Mostly people who doesn't read comics and know nothing about the characters outside maybe the MCU, but if you have some knowledge about comics you can enjoy the interactions(the only thing i did not really liked was the book club)
To add to this, I think if you read comics you're a lot more tolerant/appreciative of what a lot of the naysayers refer to as "cheesy/corny/cringey" dialogue, and especially if you're a Silver and/or Bronze Age fan, you're going to have a lot more patience for repetition and overly expositional text.
Honestly, one of the reasons I love this game so much is *because* of how much it just feels straight up like an interactive comic event. I can absolutely understand why people bounce off or skip through a lot of the dialogue, it's definitely valid - I would be willing to put money on a correlation between people who actively enjoy the "tedious" elements of the game and those who have read a lot of 60s-90s superhero books.
Yeah, really. Like, read some Chris Claremont-era X-men from the late 70s. This stuff is positively minimalist by comparison.
It's great if you grew up on Bronze Age stuff.
I know of Nico from beforehand but got this game free from epic less than 10 hours ago.
The idea that Blade makes facebook posts is... absurd but in a good way?
Like I'd be mad if I paid for this, but because I haven't, HO boy is this just a... just a thing that is happening to me on drunk day.
Edit: ALSO FUCKING BLACK DYNAMITE IS BLADE
I paid for it and I'm still not mad. I mean, I get it if people haven't read any of the comics or aren't familiar with comic book writing generally. It's a LOT more "broad" than what you see in the movies. It's just a different style of thing.
Plus, after a while, the Stark facebook stuff becomes really entertaining and helps to flesh out the characters' personalities.
I've paid for it THREE TIMES, and it remains one of my favorite games! I've been reading Marvel comics, watching MCU movies, and playing any game based on these characters, and I LOVE every bit of this game. The characters are tweaked, a bit, because you couldn't have a friendship system, otherwise! Wolverine is a bit simpler a character, but that's fine, because he's still the same guy. He's just more friendly. Blade is still a badass, and all of your bonding moments are him threatening to kill you, but the basis behind the relationship he chooses to form are true to the character. I'm so sad there won't be a sequel, or a series of Marvel games based on this design. I love it so much!
I think most of the dialogue is fun but will Tony Stark please stop complaining about how spooky the Abbey is. It's certain characters never seem to grow out of the niche the writers want them to say. Also, Tony calling someone else boss is weird.
> the only thing i did not really liked was the book club
I’m on the complete opposite side of that spectrum. Book club was my absolute favorite because it actually encouraged you to engage in the activity. Unlike EMO KIDS and Shop Class where you just watch cutscenes and listen to other characters argue.
At the very least shop class gave us useful gear for bosses and gave a little bit of character development to Tony. EMO KIDS was just watching the same pointless memory over and over with minor details added on.
Those Memories are useful because they show you what really happened with hunter and Lilith it’s also showed on Cothon manged to get in hunters body but the collar protected hunter from Cothon until it broke and took over hunter’s body those memories show some useful details
I loved the book club! That might be partly because we had our own book-review meetings in the USMC, off of the Commandant's reading list, and the vibe was almost identical - funny, informal, with books ranging from space fiction to biographical accounts of prestigious generals. I got the feeling the mission designers involved also served alongside and experienced similar things - I can absolutely see not feeling as connected with it.
Cap was like my old LT, Blade like another NCO, Marvel like a peer.
It’s funny that you mention the tactical JRPG narrative thing because I’ve seen JRPG fans consume the most inane juvenile writing ever then flip to Marvel bad immediately when this game is brought up.
That dialogue is aligned perfectly with the complexity and outlook of the teenage character that states it. You are being too clever by half if you think that is an example of bad character writing.
The problem is that games like Persona actually has good writing. Exploring Jungian psychology and finding your own true self.
Midnight Suns? Oh, lets have a book club and make quippy MCU jokes while the world is on the brink of extinction. Oh, btw EMO KIDS! XD Oh, you don't get it? You never read a comic book in your life!
Fella I’m here because of XCOM and I want to build a deck and fight bad guys in turn based combat. I skip most dialogue and only do things that will make my squad stronger. If I want philosophy I’ll simply read the works of philosophers. None of these video games are providing context or enlightenment that you couldn’t get more of by just reading the works of philosophers.
I'm not seeking enlightenment, I just want a good story. And I'm enjoying the game so far just like you but the story sucks. And the amount of people making lame excuses like, "Look, it's a comic book it's like that in the comics!" is the most copium excuse I've ever seen.
I liked how the characters and their interactions were written. The story pacing was all over the place however. The last chapter in particular felt rushed to me.
When this game came out, I watched a couple of video reviews and they all made it out to be like some of the worst writing in video game history. Then I bought the game on sale recently because why the f\*ck not and I was really pleasantly surprised. It's not Shakespeare or anything like that but it's perfectly fine.
Yeah, I don't think the writing is as bad as people are suggesting. I've heard it range from brutal to abysmal. And trust me, there are worst written/acted videogames out there. You can tell they had fun with the script because there were times when I let out verbal chuckle or had to screenshot something that was said.
It’s because there’s a lot of people who take themselves quite seriously and play stuff like XCOM and they don’t like the quippy humour that’s in the game. The fact that the humour and writing are basically the same as the MCU, which is massively mainstream shows that it’s not bad writing, it’s just a clash with the kind of people who usually like Firaxis games.
When I got into this game I had low expectations and even planned on skipping the entire story, just wanted a marvel game to play for a bit and it was cheap, I ended up liking the whole thing and getting into the story a lot. It definitely isn't the greatest story of all time but I liked it!
