Lilith, Mother of Demons, as portrayed in Ghost Rider vol. 2 # 28 in Aug. 1992.
The next game from Firaxis XCOM group is set in an unknown corner of the Marvel Comics universe. Entitled Marvels Midnight Suns, advancement of the turn-based role-playing video game is led by Jake Solomon, designer of XCOM: Enemy Unknown and XCOM 2.
The big draw here are the antiheroes and heroes, much of whom have actually never ever worked together before in any previous Marvel storyline. Firaxis confirmed that Iron Man, Captain America, Captain Marvel, Doctor Strange, Blade, Nico Minoru, Magik, Robbie Reyes as Ghost Rider, and Wolverine will all be playable. There will be a total of 13 allied heroes in all, drawn from the Avengers, X-Men, Runaways, and beyond.
Exposed Wednesday at Gamescom 2021, publisher 2K Games prepares to bring Marvels Midnight Suns to Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows PC (through Steam and the Epic Game Store), Xbox One, and Xbox Series X in March 2022.
Polygon took a seat with Solomon ahead of time for more information about the enthusiastic brand-new game.
Image: Howard Mackie, Andy Kubert, and Joe Kubert/Marvel Comics
Players will embark on turn-based objectives with 3 other superheroes. They and their compatriots abilities will level up and enhance with time. How those abilities are advanced is perhaps the most significant departure from the XCOM franchise. In in between objectives, players will have free rein to check out The Abbey, an all-new headquarters location designed in partnership with Marvel Comics, and its grounds. Solomon stated players will explore it in third individual, utilizing their time to develop relationships with the other superheroes.
” Robbie Reyes, the new Ghost Rider– he may desire to play video games. Captain Marvel might desire to go spar with you. Tony Stark might want to go play cards,” Solomon said.
As the recently reanimated Hunter, gamers are the only ones capable of stopping Lilith and her minions from damaging the world. However, while the stakes are high, the video game will not include permadeath– yet another departure from the classic XCOM formula.
The Rise of the Midnight Sons arc began in 1992 with a series of Ghost Rider comics. In it, a rogues gallery of anti-heroes, including Dr. Strange, Frank Drake, Morbius, Jonny Blaze, and Blade, must come together in order to stop Lilith, Mother of Demons, from taking control of the world. Solomon told Polygon its his favorite arc from that period of Marvel Comics history, however the video game itself wasnt truly his concept.
” It was Marvel that reached out to us after we made XCOM 2,” Solomon said. Away, they comprehended the kind of games we make.”
During the course of the video games design, Solomon said that his group had to discard most everything that had come in the past.
” There are no mechanics shared in between XCOM and the Midnight Suns,” Solomon said.
In Marvels Midnight Suns, gamers will handle the function of The Hunter, a brand new character designed in collaboration with Marvel Comics The Hunter exists to stand in for the gamer, and will be extremely personalized in both look and fight capability. Solomon said that there are over 40 various superpowers available to the gamer across a wide spectrum– from light (matching the most conventional of the superheroes in the video game, like Iron Man and Captain America) to dark (mirroring more occult anti-heroes such as Ghost Rider and Blade).
Image: Firaxis Games/Marvel Comics.
Image: Firaxis Games/Marvel Comics
Image: Firaxis Games/Marvel Comics
Image: Firaxis Games/Marvel Comics
“The dream in XCOM is the fantasy of soldiers holding on for dear life against an exceptional enemy. And in Midnight Suns extremely, really rapidly– early on– I recognized that the exceptional enemy in this game is the superheroes.
Focusing fire in order to remove a single effective opponent was essential to dominating the puzzle-like objectives in XCOM and XCOM 2. This time around, gamers will be removing multiple enemies at a time with effective attacks that have a much larger effect and range than conventional plasma or laser weaponry. Solomon said players will also be engaging more with the environment, leaping off automobiles, pulling down light poles, and kicking things all the way throughout the map.
” Youre doing these large relocations, these epic relocations, therefore the mechanics are just entirely different,” Solomon said, “which leads to you still scratching the same itch, due to the fact that it is turn-based techniques fight where youre managing the group. However the fantasy is very various. Which means the mechanics are 100% various.”
Solomon stated that high-flying design of fight wasnt initially in the video game. When refactoring the gameplay, his group spent lots of time hacking together their own tabletop game with a selection of collectible HeroClix figures in between them.
” That was surprising and scary in the start,” Solomon stated, “to realize like, Oh man, weve got ta do an entire various game. However its cool, since it provides you this different feel than XCOM, for sure.”
Todays statement was accompanied by an intricate CGI trailer. Firaxis plans to show gameplay for the first time on Sept. 1.
Solomon informed Polygon its his favorite arc from that period of Marvel Comics history, but the game itself wasnt truly his concept.
Solomon said that there are over 40 various superpowers available to the player across a wide spectrum– from light (mirroring the most standard of the superheroes in the game, like Iron Man and Captain America) to dark (mirroring more occult anti-heroes such as Ghost Rider and Blade).
And in Midnight Suns really, very rapidly– early on– I recognized that the remarkable enemy in this game is the superheroes. Solomon stated that high-flying design of combat wasnt initially in the video game. When refactoring the gameplay, his team spent lots of time hacking together their own tabletop video game with an assortment of collectible HeroClix figures in between them.