Card-Based Marvel's Midnight Suns - Marvel universe card-based tactical RPG from Firaxis

[Tyranicon]

47 hours in, and still only in the middle of Act II. This game is really trying hard to be Firaxis Presents: The Sims, with the socializing component chewing up most of the time. And it's a lot hit ("What's worse? Canada or Limbo?") and miss (Caretaker mimimimimi), but mostly miss. Really wished they would have trimmed down the fat, but the fact that the game still motivates me is a testament to the robust core combat gameplay.

I finished it and it was way longer than expected. Still, the gameplay is a lot of fun on Ultimate III (and working up to it), but yeah, too much teenage drama.

I'm not sure if I'm just the wrong demographic from what they were aiming for or if they just totally missed the mark.

Everything is teenage drama because it's the broadest audience demographic:

1. Younger kinds look up to teens and want to consume teen media
2. Teens like teen media because they're stupid and don't know better
3. Young adults like teen media because they haven't grown up and should know better
4. Older adults have no reason to like teen media but still consume it because mental maturity is a relic of a bygone era
5. Old people don't buy new shit

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Official rating after having played a few hours. Writing's not actively bad enough to be a net negative so far since I'm fine with some comic book cheese (Though there is a surprising amount of it) but the combat's fantastic. Really surprising how well they mixed tacticool turn based combat with card gaming, when I first started I was thinking it was a bit of a bummer how you get locked into combat arenas rather than being more open like Xcom, but the combat arenas fit thematically for super hero stuff and they really make the card combat system shine. Having 3 "Card plays" a turn as a resource (Which can be temporarily increased by playing cards to buff it, or cheated with cards that have the quick keyword where your card play is refunded if you KO a goon with it) for the team, and one move action a turn for the team (Which can be slightly cheated since moves are automatically included with most attacks, but the general move action's good for repositioning to line something up or get out of the radius of something), and the global heroism resource which is grown and spent by the team and which persists through turns and even maps during multi-map missions, and then on top of all that having character-specific powers like Captain Marvel charging up if you play her cards, Ghost Rider getting extra cards when he lands KO's, etc. Still a good bit of thought in card sequencing and character positioning going on for a small little arena.

It is kind of a shame that they didn't have a stronger writing team since it does feel like it wants to have more RPG stuff going on with the combat but it's pretty light thus far. Sadly even though there's a paragon/renegade point system going on there doesn't look to be any upside to pissing characters off unlike Alpha Protocol or Tyranny, and it is a little weird to go from throwing nazis into a portal to hell (But not killing them since it CLEARLY SAYS KO AND NOT KILLED. Blade's just shooting rubber bullets and probably stunning people with the impact of that stake to the heart) and then MOVIE NIGHT MOVIE NIGHT and increasing my heart rating with some 20something superheroine who then unlocks a swimsuit buuuuuuuuuut eh. Whiplash from tacticool combat to super hero dating sim aside that was a lot of fun. Even if he left/was fired from Firaxis I hope the most holy and blessed Jake Solomon will make some other turn based tactics shit since I'm clearly on the same wavelength.

 

[Jaedar]

I'm surprised this flopped so hard. I haven't bought it because of the marvelshit/win10/dating sim trifecta, but I saw some videos of the combat and it looks pretty fun. But people in general seem to like dating sim elements in their RPGs. Is it because the writing is poor? Or is everyone just really fuckin tired of marvel after 30 movies in 10 years?

Poor Solomon. He didn't exactly make the best job with xcom, but I always got the impression he tried his best in the face of dumb playtesters and executive demands for popamole.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Is it because the writing is poor? Or is everyone just really fuckin tired of marvel after 30 movies in 10 years?

Kinda both. At least the writing is closer to comic books then to movies.
Even free weekend and huge discounts not helped a bit. Kinda sad because core gameplay loop (minus the social part) is fun and can easly be upgraded into something even better. But it is safe to say that the game is dead and I don't think they'll support it after the planned DLCs.

 

[Sarkile]

Damn, I was considering grabbing this during the Steam sale, but the last few pages have me questioning that. The dating sim/woke bullshit comments make the story sound like a bit of a struggle.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Damn, I was considering grabbing this during the Steam sale, but the last few pages have me questioning that. The dating sim/woke bullshit comments make the story sound like a bit of a struggle.

The story's kinda/sorta interesting as far as this sort of thing goes, but this isn't a storyfag game, it's a strategy-card game that lives and dies on its gameplay. The best thing I can say about the writing is that you can click through and skip more or less everything. If you find it interesting, go ahead and read/listen. If you find it cringe, just click skip. You can even get all the bonuses and stuff you want by doing the side stuff and just click through anything you hate/that's boring.

I didn't read any of the books or anything, though I did "collect" them, I read a bit of the sidequest fluff, listened to some of the conversations I thought were mildly interesting and skipped anything that made me cringe. Thought it was a great time. YMMV

 

[santino27]

Looks like they just released the Morbius DLC today, to accompany last month's Venom release.