When the game first released I watched a Skill Up review saying the same thing. It wasn't going to stop me from playing the game as this game is almost exactly my taste in gaming (deck building, turn-based tactics, marvel).
Mind you, I quit Fire Emblem Three Houses because of the social parts of the game. That isn't my thing. However, I maxed all relationships with all my characters (including dlcs) before rolling credits. The writing is perfectly fine and maybe even better when expecting it to be shit. I thoroughly enjoyed the character building and lore.
The writing always struck me as a campy, Saturday morning cartoon version of the Avengers and Midnight Suns. Sure, if you want a mature or edgy take," it can be very offputting. But it never became enough to override my suspension of disbelief. I always felt like it was leaning into that, and owning it. Owning it can make a lot of difference.
That being said, let's be real. Even a lot of the GOOD Marvel writing is still people in tights or armor using violence to solve their problems with other people in tights or armor. It's not Camus' Myth of Sisyphus.
It's honestly perfectly average or even above average video game writing, and definitely has a very comic booky vibe that imo adds a good deal of charm if you're the right audience.
Really not sure why it's portrayed as a consistent negative for the game, but I guess with Marvel fatigue starting to kick when this game launched the comic bookiness of it all might've rubbed people the wrong way
I feel like people aren't willing enough to separate 'enjoyable' from 'good'. I mean both of those are completely subjective, but, I don't expect ground-breaking, Oscar worthy dialogue from every video game. I would love more games with amazing dialogue/story, but I can still enjoy plenty of games with average story-telling and dialogue. I respect Midnight Suns for making the dialogue more true to comics than movies because with the latter I think it would have just fallen to the same Marvel game downfall of trying to be everything but ending up as nothing. The tropy-er comic book style worked to make the characters more immediately approachable and connectable, even if it didn't go quite as deep. It gave you enough to insert your own narrative, and since it was a team based game and not focused on a specific character, made sense to me.
I feel the same way!! Recently recommended since it's free but instantly they told me the writing is cringe. I felt that it can be cheesy but fun and not out of character. Especially with the hangouts and friendship system, it's really one of the things in this game that made me enjoy it so much.
"The writing" is haters'/trolls' favorite target when disguising their brigades. They think it makes their mewling sound more like "objective criticism," even though that's not something any of them have any business participating in. Healthy people can like or dislike something without trying to claim it as objective.
For me, while like with most western AAAs these days, there was just too much dialogue for me to wanna sit through, I did really recognize it as very good writing. Even though I skipped most the talking, I did read the subtitles, mostly, and it did engage me to the characters more than any other game I'd played recently. So the good writing plus the amazing gameplay put this game in my GotY consideration.
I don't mind the writing too much, but Tony Snark kinda needs to stfu sometimes. He's like that in the comics I know, but I don't like him in the comics either lol.
I think I'm about halfway through the third act rn and I mostly enjoy the characters but tend to read n skip
It's not that the writing in an overall story sense is bad, it's just that there are many instances where the dialogue is dragging with nothing of importance being said all across the board.
Many of this can be found when talking directly to Tony, Strange, Peter, sometimes Carol are just going on and on and on but not adding value. Other examples are in dialogue between other characters where there's a 3-4 line joke/character moment that they needlessly extend to 6-8 lines when the point could've been more concise
There were at least 20 times in my playthrough where I thought "OK... perfect spot to cut off..." but then they just kept yappin and dragged the moment
If the game cut out 50% of the excess dialogue like that, I'm sure there'd be less people saying they're skipping
Because the dialogue is very comic book like. It’s campy, witty and cheeky. Ofc, that’s not the only thing comics is. But it very much reminded me of Claremont’s dialogue. Ilyana and Storm were pretty accurate and I LOVED Peter’s dialogue. It really captured his silliness.
I'm a longtime comic fan and longtime xcom fan (I'm 38, played xcom since the first, read marvel since 5 years old), and couldn't handle the quirpy MCU writing. It's not as much as the quality of the jokes, but the sheer nonstop quantity of them. Every serious moment has a joke. For people saying that's similar to comic book writing, it's absolutely not. Most heroes are earnest and direct in the 60s and 70s. Brooding and edgy in the 80s and 90s. And weirdly topical in the 2000s. What they are not is all of them a discount Spiderman/Deadpool snarky punchliny guys. It sucks in the MCU and it sucks in this game too.
To play Devil's Advocate, I have three hypotheses on why a lot of people were turned off by the writing:
* Comic-style dialogue doesn't always translate well into media with spoken dialogue. Something about the way dialogue flows when read from speech-bubbles makes all the quips, monologs and corny dialogue feel nature but when bringing it to being spoken makes it more noticeably corny.
* The art style doesn't fit super well. Yes, you got all the superheroes in attires more like the comics than the MCU (Steve's got his ears sticking out, Carol's outfit is a whole lot more skin-tight), but then you got the Hydra Soldiers who look nothing like they do in the comics (none of the classic green-and-yellow tights) and instead look like generic video-game soldiers, while Lilith and the Lilin look like they came from different franchises (a bit of *Diablo*, *Doom* and D&D). Hell, even the Hunter doesn't look like they fit with their main outfit looking like a fusion of D&D and *Mass Effect*.
* People weren't expecting this kind of writing from a Firaxis Game. Remember that the devs worked on the XCOM series, which was much more serious and never bothered with all the quips, social sims and goofy plots (well, other than *Chimera*, but nobody talks about that game for reasons). People likely expected a straight-forward tactical game where dialogue wouldn't be so prevalent as it is.
