Marvel Cosmic Invasion: One of the Best Beat’em Ups

Marvel’s Cosmic Invasion beat’em up is finally here! The game was released on several consoles as well as the PC. I’ll be playing the version on Xbox Game Pass.

This is one of the games I’ve been looking forward to. The trailers looked great, and this is a style of game that I love. I missed out on a bunch of the arcade beat’em ups in the 1990s, so I’m glad the genre is still going.

Cosmic Invasion is one of the longer beat’em ups that have become the standard. It is a lot different from the shorter arcade games from the 1990s. This is a beautiful looking game, and I’m really looking forward to playing it.

TLDR: Beautiful Graphics, Great Gameplay, and a Fun Story.

Narrative

The story is pretty good. It feels like a comic book, which is what you would want from a game like this. It isn’t too different from a storyline used in comics a while back.

Annialus has invaded the Marvel Universe, and you have to fight them off. They seem to have taken control of a few other villains. They have Advanced Ideas and Mechanics (AIM) as well as some Sentinel robots on their side. It is a nice touch as it brings in some of the other characters.

There are a number of subplots in this game. They’re all tied to the main plot, and revolve around someone being controlled by Annialus. This makes for some cool matchups. I wonder how many of these scenes have happened in the comics? Like Galactus destroying Asgard.

Overall, the plot isn’t too deep, but it gets the job done. I wasn’t hoping for anything amazing here. The story starts on Earth, then goes to space, and finally to the Negative Zone. It delivers on what you should expect.

Gameplay

The gameplay is wonderful, but it can get a little repetitive. This is a problem for most games in this genre. You do have to use more strategy than in other games, and this one has more features. I really like the little tag-team mechanics in the game.

There are a lot of characters to choose from in this game. Here is the roster:

• Captain America
• Black Panther
• She Hulk
• Rocket Racoon
• Spider-Man
• Wolverine
• Storm
• Cosmic Ghost Rider
• Nova
• Iron Man
• Beta Ray Bill
• Pheonix (Locked)
• Fila Vell (Locked)
• Venom (Locked)
• Silver Surfer (Locked)

Four characters need to be unlocked. I think all of them were revealed in the months since the game was announced. This is kind of cool, but I would like it if they were all available, and there were some other characters to unlock.

Your characters gain experience at the end of each stage. It is a nice addition to a beat’em up like this. As they game levels, they get upgrades. This reminds me of the Capcom beat’em ups like King of Dragons and Knights of the Round.

Like many of these modern beat’em ups, there are two play options. You can play a standard arcade version or a campaign mode. I never thought I would play a beat’em up with a save option. Most of these games were 30 minutes to an hour when I was little.

I really liked the tag team mechanic. It made things more fun, and it is cool to create different matchups. While I did have my favorites, experimenting with different teams is a lot of fun.

Overall, I love the gameplay. Beat’em ups are some of my favorite games, and this is an excellent one. The gameplay is awesome! There is some variety to it, and Cosmic Invasion feels like an arcade game.

Visuals

I love the look of this game. Cosmic Invasion uses modern pixel graphics, and it looks really good! I love how each characters look, and the stages are great looking. This is a beautiful game.

While the levels aren’t long, there are a lot of them, and they look great. There is quite a bit of variety in how each level looks. It is easy to see what can be destroyed, and I like how the power-ups are food. The health items remind me of other beat’em ups from the 1990s. When your character stops dead in their tracks to eat a pizza or a burger.

The superheroes look great. I love how some of them look more than others. Particularly, I love how She Hulk, Beta Ray Bill, and Fila Vell look. I just like those character sprites more than the others.

There is some repetition with the enemy sprites. This is something you see in most beat’em ups. The developers will change the color of a sprite to make it look like you’re fighting a stronger enemy. I don’t mind this, especially in a game like this. It is trying to recreate the feeling of an arcade game, and I think it does that.

The cutscenes between stages aren’t anything to write home about. They’re mostly still images of the characters. Some text at the bottom of the screen advances the plot. It looks like something from an arcade or console game. This is an area I would’ve liked to see something more than what was presented.

Overall, I love the game’s graphics. It looks like the games from the 1990s. This look might not be for everyone, but I enjoy it. Cosmic Invasion looks like it would fit right in with the other Marvel beat’em ups.

8.5/10. This is one of the better games I’ve played this year. Marvel Cosmic Invasion delivered on what I was hoping for. It is also cool that these games offer online play. It is a big step up from hoping that other people had the money to play with you back in the day. The graphics are beautiful, the gameplay is great, and it is an incredibly fun game.

Pros

• Beautiful Graphics
• Great Controls
• Awesome tag-team moves
• Spectacular roster

Cons

• Can get Repetitive
• A Little longer than I would like

Conclusion

This game reminds me of the Konami and Sega beat’em ups from the 1990s. There were several great Marvel-themed beat’em ups during that time. The big one is X-Men, but I really liked the Spider-Man beat’em up with its weird lineup.

If I had to rank the Marvel beat’em ups that I’ve played, this would be Cosmic Invasion would be second. Here is a quick list:

• X-Men
• Marvel Cosmic Invasion
• Spider-Man
• Captain America and the Avengers
• The Punisher

There might be some others that I haven’t played. If there are, please let me know so I can try them out. Most of these games I’ve only played on the home console. I played X-Men and Spider-Man in an arcade.

This is an excellent beat’em up. This one is a little better than Shredder’s Revenge. Up until this point, that was the best modern beat’em up that I’ve played. At some point, I’ll have to do a list of those games, but I’ll have to play more of them first.

If you liked this post, please check out my other beat’em up posts, such as Captain America and the Avengers or SNES Beat’em Ups.