Marvel Ultimate Alliance Interview

Nov 1, 2006

We still can't believe how many Marvel characters are in the upcoming Marvel Ultimate Alliance from Activision. We're not sure how it got the license to so many stars of the comic book world, but it probably involved a pile of cash bigger than Australia's GDP.

With the game on shelves across the nation, between bouts of smashing Magneto's minions we thought you'd like to read an interview with Dan Vondrak, Project Lead on the game over at Raven Software.

IGN AU: Of all the characters in the Marvel Universe, how did you go about narrowing down the list to the included 140? And how did you decide which ones should be playable?

Dan Vondrak: Ahh, the characters, starting with the big question first. This was easily one of the most challenging aspects of the game design. There was a huge meeting with Marvel, Raven and Activision to come up with a big wish list of playable characters. It was easy to come up with the first 12-14 heroes, everyone agreed on those. The next group was really tough though. There was a lot of fighting; we were switching a few characters around until a few months before release. We took a mix of more mass-market heroes, ones in movies or popular cartoons, and mixed them with slightly lesser known true comic book favorites. Luke Cage was one Marvel really wanted to see in, and I was surprised to see the huge fan reaction to him being in.

Then there were the 100 plus NPCs and villains - that took a long time. The story determined a lot of them, the rest is where we really geeked out. With so many characters everyone could get their favorites in, even if they were kind of obscure. It was a lot of fun to have the whole Marvel Universe open to you and actually get them in the game.

IGN AU: Are there any characters that you wanted to include but couldn't (for whatever reason)?

Dan Vondrak: Too many to list, really. A big one from the playable list was the Punisher, but there were licensing issues with that. We also considered Gambit and Psylocke for a long time, but we already had four X-men and wanted to have a diverse group of heroes.

IGN AU: Can you discuss how the special comic book missions are accessed during the game? Are they inserted into the main storyline, or are they separate?

Dan Vondrak: You find comic mission discs throughout the levels. When you find them you're given the option to play them right there and return to that spot when you're done, or you can replay them anytime you want from one of the headquarter levels. They are not part of the main story; instead they highlight background info on each hero or villain. What's a blast for the comic missions is playing co-op. Since there's only a single hero in most comic mission, your friends can control the enemies and have access to all their fight moves and powers and you can beat each other up.

IGN AU: How difficult was it translating the attacks into a performable in-game action?

Dan Vondrak: Depends on the power. Some went in pretty easy, others like Spider-Man's web swinging took a while to get right. Marvel was great about letting us bend the rules a bit if it made the powers cooler in game. Like the ability to control Captain America's shield as it flies through the world. It was so much fun coming up with lists of powers. Truthfully the really hard part was cutting out some of the more bizarre ideas in favor of attacks that would be more useful.

IGN AU: Was it tricky to keep a fine balance between each mutant's abilities?

Dan Vondrak: Yes, we were balancing up until the very end. Really, you could continually balance a game of this size for another year. Not only does each character have powers, stats, and equipment - but each character has four different outfits that each has its own set of attributes you can upgrade. So you can play as Ultimate Captain America, WW2 Cap, classic Spider-Man, or the Symbiote (Black Suit) Spider-Man. It's a ton of fun changing costumes and having it mean something. On top of all this we had to strike that balance between making sure each hero feels powerful, but not make the game super easy.

IGN AU: Are there any subtle details that a die-hard Marvel freak should keep their eyes open for?

Dan Vondrak: Our in-house writer, Bob Love, packed in so many special conversations in the game for each of the characters, it's fun just to play as different characters and see what they say to each other. Oh and make sure you talk to everyone in the headquarter levels, there's a secondary story happening throughout the game that you get little hints about. And make sure after you beat the game to be patient all the way through the entire credits.

IGN AU: Can you tell us about your favorite stage in the game? How about the boss battles?

Dan Vondrak: Murder World, hands down is my favorite mission. We kept adding levels to this and taking away from other levels in the game. There's a giant pinball level, a great opening level that I won't ruin by telling you about, and of course Pitfall! You actually get to play Pitfall with the Marvel Super Heroes.

Boss Battles, that's tough... Galactus edges out the battle with Dr. Doom slightly. There's such a moment of fear as he's coming towards you crushing catwalks and buildings along the way, you really have to keep moving so he doesn't catch you. Then Silver Surfer comes in to help you out, too cool.

IGN AU: Do you have any plans for Xbox Live downloadable content? What might be included?

Dan Vondrak: I can't comment too much on this, we're still trying to work out the details and what is possible.

IGN AU: How many alternate endings are in the final game? How do your actions determine which ending you see?

Dan Vondrak: At the end of the game, the player is treated to an epilogue, basically a series of cut scenes that show you how certain critical decisions during the game had a ripple affect on the Marvel Universe. One example is Atlantis, depending on if you help Namor on a certain quest or not, you'll determine which side the Atlanteans ultimately choose and what happened as a result.

IGN AU: How much of a bitch was it to get 4 player co-op running on XBL? Will this need a super fast Net connection to run?

Dan Vondrak: Ha ha, the tech guys did an amazing job with the online play. A good connection always helps, but truthfully you don't need a blazingly fast connection at all. If you've got 4 players with really bad connections, it will certainly perform worse. But the average connection runs really well. We had all sorts of QA tests with people playing the game from home on a standard connection and it worked well.

IGN AU: What did the Xbox 360's increased power allow you to do in terms of gameplay, rather than just graphical sheen?

Dan Vondrak: Our efforts were focused almost entirely on shaders, physics, high poly characters and models. Because we were developing on all platforms at once, we couldn't dedicate brand new game modes to each platform. Instead we made sure to concentrate on things like achievements for the 360, SIXAXIS controller support for PS3 and of course the Wii-mote and Nunchuck support for Wii. The control stuff turned out great, it was a lot tougher than you might think.

Oh and before this ends, I've got to tell you about my favorite part of the game - Arcade Mode! This is the standard 2-4 player coop story mode that takes you from start to end playing with your buddies. Only now you can make it competitive with Arcade Mode. In normal coop health, energy, experience, etc. is shared among the team. In Arcade mode it's every man for himself. And we keep track of the damage you did, kills you made, all sorts of categories and give you points for it. Whoever has the most points at the end of a level wins the level and gains bonus rewards. It's an awesome way to play. Instead of arguing over who kicked the most butt, you can see it tally up and prove who played the best. You've got to love bragging rights!