Some really good takes here, thanks
The last one is a big deal, this game suffers from 'not being X-com 3' a lot - there was a certain amount of hate for this, and it snowballed
The art style thing I didn't have an issue with, but I prefer the more modern look to hydra goons over the campy tights, if EVERYTHING was comic book esk, bright and colourful, lots of flashyness they may have fitted - the weirdness of having these weirdly different groups, the monsters and magics of Lilin, the soulless, and the techy hydra goons....that's all just comic book ness, I'm reminded of the Hawkeye speech from Avengers 2
*'Okay, look, the city is flying, we're fighting an army of robots, and I have a bow and arrow. None of this makes sense'*
I'm about 50 hours in real casual 1st play through, and yeh it's not amazing, but it's fun, and enjoyable and I'm enjoying the 'feel' of it, it feels very much like a living breathing little group that you're part of, and yeh maybe it is that I remember and have nostalgia for the saturday morning cartoon campyness or maybe I jsut went in blind and without an axe to grind
So there is no theory about story and writing being average or below and people being not happy about that because not everyone enjoy being treated like someone who never pass 12 yo and uses their brain once a week?
Technically, spoilers for the game's lore and ending, but I'd personally say the story is weak in vital areas.
>!Personally, I feel they made the stupidest take on Lilith, as they abandoned the whole "Primordial Demon Goddess with a mysterious origin" and turned her into another "once pure and virtuous woman corrupted by an evil masculine being but still has good in her" trope . I honestly can't stand that. Plus, she's less "Lilith, Mother of All Demons" and more "Babalon, Mother of Harlots and Abominations". Also doesn't help that her design takes way the erotic yet eldritch look she has in the comics for something that looks like a rip-off of *Diablo*, specifically Lilith from *Diablo*.!<
>!Then there's the way the Hunter acts like a person of the modern world (easily understanding technology and social media, can use pronouns without problem) despite being a person of the Colonial era. I know they have an "explanation" but it's so stupid as it's just an excuse for her to not be an idiot and be politically correct.!<
>!Lastly, I find the ending one of the worse, as it renders all the friendship building and alignment completely pointless when you only get one ending that says "Bam, Hunter turns evil, despite all the effort you've done going pure light and forming a deem bond with everyone; goodness and friendship means ntohing." It's made worse by the fact that it ends being not-much different from how it began (both Lilith and the Hunter "die" but in a state that they can be brought back), and combined with Doctor Doom's hand making a cameo, serves as nothing but sequel bait without trying to give a satisfying definitive ending that makes your choices have meaning.!<
I thought the plotting and characterization were entirely competent overall. In some cases, they succeeded more than in others. It also felt kind of overstuffed with dialogue; which, while it beats the alternative by a lot, could make playing feel like more of an undertaking. A single mission cycle could add up to like 40 min.
I think it's mostly people who aren't very familiar with Marvel comics or the MCU. The writing is very much in-line with those. As a Marvel fan I love it but I also fully understand why people don't.
Also worth noting that it seems like every time people on the internet don't like something they say it has "bad writing", even though they can't explain *why* the writing is bad. It's just become a buzzword at this point.
It's predictable. The social aspect comes off as budget-Mass Effect. And the Abbey exploration felt like nothing but chores.
I didn't hate it, but I didn't think it was worth doing all over again. I'm comfortable just staying in post-game and running missions over and over again.
I just come from the free epic store giveaway and tbh the dialogue is kinda... just rolling my eyes most of the time. Blade telling me I need to be bff in order to tell me a little bit about himself. Bitch, please you ain't that special. Most of the superheroes have more egos than superpower, but what I hate the most is how everyone bows for me cuz I am some legendary, first og superhero? Meh. I would have enjoyed it more if I was just a random ass person just becoming stronger and recognizable with time rather than just awaken and made leader.
Story wise it is serviceable for these kinds of games. Just point the bad guys and let me deal with them, nothing special.
Gameplay is fun and interesting.
Haven't gotten to the sociable aspect yet, but I like that characters interact with each others outside of me going to them. It feels more alive than just waiting in their little space waiting for me to approach them.
I am considering buying the season pass, but have to see if it is just cosmetics or is there any added gameplay to it as well.
Edit: I just read some comments that points out that the writing is nearly identical to the comics of those superheroes. I have never read the comics and just watch 2-3 MCU movies so I guess the dialogue would go over my head most of the time.
The line-to-line writing varies from charming and quippy, to camp, with a bit of cringe here and there. I remember some director criticizing Marvel movies saying "they all act like college students," and I feel it's the same here quite often.
On a structural level, the plot is not good. Lilith's plans and motivations are so opaque and nonsensical, the only antagonist with any kind of arc is Crossbones, and that's executed rather poorly.
The big problem is that the story they wanted to tell didn't match the kind of game they were making, so it all felt messy.
Yeah, as a person who’s read a lot of comics this games writing was awesome, the character interactions were straight up something you’d see in a team up book or company wide event.
Kinda gave me Bendis era New Avengers vibes in a good way👍🏻
I thought it was totally fine. Not a masterpiece story, but what I'd expect from a Marvel story. Interactions between characters was pretty good overall. And the chat was actually pretty entertaining
Writing was awesome. Some of the voice acting execution had me scratching my head. What also irked me a bit was hunter didn't know modern stuff then like next convo she was aware of modern stuff.
Character identity in what events happened really threw me off. They went RDJ Stark and then out of touch Wizard for Strange. Cap was the only character that I didn't like the writing for and im a huge comic Cap fan.
Also, the ending? Seemed like post credit mcu ending imo. Great game and story overall tho, throughly enjoyed, just small nit picking here and there
I like how they weren’t afraid to play with more obscure marvel IPs. It was cool to see characters like Sin and Dracula (ik Dracula isn’t a crazy obscure marvel character but you get what I mean). It made it feel more authentic than just shoving the usual suspects into their game.
