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| Gaz Adds a Little Mischief, and A Lot of Fun, in 2.0 |
Some months ago, I did a review of Marvel Heroes. I had been a Beta tester for said game since October of last year and the game had thoroughly impressed me. I am pleased to say that, since that review, Gazillion, being as amazingly responsive to community suggestion as ever and showing their own imagination, has continued to make the game better with each update.
The splinter system for unlocking heroes I mentioned in my review, has now been live for some time. It allows players to save up a currency to buy specific heroes or buy a random box to gamble on getting a new hero. Human Torch, Emma Frost, Luke Cage, and Squirrel Girl were all added as playable after I wrote that review. There have also been dozens of adjustments to quality of life elements and hero powers. Plus new elements, like unique items (they named one after yours truly), team insignias (a type of equip), and the Midtown Manhattan area (random way to level if you are burnt out on story).
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Today, patch 2.0 of Marvel Heroes will go live. This patch is the first of four that will feature Asgardian story content (obvious tie-in with the new Thor movie, cannot wait to see what Gaz does next summer). Among the content is, just surprisingly announced about a week or so ago, a new playable... character, Loki! Loki's default costume will be based on the new Thor movie, but he will have a purchasable costume that is truer to his comic book appearance (no, Hiddleston didn't do the voice acting, they got Crispin Freeman, but he's a veteran voice-actor, so not bad). The patch will also add two new areas, a Fjords of Norway area that can be traveled to if you have beaten Doctor Doom on any difficulty. That area will have, in addition to mobs to fight, events, and side treasure rooms, an area with Reed Richards. Reed will be accepting donations of all types of items. There are set goals for each item type, and when all those goals have been met, he will be able to open the portal to Asgard. This is, essentially, gonna be a game-wide unlock event, and the top 500 donors will be listed for future players to see once the event has finished.
The Asgard area was unlocked on Test Center, and it will also feature some new playable content, with more presumably to come in the three remaining Asgard patches. Among other things, Asgard includes a new playable hub of Odin's Palace. This hub has all the typical vendors, but you will also be able to purchase a new type of equipment called a legendary item. These items, which are bought with currency earned from doing legendary quests, can actually level up and become more powerful as they are used. The patch will also add two more artifact slots and a new slot for a ring. Rings are found as drops of different rarities (green, blue, purple) and are basically just equippable sets of different helpful stats.
On Test Center, they had made an adjustment to one of Rocket Raccoon's staple powers, Tactical Destruction. The change they made unintentionally nerfed the power rather hard. One of the developers, Xeneth, went to fix that issue and decided, while doing it, why not give Rocket Raccoon a bunch of quick buffs, which he did (awesome). Some of his powers are now quicker and more powerful... and Groot unlocks at level 10 (instead of 30)! This should help one of the main issues some had with Rocket, that he felt a bit dull to level at low levels. And, speaking of Groot, he finally is receiving a proper voice-over in this patch. When he is summoned, he exclaims "I am Groot!" (Cool, I know). And, speaking of Rocket, he still has an upcoming full review and rework, which I expect will make him even better (since he is considered by the min/max-ing crew as one of the weaker heroes, like I care. He is a blast to play, in my opinion)
If you tried Marvel Heroes out earlier this year and thought it was just ok or meh, maybe give it a second look, when the patch goes live later today. And, if you haven't tried it yet, go to marvelheroes.com, register, and download. It is free-to-play (and awesome).
(Also, a brief mention of future plans. Gambit will be added later this month, a new Bronx Zoo area is planned. Ghost Rider and Nightcrawler are both expected next, the former definitely within the year, the latter possibly so. After them, Moon Knight and Doctor Strange are both planned. And, as I've mentioned Peter Quill and Gamora will be added at some point, as Guardians reps, in the future.)
Until next time, this is the Raccoonatic Commander, signing out.