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Time to save the world via turn-based combat
Oh boy. This game is hard to review, because emotions and reason will clash a lot. First released for the latest generation of consoles in 2022, with versions for the last generations coming out the following year, Marvel’s Midnight Suns is a tactical RPG from the makers of the Civilization franchise, Firaxis Games. With a cast of 13 playable characters and 4 additional ones introduced via DLC with their own story missions, this has the charisma of anything stamped by the Marvel brand, and tactical games are not the most common genre out there, so fans like myself may tend to overlook flaws and appreciate new titles regardless, but this game is rough. Let’s get to it.
The good
There are positives and negatives. Off the bat, let me say this: I played this game for 90 hours. I purchased all DLC and played through all of them as well, and got the platinum trophy. I love tactical games, and, at its tactical core, this game is totally enjoyable. There is an original character called the Hunter, and you’ll be playing as him/her in main missions and when exploring outside of missions. But lots of big names in the Marvel canon are there too, as well as some less well-known ones. The base game includes Iron Man, Doctor Strange, Captain Marvel, Blade, Nico Minoru, Magik, Ghost Rider, Spider-Man, Captain America, Wolverine, Scarlet Witch and Hulk. Deadpool, Morbius, Venom and Storm are DLC exclusive.
The voice acting is extraordinary. Really superb. Josh Keaton voices Iron Man and I could not get enough of him. Iron Man can be hard to pull off, because being inherently arrogant, he can come across as simply unlikeable – which contradicts the fact he should have charisma to spare. But the voice work here is flawless. Even at his lowest points, I found myself rooting for him, excusing his mistakes and cracking up at his jokes. There are other big names as well. Spider-Man is voiced by the same actor who plays him in the lauded Insomnia games, Yuri Lowenthal, and Nico Minoru is voiced by the Lyrica Okano, reprising the role from the MCU. No stiff lifeless characters here, everyone is doing a top notch job.
Combat borrows a lot of inspiration from indie game Slay the Spire. Most of your actions are defined by a deck of cards (there are cards for attacking enemies, or shielding allies, or drawing more cards, and so on). You can bring three characters to a mission, and each character can have a maximum of 8 cards in their active deck, so even though they have more possible moves than that, you will have to choose which ones to bring to battle. During combat, cards will be drawn and you will have to strategically choose which ones to use. Some cost power, some restore it, so that’s a sort of in-battle currency you will be managing. It’s a bit like Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories, but turn-based. Or it’s a bit like Final Fantasy Tactics, but with cards. You kind of have to see it. Trust me that it works. It is what kept me going for almost 100 hours. And the humour. The humour is superb, especially Iron Man’s and Magik’s.
The bad
The game looks like it came out 10 years ago. The character models are rough. The environments probably even more so. Graphics aren’t always the most important aspect of a game, but this stands out. Worse than that is exploration. In between missions, you are given free roam of the Abbey, where the team is based, and its surroundings. There are side quests to be done which give out major lore, but you need endurance. Navigating the Abbey is awful. Almost all areas outside the building you’re staying in look pretty nondescript and identical. The map is horrible to navigate, the minimap is nearly useless. There are areas you need to unlock abilities to access, but they are hard to spot sometimes, and even harder to find again if you happened upon them before you had the necessary power. There are collectibles scattered in this world, but most of them add nothing, are tricky to see and will require a guide. The game could have benefited from this element not being in it at all.
Then there are the bugs. My oh my. They have patched a lot of them, but I encountered more than would be acceptable. The DLC are particularly bad for introducing them. New Game+ too. Combined, they are a mess. There is a particularly common bug that is campaign ending for the DLC quests. Thankfully there are constant auto saves that don’t overwrite one another, so when I ran into it, I was able to brute force my out of it by trail and error, and repeating a long quest a few times. It is really unforgiveable, games deemed ready to launch should never have this many problems.
The verdict
The things Marvel’s Midnight Suns does well it does very well. Firaxis is versed in tactical games, so it is no surprise this title’s strengths are in the tactical gameplay. But its shortcomings are very hard to ignore. Is this an overall good game, or will people who like this type of game excuse any flaws? I don’t know, but a game that kept me hooked for 90 hours has undeniable evidence of success. There is also great value in featuring the big celebrities of the MCU and some deep cut characters as well, it keeps things fresh. Playing this has made me want to revisit other tactical games and try some that have been on my list and I’ve never tried. I believe if you go into it prepared to face technical difficulties and to focus on the core gameplay, this can be a worthy addition to your library.