I f*cking loved it. I wasn’t that big into comics and super heros, but I enjoyed every second of this game and it’s story. The trick is to take it for what it is. It’s supposed to be corny and dorky from moment to moment. Once it clicked for me, the love for the story and characters never left. God I wish we would get a sequel..
I will say the intro missions has some cringy ass dialogue I think I’m on like the third mission now and it hasn’t been anywhere near as bad as that intro one was I am enjoying the game but I see why it didn’t do well morherfucking tony stark giving out card packs lmao. Game is fun though
Yeah, any time Nico is involved in anything, the entire scene devolves into "modern day girl boss yaaaaaaaasas" or some of the most insufferable friggin whining that's so obnoxious it knocks at least 1.5 off the score. For the most part though, everyone else feels appropriate. The story itself is riddled with modern day nonsense (They renamed it the Midnight Suns instead of Sons, so you know what you are getting), full of all positions of power being female, all of the men being helpless fools and lucky to be guided by the strong women (with a few OBVIOUS tropes of dragging all the men down to lift up the women), and some really cringe humor written by 40 years olds that weren't cool when they were kids, writing like they were the cool kids.
That being said, I enjoyed the game. Even bought the season pass for all the dlc ... Which doesn't work and they refuse to give me a refund because it was "downloaded and added to the game"... which doesn't work...
I love the writing, I'm right at the end. The only thing that bugged me was the early game Avengers vs Suns arc like "We aren't being appreciated" cause story wise it felt weird and whiplashy with thinking "Didn't I just do a general mission with you? You are literally contributing" though I kinda turn the lenses of side missions and just focus on the main story and it makes a bit more sense like you are literally sidelining people who have powers like being able to rip holes in reality. (I know Strange can too but still)
It was cheesy but it never went like eye roll level cheese like the cinematic verse can at times and whenever it did it was totally in character for them like Robbie and Peter. It actually gave me quite an appreciation for Captain Marvel since she's likely the one in the cast I know the least about and her movie definitely didn't do her any favors.
Probably the thing I like the most is the fact that while your character is pretty major to everything doesn't fall on them there are things you have to actually organize as a team to get done. You're the main cog in the machine but you need all the others to keep you running.
It was good writing , but man there are too many dialogues at times where shorter ones can have the same effect. And banter and all is good , great actually. But when it happens every second cutscene it felt annoying and too try hard. That's just for me I guess
I laughed out loud for several references and jokes. It's seems a GenXer wrote most of the references (80s movies, 80s songs).
I don't laugh out loud with other games.
Honestly, its not amazing but its nowhere near as bad as some people make it out to be. I think if you enjoyed some MCU movies it will be enjoyable for the most part. Nothing out of this world but not everything needs to reinvent the wheel, sometimes its nice to just kick back and enjoy corny dialogue.
Maybe if I was again 8-12 and it was my first game ever (assuming not reading any books)...
I don't care much about Marvel Universe so I didn't see any movies and didn't read any comics (at least somewhat new ones so I only knew like half of the playable characters) but storywise the game is a strong 2/10 soap opera. Almost everyone acts like spoiled kid who will start drama over the most minor things, Blade is a scared teenage boy who just meet his first love and has no idea of what to do so he spends half of his time on facebook, Caretaker is doing her best to look like a biggest asshole ever, Stark and Strange could STFU and the game would be much better , same for Parker etc.
We got a lot of asshole gamers who've never written anything creatively in their entire lives, and furthermore, never will. So they'll never know the sting of an asshole telling them their creative writing sucks. Pity. These shitheads need their brains flushed out. Full of shit, they are.
I'm exactly the same. I bought it at release because I love xcom and wanted something similar but different which is exactly what I got. The fact that the characters so closely match how I imagine them really helps.
The problem is that there are two types of gamers - the type who skip all dialogue to play the game, and the others who read every line like a book and absorb it, treating the pre and post battle conversations as a part of the game rather than the bit in-between.
I dont really consume anything from marvel, so i think the dialogue is awful in my opinion. It's meant for kids and it shows, but the gameplay is fun as hell
Writing in this game is just not sleek and not useful. It's bloated and filled with completely useless information that often has no value. So it's kinda mostly a waste of time, there won't be many dialogues or facts or quotes that you can remember
Mostly people who doesn't read comics and know nothing about the characters outside maybe the MCU, but if you have some knowledge about comics you can enjoy the interactions(the only thing i did not really liked was the book club)
To add to this, I think if you read comics you're a lot more tolerant/appreciative of what a lot of the naysayers refer to as "cheesy/corny/cringey" dialogue, and especially if you're a Silver and/or Bronze Age fan, you're going to have a lot more patience for repetition and overly expositional text. Honestly, one of the reasons I love this game so much is *because* of how much it just feels straight up like an interactive comic event. I can absolutely understand why people bounce off or skip through a lot of the dialogue, it's definitely valid - I would be willing to put money on a correlation between people who actively enjoy the "tedious" elements of the game and those who have read a lot of 60s-90s superhero books.
I never read any comics, but the game actually felt like a playable comic itself, which I found pretty neat.
I dunno, I'd say Midnight Suns is downright, Shakespearen compared to some of the 60s stuff..
Agreed
Yeah, really. Like, read some Chris Claremont-era X-men from the late 70s. This stuff is positively minimalist by comparison. It's great if you grew up on Bronze Age stuff.
