Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects Review

Character Lineup

Easily the biggest disappointment with Marvel Nemesis is in the character roster itself. Rather than filling the lineup with Marvel heavy hitters, we instead get a handful of heroes we actually want to play as (Spider-Man, Wolverine, Venom, Iron Man, Magneto, and Storm among others) along with a bunch of new characters designed by EA called The Imperfects. Now, I’ll admit, these new characters blend in with the Marvel group pretty well and if you aren’t a big comic book fan you probably wouldn’t even realize these were completely new characters, but if you are a comic fan the addition of these characters is a major turn off. We get these lame no names instead of characters we would actually want to play as (such as The Hulk, The Punisher, and Captain America who are all killed off in the opening cinema sequence). What should have been the best part of Marvel Nemesis is easily its weakest aspect which is absolutely ridiculous when you consider the incredible cast of Marvel characters there is to choose from.

Online Play

Once you get tired of beating up mindless AI opponents, you can also take Marvel Nemesis online and duke it out. Playing against real people is considerably more fun than the single player game, but the limitations of the fighting mechanics are even more apparent here so the thrill of playing online fades pretty quickly. When you only have a limited number of moves at your disposal to begin with and everyone playing knows how to perform all of the moves (unlike other fighters where skill and training is required to use more difficult moves) it just isn’t all that fun. A lot of fights just devolve into projectile throwing slugfests which isn’t too hot either. To its credit, the game runs smoothly online and jumping into a fight is nice and easy, but it won’t take very many fights before you log off this one for good.

Graphics and Sound

Easily the best parts of Marvel Nemesis are the graphics and overall presentation. The game is darker and edgier than the way you have seen most of these characters in the past and the new look works incredibly well. Simply put, I absolutely love the art style used in this game. Character models are very detailed and smoothly animated and they just look great overall. The environments aren’t quite as sharp, but look very nice as well. Special effects for the super powers and a healthy dose of fancy lighting effects round out the visual smorgasbord and really make everything look good.

The sound is also very well done. The music is well matched to the action and fits the dark feel of the game. There is also a lot of spoken dialogue and the voice work is very high quality.

Overall, Marvel Nemesis is a great looking and sounding game. It is just too bad the same level of polish wasn’t applied to the parts that matter – like the gameplay.

Bottom Line

We have seen a lot of really great comic book games lately which makes Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imprefects look pretty bad by comparison. The roster and implementation of their superpowers leaves quite a bit to be desired and the fighting engine is simplistic and a disappointment overall. In other words, Marvel and comic book fans won’t like it much and fighting game fans won’t like it either. If you are looking for a new superhero game, give Marvel vs. Capcom 2, Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, or X-Men Legends II a try instead. Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects is a rental at best, but serious comic book fans can skip it completely.