Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes

As far as arcade mainstays in America go, MvC2 is on Mount Rushmore. Absolutely gorgeous spritework (with some odd exceptions), a flamboyant lounge-jazz soundtrack, and flashy, fast-paced combat system based around teamwork and combo-chains made it an immediate eye-catcher for many kids growing up around the turn of the century. And for good reason, too, because MvC2 is one of the most entertaining fighters I've ever played.

From top to bottom, the roster is stacked with familiar names - half of the Street Fighter and Darkstalkers mainstays comprise the CAPCOM corner, while the Marvel roster strikes a cool balance of Avengers, X-Men, and deep cut cult favorites like Blackheart and Omega Red. The Marvel characters steal the show here, too - the sprites are large, detailed, fluid, and look ripped right out of a comic page (with Venom being especially cheeky about it). The fanservice is pretty obvious, but this was a time well before Marvel became the super-conglomerate film factory it is in 2018 - it was very clear that the game was an outlet of passion for comic books for many artists working at CAPCOM in the late 1990s. And what better way to celebrate these teams of fighters and heroes than to embrace a team-based battle system?

It's perfectly normal to try and play this like Street Fighter with three life bars, but the real fun comes from using assists, hyper moves, character switching, and delay hypers to disorient and stunlock your opponent for as long as possible. Because characters provide value in both assists and team hypers even when not actively being played, the defensive priority is to keep everyone alive as long as possible, which leads to plenty of interesting 1v1 matchups over the course of just a single fight. Add the rock-paper-scissors-etc matchup structure of the general character archetypes into the mix and you have a recipe that encourages experimentation, knowledge of the game, raw instinct, and the bold. Narrowing down the three (or more) that you feel comfortable with is extremely rewarding

That said, like most high-budget fighters with large rosters, the main gameplay issues arise not from controls but roster balance. In fact, a quick watch of any high-level MvC2 tournament play will tell you that only 10ish of the 56 heroes in this game are really all that viable when you're at the top - which, while indicative of some deeper mechanical issues, is really not all that important to 7o% of players who play single player Arcade mode or against friends. I can unabashedly tell you I've gotten my ass kicked by well over half the roster, so I'd say "viability" and tier lists can be a bit of a placebo at times. At any rate, even the absolute worst characters in the game (ie. Roll) can still be used as passable assists, making even the largest balance disparities less impactful than in other games.

In terms of it being a home port, New Age of Heroes doesn't do much to flesh the base game out into the full experience it could have been. The additions of the ever-helpful training mode is always welcome, but the only other key differences are a score attack mode and the fact that 36/56 of the characters have to be unlocked through hours of playtime. Attempts at maintaining the feel of the original arcade game also means the UI can also come off as wonky occasionally - meaning no unselecting characters at all, and returning to the main menu has to wait until after you've started the fight. I personally don't find this very hindering, but explaining it to 3 or more people while the game boots up is not easy.

The quest to unlock all 36 unlockable characters, 7 bonus stages, and extra costumes for every character in the game will probably take weeks. But that's just really a tertiary goal to keep you playing one of the most varied and tight fighting games on the Dreamcast.