Square Enix and Marvel have just announced that they are joining for a multi-game partnership. This partnership will kick off with The Avengers Project, for which they released a trailer. Crystal Dynamics will be working with Edios Montreal to bring The Avengers Project (obviously a working title) to consoles.

There are few other details besides the announced partnership and the brief teaser trailer. The deal seems to be pretty big, as the announcement stated:

The Avengers project is being designed for gamers worldwide and will be packed with all the characters, environments, and iconic moments that have thrilled longtime fans of the franchise. Featuring a completely original story, it will introduce a universe gamers can play in for years to come.

According to that, gamers will have a lot of titles to look forward to in the coming years! Marvel is obviously interested in getting back into the console space after their success on mobile, and they want to do it with a bang.

Video Source – J Smitty

From here on out will be my opinions on the announcement and trailer. From the trailer, I think it is safe to make a few assumptions. We can see that the Avengers have split up. Whether that is willingly or not is not explicitly stated. However, the narrator talks about the “time of heroes” being over, and that those with powers are feared. This implies that they were forcefully disband, presumably by some governmental body.

This would follow the basic storyline of the movies. In Captain America: Civil War, the Sokovia Accords tore the Avengers apart by forcing governmental regulation on them. This regulation meant that they could not act on their own (or anywhere near as quickly). Some of the Avengers were for this, but it did not sit well with others. In the end, the Avengers were split down the middle and fell apart.

In the trailer Thor’s hammer, Iron Man’s arm (from the suit), and Captain America’s shield are all shown amongst rubble and debris. My guess would be that it is from the Avengers fighting amongst themselves, but one could speculate that this was the result of a battle with a super villain. However, I find it unlikely that a villain would have forced the Avengers apart in this case. If this was the case, I would expect the people to not be afraid of the Avengers, as is stated in the trailer, but to look to them for help.

I can envision a scenario where the government could have stepped in and saved the day after the Avengers weakened the villain, but I doubt this will be the case. There is a possibility though, so we cannot rule it out.

Now on to the developer reveal: it was shown in the trailer that Crystal Dynamics will be collaborating with Edios Montreal to develop The Avengers Project. I am actually somewhat disappointed by this. I know that I will be in the minority by saying this, but I am not a huge fan of the Tomb Raider games that they have rebooted.

To me, they have always felt like a cheaper, knock-off version of Uncharted. Everything that they do (story-wise, that is) feels just a little off the mark. I have never been able to get into the games because of this aspect. The world just does not feel right to me.

Now, do not get me wrong here; the gameplay in the Tomb Raider reboot games is amazing. Very fluid and fun combat with an awesome progression and upgrade system. This is why I am still optimistic for The Avengers Project. I am holding out hope that they will be able to do more with the story because it is in a universe as rich and expansive as Marvel’s.

Gameplay-wise, I am not too worried. Crystal will probably put their well refined RPG mechanics into this game, and that is very exciting. I would, personally, love to play a super hero game with RPG elements and upgrading trees as refined as Crystal’s. Crystal Dynamic’s gameplay has never been under question, but I do hope they do more with the story than in Tomb Raider.

Now, I want to be clear: I am in no way anywhere even close to writing this game off. Quite the contrary, in fact. I am very cautiously optimistic for The Avengers Project, and all of the other up coming games. We have only seen a brief teaser trailer, so it is important to not get overhyped this early on. That being said, this is a very exciting announcement, so stay tuned to GameTradersUSA for more information as it comes!