in the previous high-profile Marvel ensemble game, Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite. So far however, Wolverine and the Sentinels are the only Fox-owned Marvel characters to be teased for the game.
Keep assembling to Eggplante for major news and updates on Marvel: Ultimate Alliance.