Upcoming updates in Marvel Heroes & Marvel Avengers Alliance!

So quite a lot of announcements happened over the last weekend at the New York Comic Con (NYCC) 2013 for both Marvel Heroes & Marvel Avengers Alliance! Time to Hero Up! Also Doomsaw spilled the beans recently here as well. Read on to find out...

MARVEL AVENGERS ALLIANCE

*Thor movie & comics fans! The next Spec Ops 14 is gonna ring in the release of Thor: The Dark World! With Heimdall as the Ops Hero to recruit in the end, Loki as the lockbox hero & Kurse as the group boss, it's gonna be loads of fun for all us MAA addicts while we help defeat Malekith & his evil elvish forces!

*Following Loki, Sabretooth will be the next lockbox hero.
*Domino will be the next PVP hero up for grabs in Season 12. S12 will also feature a change to how the armory works.

*While we do know that Cyclops' Uncanny costume will be the reward for the Chapter 2 Mastery in storymode Season 2, Daredevil's original costume will be the reward for Chapter 3 Mastery. Also Kingpin & Sin- daughter of Red Skull, will be making their villainous debuts in Chapter 3.
*Even though he was first announced at last year's SDCC, Doctor Voodoo will be coming soon in the game.

*Android fans- MAA will be launching via Google Play on November 21!

*iOS fans- Deadpool will be the next PVP hero. Also, Punisher & Beast will soon be available for recruitment.
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MARVEL HEROES

Check out the NYCC trailer of new content:


-Work continues on the Mac version and you could probably expect it by Christmas.
-Trading is being worked on & will need at least a month of hardcore testing & iteration to make sure it's unbreakable.

New Heroes:
-Squirrel Girl is currently in the test center & will be the next new hero in 1.4. Sneak peek names of some of her powers: Squirrelpocalypse, Hulkbuster Squirrels.
-She'll be followed by Gambit (in 1.5- Nov) & Nightcrawler (1.6- Dec)
-Gambit is in full design process right now. He has a fun ability called "52-card pickup" that basically kills everything on screen. He also has some very well-animated combat animations & combat systems. Other power names- Cheat Death, Rain of Pain.  He has a Vagabond skill tree with some unique powers, including a power called "Sticky Fingers" that gives him a unique bonus to find orbs, credits & special items.

-Silver Surfer & Galactus will make an appearance in Marvel Heroes during 2014.
-Playable villians are not that far away.

Hero improvements:
-More improvements for many heroes including Colossus, Captain America, Daredevil, Hawkeye & Punisher by next month.
-Options are being added to help significantly reduce the cooldown on ultimate powers via the item & power system. [Update: With the Spiderman rework & 1.4's Squirrel Girl, Signature Powers will be introduced which will unlock at L30 having a cooldown of 3 minutes or less. At L52 the Ultimate power will unlock which will be even more powerful for tougher end-game content. More deats here. ]

Costumes:
-For Squirrel Girl, Gazillion has created it's own costume & pitched it to Marvel. They plan to do this a lot more in the future as Marvel really likes that process.
-For Halloween, the Brood Wolverine costume has been added to the store & will be available until November 1. Watch out for Punisher's Frankencastle costume in the game next!
-Costume alts for Spiderman (ENHANCED Superior Spiderman), Scarlet Witch (Ultimate) & Thor (Beta Ray Bill).

Items:

-New item slots (coming in 1.4):
*Stark-Tech items (unlocks at L45)- Devices created by Stark Industries to help any hero in different ways. Difficult to obtain, but can be crafted as well as found. Can be upgraded through your crafter.

*Legendary items (L55)- Provided to the most accomplished heroes from Odin's Vault (through Odin Marks). Strong items that get much stronger as they gain experience. As a player gains experience (even at L60), the item will level up & unlocks new powers. Can rank up 5 times & unlock new abilities. eg. The Ultimate Nullifier has a chance to wipe an enemy from existence (you still get the loot). As it ranks up, it improves your mental strength (spirit), damage and at rank 5 you will have a chance to devastate a boss on hit! Check out the list of Legendary items revealed here.

