super hero squad |

Publisher: THQ

Developer: THQ

Release Date: 10/20/2009

Available On

Why is it that all things childish have to be bad? Marvel Super Hero Squad features pint-sized superheroes that you would expect to have life-size powers, but this seems to be just an illusion. The game has a great story with Dr. Doom trying to take over the world with an infinity crystal. Modok screws up his doom cannon and blows the shard into six pieces that each side is desperately trying to find. The voice acting is great, and the dialog is actually pretty fun, which is a plus for such a crappy game.

What really hurts the game is the repetition. You start the game by picking two different heroes, then you are thrown into a level with yellow guys called AIM soldiers. You basically mash X (light) and O (heavy) attacks to kill these guys. You can pick stuff up and throw it at them, and sometimes you can use a powerful special attack. That is pretty much it. Yes, I am dead serious. Do not doubt this. I played well into the second chapter, and nothing changed. There are some semi-fun button-pressing sequences, but that’s as far as variety goes in in-game play. Each character plays exactly the same role, so choosing different characters isn’t going to do you much. Enemy variety is pretty minimal, and not only is the game repetitive, but the controls are sluggish and hard to manage.

If mindless button-mashing is your thing, then go for it since the objectives are also just as boring. Kill all enemies here, destroy all equipment here, protect this, protect that. The issue here is that the enemies never stop coming. Combat wouldn’t be too bad if you didn’t have to fight the terrible camera, but there’s no way to control it. Sometimes the camera will even do weird things like zoom WAY out where the level is a lot, then go back in.

If you like co-op, then that is probably the best thing to do here, or go into battle mode and fight it out. There are some extras, but they aren’t worth playing through this horribly repetitive and boring game. Save it for the kids.