Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects

Clash of the super heroes.

NA release: 20th September 2005
EU release: 14th October 2005
JP release: N/A
Developer: Nihilistic Software
Publisher: Electronic Arts
NGC Magazine Score: 30%
Mods Used: Widescreen Hack

Within comic books, there’s so many characters to choose from, especially in a franchise like Marvel. You would be able to find what kind of character you want to use, especially when you consider alternate universe versions of characters as well. For a Marvel video game, you’re all set. So I think it’s quite brave that EA and Nihilistic Software decided to make a new squad of super villains for Marvel Nemesis.

The Imperfects are this new group, with each one having their own abilities and backstory. And none of them are all that interesting (despite Marvel having full comic book rights, they’ve never used them again), which is a big let down. What doesn’t help is that their main introduction is when you have to control them to take out the hero you’ve been playing as, which is just annoying.

The heroes in the game are an interesting bunch, with popular characters like The Hulk, Captain America and The Punisher being taken out in the opening cutscene (just ignore the fact that anything that can take The Hulk out in seconds will probably be too powerful for most heroes), with you starting off the game as The Thing, Elektra and a version of Wolverine that doesn’t look like any iteration of the character.

The game is a beat-’em-up with one main attack button. The R button modifies this to a special ability, either a projectile attack or a stronger attack. You fight boring robots and the levels generally last around 2 or 3 minutes. It never really gets exciting, although the controls make more sense once you reach a 1-on-1 fight against another main character.

These are typical arena fighters, with the basic attacks and grabbing and throwing items. It’s still not very exciting, and only ever supports two people instead of the typical four for the genre. Like the beat-’em-up levels, if just never gets interesting. Interesting idea, but poorly executed, and definitely not helped by how unsaturated of look, not even Spider-Man is colourful.

Poor

It’s a bog-standard brawler – actually, make that sub-standard. Enter story mode and you’re plunged into the ‘thick’ of the action, with a woefully unexciting against three robot alien things that you have to defeat through repeated stabs of the A button – it doesn’t get much better either.
Geraint Evans, NGC Magazine #113

Remake or remaster?

Not much for this.

Official Ways to get the game

There’s no official way to buy Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects