Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 for the Nintendo Switch serves up an original story tasking you to create your dream team of superheroes, including new additions The Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain Marvel, Scarlet Witch, and more, as they face off against Thanos and The Black Order.

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 is a more-than-solid release that will interest most Switch owners. While some fans of the original games might have gripes, it's still likely to be a solid choice.

Hardcore Marvel fans will find a lot to love in Ultimate Alliance 3, straddling as it does the many eras of Marvel's history so well. For everyone else, Ultimate Alliance 3 is an entertaining and extremely fun game that is best experienced with others.

When Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 released in 2009 we were just two movies into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with only Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk. The status of the superhero genre has transformed radically since then with 21 more Marvel movies, over 10 Marvel TV shows, and an absolutely obscene amount of promotion and products.

A couple of stripped back features aside, Marvel Ultimate Alliance is a great series revival that should keep new and old fans busy for quite a while. With DLC coming later this year, it will only get better.

In yet another take on the Infinity Stone saga, Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order is a fun and irreverent comic book story that pulls from an exceptionally wide pool of Marvel material. Its combat systems are fairly simple, but they were still surprisingly engaging as I excitedly experimented with different hero combinations while my roster of A, B, and C-list characters grew. Its vast array of post-game upgrades and other extras has been uninteresting so far, and there are (unsurprisingly) some inherited camera issues in co-op, but this superhero brawler is still a treat to play alo...

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order lets players hop into a galactic battle against Thanos. For a Marvel fan who enjoys RPG mechanics this is a fun buy, especially with others to play with. Some spotty online moments but well worth the fun.

“Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 is delicious fan service, but it’s also shallow and repetitive.”

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 is an acceptable, albeit dull game that’s only held together by the diverse Marvel universe. It’s enjoyable when played cooperatively, but that’s an excuse that can be used for any title. The problem lies in the archaic and stale combat scenarios that take us room to room with little variety until you get to the more mechanically-challenging bosses. At least there's a large roster to pick through, each with their own unique and entertaining combat skills that’s an over-the-top romp when mashed together. It’s a shame that the story moves too quickly, trying to hit eve...

After a decade, a new alliance is here.

Shallow, stupid, and very repetitive but as long as you play with friends there’s a goofy charm to what is, for better or worse, the best Marvel team-up game in a long while.

However, strong post-launch support like this only really matters if the game itself is worth playing, and we can't really say that about Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3. At its best, the game is a mediocre brawler, and at its worst, it is an incoherent mess with a nightmare camera, frustrating battles, and ugly graphics. Anyone hoping for a return to form for the franchise will be disappointed, to say the least.