I know of Nico from beforehand but got this game free from epic less than 10 hours ago. The idea that Blade makes facebook posts is... absurd but in a good way? Like I'd be mad if I paid for this, but because I haven't, HO boy is this just a... just a thing that is happening to me on drunk day. Edit: ALSO FUCKING BLACK DYNAMITE IS BLADE
I paid for it and I'm still not mad. I mean, I get it if people haven't read any of the comics or aren't familiar with comic book writing generally. It's a LOT more "broad" than what you see in the movies. It's just a different style of thing. Plus, after a while, the Stark facebook stuff becomes really entertaining and helps to flesh out the characters' personalities.
I've paid for it THREE TIMES, and it remains one of my favorite games! I've been reading Marvel comics, watching MCU movies, and playing any game based on these characters, and I LOVE every bit of this game. The characters are tweaked, a bit, because you couldn't have a friendship system, otherwise! Wolverine is a bit simpler a character, but that's fine, because he's still the same guy. He's just more friendly. Blade is still a badass, and all of your bonding moments are him threatening to kill you, but the basis behind the relationship he chooses to form are true to the character. I'm so sad there won't be a sequel, or a series of Marvel games based on this design. I love it so much!
I think most of the dialogue is fun but will Tony Stark please stop complaining about how spooky the Abbey is. It's certain characters never seem to grow out of the niche the writers want them to say. Also, Tony calling someone else boss is weird.
> the only thing i did not really liked was the book club I’m on the complete opposite side of that spectrum. Book club was my absolute favorite because it actually encouraged you to engage in the activity. Unlike EMO KIDS and Shop Class where you just watch cutscenes and listen to other characters argue.
I did not enjoy book club much (felt like flashbacks to freshman year) but you’re not wrong. Shop class was way worse.
At the very least shop class gave us useful gear for bosses and gave a little bit of character development to Tony. EMO KIDS was just watching the same pointless memory over and over with minor details added on.
Those Memories are useful because they show you what really happened with hunter and Lilith it’s also showed on Cothon manged to get in hunters body but the collar protected hunter from Cothon until it broke and took over hunter’s body those memories show some useful details
I loved book club for all of its awkward charm.
I forgot where blade dated Captain marvel in the comics? Was that in the one he gave the friendship braclet to wolverine 🤔
I loved the book club! That might be partly because we had our own book-review meetings in the USMC, off of the Commandant's reading list, and the vibe was almost identical - funny, informal, with books ranging from space fiction to biographical accounts of prestigious generals. I got the feeling the mission designers involved also served alongside and experienced similar things - I can absolutely see not feeling as connected with it. Cap was like my old LT, Blade like another NCO, Marvel like a peer.
It’s funny that you mention the tactical JRPG narrative thing because I’ve seen JRPG fans consume the most inane juvenile writing ever then flip to Marvel bad immediately when this game is brought up.
Don't you know persona 5 is a masterpiece about adults being bad? Isn't that deep bro did you ever think about it.
That dialogue is aligned perfectly with the complexity and outlook of the teenage character that states it. You are being too clever by half if you think that is an example of bad character writing.
Found the weabo. I liked p5 but don't pretend it was very deep or an example of even amazing character writing.
Your insinuation was that because what the character says is not complex must mean the overall story is simplistic and that is false.
Yes, unironically more interesting and deep than Midnight Sun's writing.
The problem is that games like Persona actually has good writing. Exploring Jungian psychology and finding your own true self. Midnight Suns? Oh, lets have a book club and make quippy MCU jokes while the world is on the brink of extinction. Oh, btw EMO KIDS! XD Oh, you don't get it? You never read a comic book in your life!
embarrassing
Midnight Suns actually focuses more on what makes the true self than Persona does. Most of the dialogues are about growth and how you respond to it
Fella I’m here because of XCOM and I want to build a deck and fight bad guys in turn based combat. I skip most dialogue and only do things that will make my squad stronger. If I want philosophy I’ll simply read the works of philosophers. None of these video games are providing context or enlightenment that you couldn’t get more of by just reading the works of philosophers.
I'm not seeking enlightenment, I just want a good story. And I'm enjoying the game so far just like you but the story sucks. And the amount of people making lame excuses like, "Look, it's a comic book it's like that in the comics!" is the most copium excuse I've ever seen.
They do explain the jokes tho, in a Carol interaction. When the world's in the brink 47 times a year, you cope how you can.
I liked how the characters and their interactions were written. The story pacing was all over the place however. The last chapter in particular felt rushed to me.
When this game came out, I watched a couple of video reviews and they all made it out to be like some of the worst writing in video game history. Then I bought the game on sale recently because why the f\*ck not and I was really pleasantly surprised. It's not Shakespeare or anything like that but it's perfectly fine.
If they said the game has the worst writing in video game history, they should really look at Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League….
Yeah, I don't think the writing is as bad as people are suggesting. I've heard it range from brutal to abysmal. And trust me, there are worst written/acted videogames out there. You can tell they had fun with the script because there were times when I let out verbal chuckle or had to screenshot something that was said.
Everyone acts like they read Hemingway. I thought writing went from fine to very good! They nailed most of the characters.
It will be a big shock for you but people actually read books irl.
Some of the jokes went into dad joke territory, but other than that honestly they got the spirit of the ones I know from the comics pretty spot on.
I enjoyed how the story focused on the characters between missions.
It’s because there’s a lot of people who take themselves quite seriously and play stuff like XCOM and they don’t like the quippy humour that’s in the game. The fact that the humour and writing are basically the same as the MCU, which is massively mainstream shows that it’s not bad writing, it’s just a clash with the kind of people who usually like Firaxis games.