 

[GhostCow]

I enjoyed the base game, but I have no desire to play again to experience the dlc.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I'm just waiting for the last one to come out and then I'll probably fire it up to run them all and see if their abilities makes me feel like playing more after they're unlocked.

 

[Skorpion]

Looks like they just released the Morbius DLC today, to accompany last month's Venom release.

 

[Cyberarmy]

I enjoyed the base game, but I have no desire to play again to experience the dlc.

At least this kind of DLC, game need a proper expansion pack that also irons it's most shit.

And WTF why Morbeus has nose now?? Come on...

 

[mediocrepoet]

And WTF why Morbeus has nose now?? Come on...

What? I know nothing about the character, but a Google search for comic images of him came up with a variety of art that had a huge variety of noses including bat noses, normal human noses, relatively normal human noses, etc. I didn't see even one that had no nose.

EDIT: Spoke too soon. There were a few that had a skull like nose cavity, but (at least on Google search) they were in the vast minority. Perhaps it depended on the comic run, artist, and storyline?

 

[Monocause]

Jesus, I not only didn't realize this game was headed up by The Most Revered Jake Solomon, I didn't even know it was made by fucking Firaxis until just now. Didn't hear of it when it first launched, heard a little bit of "Xcom-like card battler with super heroes" later and thought that might be cool but wasn't anything I'd want quickly, then completely ignored it until I happened to see a cover of the box art just now and noticed the Firaxis logo. Well fuck. I guess not realizing may have worked in my favor since I likely would've D1P'd it otherwise, but at this point I guess it sounds like I should just wait for a steep sale if I'm already this far into launch.

This is clearly the problem. I really dig and follow strategy titles and didn't even know this was Firaxis or worth looking into.

Thing is I don't care for the Marvel universe. Worse yet, it started to piss me off as past decade there's been a ridiculous amount of movies and other crap released. I probably immediately assumed that I'm dealing with a shitty 3rd person beat em up or action game when I've seen the Marvel logo and did so for months.

Might pick it up at some point as the core gameplay seems okay.

EDIT: Reviewed the promo materials they've chosen and they really do not look representative of the product at all. Marketing fucked up big time with trying to appeal to a very broad audience and if anything they should pick the bill up rather than studio heads. For instance, check out the Steam store page and look at the shots available there and compare to what you had on the Xcom2 page where you had in-game screenshots showing a soldier overview, research pick menu or the tactical map.

EDIT2: I stand corrected - there's exactly one (one!) screenshot showing how the interface and actual gameplay looks like on the steam store page. Easy to miss among all the zany action superhero mugshots that some people probably jerk off to. Marketing didn't stand by the game's vision and clearly tried to obfuscate it, and paid for it.

 

[mediocrepoet]

This is clearly the problem. I really dig and follow strategy titles and didn't even know this was Firaxis or worth looking into.

Thing is I don't care for the Marvel universe. Worse yet, it started to piss me off as past decade there's been a ridiculous amount of movies and other crap released. I probably immediately assumed that I'm dealing with a shitty 3rd person beat em up or action game when I've seen the Marvel logo and did so for months.

Might pick it up at some point as the core gameplay seems okay.

EDIT: Reviewed the promo materials they've chosen and they really do not look representative of the product at all. Marketing fucked up big time with trying to appeal to a very broad audience and if anything they should pick the bill up rather than studio heads. For instance, check out the Steam store page and look at the shots available there and compare to what you had on the Xcom2 page where you had in-game screenshots showing a soldier overview, research pick menu or the tactical map.

EDIT2: I stand corrected - there's exactly one (one!) screenshot showing how the interface and actual gameplay looks like on the steam store page. Easy to miss among all the zany action superhero mugshots that some people probably jerk off to. Marketing didn't stand by the game's vision and clearly tried to obfuscate it, and paid for it.

Yeah, I think you've about nailed it. I had it so far off my radar I wasn't even considering checking it out. It wasn't until I watched a video of some gameplay and was surprised that I thought it looked cool that I figured I'd check it out. Whatever they did in promoting the game really shit the bed and missed the niche of strategy/card game fans that may have really appreciated the game and supported it.

 

[Mangoose]

I enjoyed the base game, but I have no desire to play again to experience the dlc.

At least this kind of DLC, game need a proper expansion pack that also irons it's most shit.

And WTF why Morbeus has nose now?? Come on...

Because they're cross-promoting the Sony franchise: Tom Hardy Venom; Morbius. So probably film Morbius has a nose

.. And Blade could feasibly be teasing a Sony-Disney teamup (or taking advantage of teasing it).

That's me being corporate paranoid of course (about Blade)

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

I enjoyed the base game, but I have no desire to play again to experience the dlc.

At least this kind of DLC, game need a proper expansion pack that also irons it's most shit.

And WTF why Morbeus has nose now?? Come on...

Because they're cross-promoting the Sony franchise: Tom Hardy Venom; Morbius. So probably film Morbius has a nose

.. And Blade could feasibly be teasing a Sony-Disney teamup (or taking advantage of teasing it).

That's me being corporate paranoid of course (about Blade)

Movie Morbius has a nose like the comic book version.

Maybe someone was just lazy or something. I don’t really get it because his concept art for the game looks like Morbius. But in-game he just looks like a normal guy but with white makeup on. Maybe someone thought he wasn’t fuckable the other way or something. But even forgetting the nose, Morbius in this game doesn’t even have a face like Morbius normally has.

 

[lycanwarrior]

I'm surprised this flopped so hard. I haven't bought it because of the marvelshit/win10/dating sim trifecta, but I saw some videos of the combat and it looks pretty fun. But people in general seem to like dating sim elements in their RPGs. Is it because the writing is poor? Or is everyone just really fuckin tired of marvel after 30 movies in 10 years?

Poor Solomon. He didn't exactly make the best job with xcom, but I always got the impression he tried his best in the face of dumb playtesters and executive demands for popamole.

Me, I've pretty burned-out on super hero movies, although I still read the comics.

The card-based mechanic likely turned off a large contingent of potential fans, at least initially.

 

[deuxhero]

Ports canceled. All they had to do was make a Freedom Force successor, instead they tried smashing together a bunch of random genres, refused to let you play as a female character (just crazy man) and nothing fits.
https://nichegamer.com/marvels-midnight-suns-prev-gen-ports-may/

I think trying to stick to a limiting theme for characters was a mistake that doesn't get enough attention. They then tried to bend it to get the iconic heroes in, and it just doesn't work.

 

[Galdred]

Ports canceled. All they had to do was make a Freedom Force successor, instead they tried smashing together a bunch of random genres, refused to let you play as a female character (just crazy man) and nothing fits.
https://nichegamer.com/marvels-midnight-suns-prev-gen-ports-may/

I think trying to stick to a limiting theme for characters was a mistake that doesn't get enough attention. They then tried to bend it to get the iconic heroes in, and it just doesn't work.

I thought super hero games were more popular on Switch. Maybe it was more of a hassle to port?

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

They didn’t really smash together a bunch of random genres. They basically just made their version of a JRPG, with I guess the biggest change up being they added a randomized attack option element to combat. What I don’t get is the Abbey stuff very much seems like it’s influenced by the time management aspect of Persona, but the approach Firaxis Games took was to drop the time management part (which is the actual gameplay part of that section of Persona) while only keeping the social link bit.

I’d expect Firaxis to make a Freedom Force successor about as much as I’d of expected them to make a Marvel Ultimate Alliance successor. Their whole thing is turned-based games, something like Freedom Force would’ve been a big change up for them.

 

[bertram_tung]

GOTY 2022. not saying much, but there it is.

 

[deuxhero]

Their whole thing is turned-based games, something like Freedom Force would’ve been a big change up for them.

I said successor, not clone. Freedom Force wouldn't need that much adjustment to be playable turn based. Valkyria Chronicles showed knocking characters around with physics was totally doable in a gridless turn based game (VC's unusual turn system aside).

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

Their whole thing is turned-based games, something like Freedom Force would’ve been a big change up for them.

I said successor, not clone. Freedom Force wouldn't need that much adjustment to be playable turn based. Valkyria Chronicles showed knocking characters around with physics was totally doable in a gridless turn based game (VC's unusual turn system aside).

Well, that wouldn’t exactly be a Freedom Force successor. Even with the real-time with pause element to Freedom Force, Freedom Force as a purely turn-based game would be more of a radical shift then a purely real time action game take on Freedom Force.

It sounds more like you want what this game is already doing during combat, (maybe without the random card stuff) but with Valkyria Chronicles turn-based movement, and maybe larger areas for combat.

 

[Galdred]

Their whole thing is turned-based games, something like Freedom Force would’ve been a big change up for them.

I said successor, not clone. Freedom Force wouldn't need that much adjustment to be playable turn based. Valkyria Chronicles showed knocking characters around with physics was totally doable in a gridless turn based game (VC's unusual turn system aside).

Well, that wouldn’t exactly be a Freedom Force successor. Even with the real-time with pause element to Freedom Force, Freedom Force as a purely turn-based game would be more of a radical shift then a purely real time action game take on Freedom Force.

It sounds more like you want what this game is already doing during combat, (maybe without the random card stuff) but with Valkyria Chronicles turn-based movement, and maybe larger areas for combat.

Even then, just a turn/grid based Freedom Force with Marvel characters would probably havr worked better.
FF Characters were memorable without this weird HQ social stuff.

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

Ports canceled. All they had to do was make a Freedom Force successor, instead they tried smashing together a bunch of random genres, refused to let you play as a female character (just crazy man) and nothing fits.
https://nichegamer.com/marvels-midnight-suns-prev-gen-ports-may/

I think trying to stick to a limiting theme for characters was a mistake that doesn't get enough attention. They then tried to bend it to get the iconic heroes in, and it just doesn't work.

Only the Switch port was canceled.

That being said, I sank 60+ hours into this game, and despite the questionable mish-mash of genres, it's strategy-core triumphs. The only worthy AAA game of 2022 besides Elden Ring to play.