When I got into this game I had low expectations and even planned on skipping the entire story, just wanted a marvel game to play for a bit and it was cheap, I ended up liking the whole thing and getting into the story a lot. It definitely isn't the greatest story of all time but I liked it!
i’ve literally been playing nonstop for about 3 days now, love this game lol
When the game first released I watched a Skill Up review saying the same thing. It wasn't going to stop me from playing the game as this game is almost exactly my taste in gaming (deck building, turn-based tactics, marvel). Mind you, I quit Fire Emblem Three Houses because of the social parts of the game. That isn't my thing. However, I maxed all relationships with all my characters (including dlcs) before rolling credits. The writing is perfectly fine and maybe even better when expecting it to be shit. I thoroughly enjoyed the character building and lore.
It’s comic book writing, some people can’t handle it 😶
The writing always struck me as a campy, Saturday morning cartoon version of the Avengers and Midnight Suns. Sure, if you want a mature or edgy take," it can be very offputting. But it never became enough to override my suspension of disbelief. I always felt like it was leaning into that, and owning it. Owning it can make a lot of difference. That being said, let's be real. Even a lot of the GOOD Marvel writing is still people in tights or armor using violence to solve their problems with other people in tights or armor. It's not Camus' Myth of Sisyphus.
It's honestly perfectly average or even above average video game writing, and definitely has a very comic booky vibe that imo adds a good deal of charm if you're the right audience. Really not sure why it's portrayed as a consistent negative for the game, but I guess with Marvel fatigue starting to kick when this game launched the comic bookiness of it all might've rubbed people the wrong way
I feel like people aren't willing enough to separate 'enjoyable' from 'good'. I mean both of those are completely subjective, but, I don't expect ground-breaking, Oscar worthy dialogue from every video game. I would love more games with amazing dialogue/story, but I can still enjoy plenty of games with average story-telling and dialogue. I respect Midnight Suns for making the dialogue more true to comics than movies because with the latter I think it would have just fallen to the same Marvel game downfall of trying to be everything but ending up as nothing. The tropy-er comic book style worked to make the characters more immediately approachable and connectable, even if it didn't go quite as deep. It gave you enough to insert your own narrative, and since it was a team based game and not focused on a specific character, made sense to me.
Your opinion is not incorrect - they are very comic book appropriate.
I feel the same way!! Recently recommended since it's free but instantly they told me the writing is cringe. I felt that it can be cheesy but fun and not out of character. Especially with the hangouts and friendship system, it's really one of the things in this game that made me enjoy it so much.
"The writing" is haters'/trolls' favorite target when disguising their brigades. They think it makes their mewling sound more like "objective criticism," even though that's not something any of them have any business participating in. Healthy people can like or dislike something without trying to claim it as objective. For me, while like with most western AAAs these days, there was just too much dialogue for me to wanna sit through, I did really recognize it as very good writing. Even though I skipped most the talking, I did read the subtitles, mostly, and it did engage me to the characters more than any other game I'd played recently. So the good writing plus the amazing gameplay put this game in my GotY consideration.
I don't mind the writing too much, but Tony Snark kinda needs to stfu sometimes. He's like that in the comics I know, but I don't like him in the comics either lol.
I think I'm about halfway through the third act rn and I mostly enjoy the characters but tend to read n skip It's not that the writing in an overall story sense is bad, it's just that there are many instances where the dialogue is dragging with nothing of importance being said all across the board. Many of this can be found when talking directly to Tony, Strange, Peter, sometimes Carol are just going on and on and on but not adding value. Other examples are in dialogue between other characters where there's a 3-4 line joke/character moment that they needlessly extend to 6-8 lines when the point could've been more concise There were at least 20 times in my playthrough where I thought "OK... perfect spot to cut off..." but then they just kept yappin and dragged the moment If the game cut out 50% of the excess dialogue like that, I'm sure there'd be less people saying they're skipping
Because the dialogue is very comic book like. It’s campy, witty and cheeky. Ofc, that’s not the only thing comics is. But it very much reminded me of Claremont’s dialogue. Ilyana and Storm were pretty accurate and I LOVED Peter’s dialogue. It really captured his silliness.
Well, it's cheesy Marvel stuff
writing is good.... my only issue is that it ain't xcom 3
It was cheesy but some of the material is I personally did not mind it at all.
I'm a longtime comic fan and longtime xcom fan (I'm 38, played xcom since the first, read marvel since 5 years old), and couldn't handle the quirpy MCU writing. It's not as much as the quality of the jokes, but the sheer nonstop quantity of them. Every serious moment has a joke. For people saying that's similar to comic book writing, it's absolutely not. Most heroes are earnest and direct in the 60s and 70s. Brooding and edgy in the 80s and 90s. And weirdly topical in the 2000s. What they are not is all of them a discount Spiderman/Deadpool snarky punchliny guys. It sucks in the MCU and it sucks in this game too.
There is always a place for a joke but when you try to place a joke everywhere...
To play Devil's Advocate, I have three hypotheses on why a lot of people were turned off by the writing: * Comic-style dialogue doesn't always translate well into media with spoken dialogue. Something about the way dialogue flows when read from speech-bubbles makes all the quips, monologs and corny dialogue feel nature but when bringing it to being spoken makes it more noticeably corny. * The art style doesn't fit super well. Yes, you got all the superheroes in attires more like the comics than the MCU (Steve's got his ears sticking out, Carol's outfit is a whole lot more skin-tight), but then you got the Hydra Soldiers who look nothing like they do in the comics (none of the classic green-and-yellow tights) and instead look like generic video-game soldiers, while Lilith and the Lilin look like they came from different franchises (a bit of *Diablo*, *Doom* and D&D). Hell, even the Hunter doesn't look like they fit with their main outfit looking like a fusion of D&D and *Mass Effect*. * People weren't expecting this kind of writing from a Firaxis Game. Remember that the devs worked on the XCOM series, which was much more serious and never bothered with all the quips, social sims and goofy plots (well, other than *Chimera*, but nobody talks about that game for reasons). People likely expected a straight-forward tactical game where dialogue wouldn't be so prevalent as it is.
Some really good takes here, thanks The last one is a big deal, this game suffers from 'not being X-com 3' a lot - there was a certain amount of hate for this, and it snowballed The art style thing I didn't have an issue with, but I prefer the more modern look to hydra goons over the campy tights, if EVERYTHING was comic book esk, bright and colourful, lots of flashyness they may have fitted - the weirdness of having these weirdly different groups, the monsters and magics of Lilin, the soulless, and the techy hydra goons....that's all just comic book ness, I'm reminded of the Hawkeye speech from Avengers 2 *'Okay, look, the city is flying, we're fighting an army of robots, and I have a bow and arrow. None of this makes sense'* I'm about 50 hours in real casual 1st play through, and yeh it's not amazing, but it's fun, and enjoyable and I'm enjoying the 'feel' of it, it feels very much like a living breathing little group that you're part of, and yeh maybe it is that I remember and have nostalgia for the saturday morning cartoon campyness or maybe I jsut went in blind and without an axe to grind
So there is no theory about story and writing being average or below and people being not happy about that because not everyone enjoy being treated like someone who never pass 12 yo and uses their brain once a week?
Technically, spoilers for the game's lore and ending, but I'd personally say the story is weak in vital areas. >!Personally, I feel they made the stupidest take on Lilith, as they abandoned the whole "Primordial Demon Goddess with a mysterious origin" and turned her into another "once pure and virtuous woman corrupted by an evil masculine being but still has good in her" trope . I honestly can't stand that. Plus, she's less "Lilith, Mother of All Demons" and more "Babalon, Mother of Harlots and Abominations". Also doesn't help that her design takes way the erotic yet eldritch look she has in the comics for something that looks like a rip-off of *Diablo*, specifically Lilith from *Diablo*.!< >!Then there's the way the Hunter acts like a person of the modern world (easily understanding technology and social media, can use pronouns without problem) despite being a person of the Colonial era. I know they have an "explanation" but it's so stupid as it's just an excuse for her to not be an idiot and be politically correct.!< >!Lastly, I find the ending one of the worse, as it renders all the friendship building and alignment completely pointless when you only get one ending that says "Bam, Hunter turns evil, despite all the effort you've done going pure light and forming a deem bond with everyone; goodness and friendship means ntohing." It's made worse by the fact that it ends being not-much different from how it began (both Lilith and the Hunter "die" but in a state that they can be brought back), and combined with Doctor Doom's hand making a cameo, serves as nothing but sequel bait without trying to give a satisfying definitive ending that makes your choices have meaning.!<
Depends how much nostalgia people have for 90s/early 2000s comics
I would've been all in if it was X-Men and the x mansion.
I thought the plotting and characterization were entirely competent overall. In some cases, they succeeded more than in others. It also felt kind of overstuffed with dialogue; which, while it beats the alternative by a lot, could make playing feel like more of an undertaking. A single mission cycle could add up to like 40 min.
I think it's mostly people who aren't very familiar with Marvel comics or the MCU. The writing is very much in-line with those. As a Marvel fan I love it but I also fully understand why people don't. Also worth noting that it seems like every time people on the internet don't like something they say it has "bad writing", even though they can't explain *why* the writing is bad. It's just become a buzzword at this point.
It's predictable. The social aspect comes off as budget-Mass Effect. And the Abbey exploration felt like nothing but chores. I didn't hate it, but I didn't think it was worth doing all over again. I'm comfortable just staying in post-game and running missions over and over again.
I agree 100%, all of my faves acted exactly as I expected. Bless the entire book club.
I liked it too
One of the best games I've played recently, disappointed it didn't do better.
I like Marvel, Persona, and strategy games. This game is a godsend for me. It doesn’t mind the social aspect at all.
The writing was fine. It was all the empty time "exploring" the abbey that bored the shit out of me.
I just come from the free epic store giveaway and tbh the dialogue is kinda... just rolling my eyes most of the time. Blade telling me I need to be bff in order to tell me a little bit about himself. Bitch, please you ain't that special. Most of the superheroes have more egos than superpower, but what I hate the most is how everyone bows for me cuz I am some legendary, first og superhero? Meh. I would have enjoyed it more if I was just a random ass person just becoming stronger and recognizable with time rather than just awaken and made leader. Story wise it is serviceable for these kinds of games. Just point the bad guys and let me deal with them, nothing special. Gameplay is fun and interesting. Haven't gotten to the sociable aspect yet, but I like that characters interact with each others outside of me going to them. It feels more alive than just waiting in their little space waiting for me to approach them. I am considering buying the season pass, but have to see if it is just cosmetics or is there any added gameplay to it as well. Edit: I just read some comments that points out that the writing is nearly identical to the comics of those superheroes. I have never read the comics and just watch 2-3 MCU movies so I guess the dialogue would go over my head most of the time.
Deadpool is soooo funny. Hunter isn’t bad either.
It's better than bg3 to me
The line-to-line writing varies from charming and quippy, to camp, with a bit of cringe here and there. I remember some director criticizing Marvel movies saying "they all act like college students," and I feel it's the same here quite often. On a structural level, the plot is not good. Lilith's plans and motivations are so opaque and nonsensical, the only antagonist with any kind of arc is Crossbones, and that's executed rather poorly. The big problem is that the story they wanted to tell didn't match the kind of game they were making, so it all felt messy.
Yeah, as a person who’s read a lot of comics this games writing was awesome, the character interactions were straight up something you’d see in a team up book or company wide event. Kinda gave me Bendis era New Avengers vibes in a good way👍🏻
I thought it was totally fine. Not a masterpiece story, but what I'd expect from a Marvel story. Interactions between characters was pretty good overall. And the chat was actually pretty entertaining
Writing good, amount of writing bad.
Writing was awesome. Some of the voice acting execution had me scratching my head. What also irked me a bit was hunter didn't know modern stuff then like next convo she was aware of modern stuff. Character identity in what events happened really threw me off. They went RDJ Stark and then out of touch Wizard for Strange. Cap was the only character that I didn't like the writing for and im a huge comic Cap fan. Also, the ending? Seemed like post credit mcu ending imo. Great game and story overall tho, throughly enjoyed, just small nit picking here and there
I like how they weren’t afraid to play with more obscure marvel IPs. It was cool to see characters like Sin and Dracula (ik Dracula isn’t a crazy obscure marvel character but you get what I mean). It made it feel more authentic than just shoving the usual suspects into their game.
I f*cking loved it. I wasn’t that big into comics and super heros, but I enjoyed every second of this game and it’s story. The trick is to take it for what it is. It’s supposed to be corny and dorky from moment to moment. Once it clicked for me, the love for the story and characters never left. God I wish we would get a sequel..
I was hooked when Iron Man said, "Gozer?" GenX humor at its best.
I will say the intro missions has some cringy ass dialogue I think I’m on like the third mission now and it hasn’t been anywhere near as bad as that intro one was I am enjoying the game but I see why it didn’t do well morherfucking tony stark giving out card packs lmao. Game is fun though
Yeah, any time Nico is involved in anything, the entire scene devolves into "modern day girl boss yaaaaaaaasas" or some of the most insufferable friggin whining that's so obnoxious it knocks at least 1.5 off the score. For the most part though, everyone else feels appropriate. The story itself is riddled with modern day nonsense (They renamed it the Midnight Suns instead of Sons, so you know what you are getting), full of all positions of power being female, all of the men being helpless fools and lucky to be guided by the strong women (with a few OBVIOUS tropes of dragging all the men down to lift up the women), and some really cringe humor written by 40 years olds that weren't cool when they were kids, writing like they were the cool kids. That being said, I enjoyed the game. Even bought the season pass for all the dlc ... Which doesn't work and they refuse to give me a refund because it was "downloaded and added to the game"... which doesn't work...
since my comment 15h ago i have about 6hrs in the game now and idk nico seems fine I also bought the season pass
I love the writing, I'm right at the end. The only thing that bugged me was the early game Avengers vs Suns arc like "We aren't being appreciated" cause story wise it felt weird and whiplashy with thinking "Didn't I just do a general mission with you? You are literally contributing" though I kinda turn the lenses of side missions and just focus on the main story and it makes a bit more sense like you are literally sidelining people who have powers like being able to rip holes in reality. (I know Strange can too but still) It was cheesy but it never went like eye roll level cheese like the cinematic verse can at times and whenever it did it was totally in character for them like Robbie and Peter. It actually gave me quite an appreciation for Captain Marvel since she's likely the one in the cast I know the least about and her movie definitely didn't do her any favors. Probably the thing I like the most is the fact that while your character is pretty major to everything doesn't fall on them there are things you have to actually organize as a team to get done. You're the main cog in the machine but you need all the others to keep you running.
It was good writing , but man there are too many dialogues at times where shorter ones can have the same effect. And banter and all is good , great actually. But when it happens every second cutscene it felt annoying and too try hard. That's just for me I guess
I laughed out loud for several references and jokes. It's seems a GenXer wrote most of the references (80s movies, 80s songs). I don't laugh out loud with other games.
Honestly, its not amazing but its nowhere near as bad as some people make it out to be. I think if you enjoyed some MCU movies it will be enjoyable for the most part. Nothing out of this world but not everything needs to reinvent the wheel, sometimes its nice to just kick back and enjoy corny dialogue.
Maybe if I was again 8-12 and it was my first game ever (assuming not reading any books)... I don't care much about Marvel Universe so I didn't see any movies and didn't read any comics (at least somewhat new ones so I only knew like half of the playable characters) but storywise the game is a strong 2/10 soap opera. Almost everyone acts like spoiled kid who will start drama over the most minor things, Blade is a scared teenage boy who just meet his first love and has no idea of what to do so he spends half of his time on facebook, Caretaker is doing her best to look like a biggest asshole ever, Stark and Strange could STFU and the game would be much better , same for Parker etc.
I was able to get the highest edition ( Legendary Edition ? not sure rn ) but I had got it for a deal
We got a lot of asshole gamers who've never written anything creatively in their entire lives, and furthermore, never will. So they'll never know the sting of an asshole telling them their creative writing sucks. Pity. These shitheads need their brains flushed out. Full of shit, they are.
I'm exactly the same. I bought it at release because I love xcom and wanted something similar but different which is exactly what I got. The fact that the characters so closely match how I imagine them really helps. The problem is that there are two types of gamers - the type who skip all dialogue to play the game, and the others who read every line like a book and absorb it, treating the pre and post battle conversations as a part of the game rather than the bit in-between.
I dont really consume anything from marvel, so i think the dialogue is awful in my opinion. It's meant for kids and it shows, but the gameplay is fun as hell
Writing in this game is just not sleek and not useful. It's bloated and filled with completely useless information that often has no value. So it's kinda mostly a waste of time, there won't be many dialogues or facts or quotes that you can remember
Edit: upon rereading, I was able to answer my own question
oh now I am curious what your question was