*1 PVP ring slot (L20)
*Two additional artifact slots
*1 Pet slot 

-Besides adding Blessings to artifacts, Odin Marks will have other uses once Asgard launches.
-Uniques & Legendaries will not be tradeable, they are going to stay "self-found" items.
-Cosmic Medallions bosses coming soon!
-Loads of new crafter recipes in the future so ensure you get your crafters to L20 asap!
-More items to be added to gear vendors to reward players who level them. They will likely be things you can only buy from them, including stuff similar to the gambling mechanic from D2.
-No current plans to make relics unbindable, but several new relics will be added in the future so you can spread them out to various heroes. They may make an extremely costly unbinding method so players can unbind relics only if absolutely needed.

New zones:
-Asgard will be the next new hub & looks AMAZING! The Dark Elves will show up. And get ready to whoop Loki's ass! There will be a Global Unlocking event for the Asgard content, after which Legendaries will be available. It will come in 3 chapters set up like a story, getting progressively more intense. Raids will be in one of the later chapters as things get more deadly.

-Bronx Zoo will be a new zone amongst others.

Endgame: 

-Terminals:
*A new Kingpin terminal.
*Randomized terminals with terminal-wide affixes on difficulty and loot. egs. All enemies are fire enchanted, but give 20% more special items or All enemies are invisible, but all drop an extra purple item. You can reroll the affixes until you get a challenge you like.
*A completely redesigned Limbo terminal for 5 players that acts as a never-ending dungeon descending into the planes.

-A very unique competitive PVE mode is in development
-The first PVP Mode called "Against the Gods" will be going on the test center by around October 24. Get more deats on it here.

So what are you guys most looking forward to? For me it's Asgard in Marvel Heroes & then Loki as a playable hero in MAA (WITH his movie costume! YAY!)

And before I forget- you can head on over to my Marvel Heroes group Comic Book HEROES Are Hot & join in our MH discussions out there!

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Spiral is the new PVP hero in Marvel Avengers Alliance!

Good day SHIELD Agents! I'm sure all you MAA addicts are already at it in PVP Season 11! This time around we have a chance to win the six-armed siren, Spiral. I LOVE the character art for her & love how she looks in the game as well (although she does seem a bit small in size).

As always if you finish PVP in Adamantium league you win Spiral. Also they've tried to make things a bit different & interesting this time- You have a series of covert side tasks going on simultaneously, that includes collecting certain items via PVP to enable Drs. Pym & McCoy to create their very own Tesseract. Check out the entire task list here.

What I love this season is the little changes in the PVP interface- Gone are the long waiting times before the battle begins. They've gotten rid of the player profiles display screen where you had to click "Continue" to begin the battle. It now straightaway loads into the battle & this GREATLY saves on the loading time. The profiles don't appear at the end of the battle either, but there is a "Compare" button that you can click to check the side-by-side comparison of the bonuses, & a "Profile" button beneath the opponent's name that will take you to their profile. I like it this way because now I know if I lose a match, I WILL be checking the comparison. Before when a fight didn't seem to be going my way, I would make a mental note during the fight about checking the opponents bonuses & profile after, but then I would still just click away & forget about it in the end.

But as always with every PVP season, this one too comes with it's customary gripes. Last season it was the constant forced refresh after every PVP battle unless you refreshed your game before every fight (which wasn't guaranteed to always work either). This season it's seeing defense battles in your battle reports where you have fought...YOURSELF! Check my battle reports- I'm Agent MF Darkholme in the game & that's what I see in my reports!

And just like every other season, I have hopes of doing well this season. But this time it's because I managed to get my hands on the Custom Sword of the Barony AND the Scroll of the Angolob! FINALLY!!! So in the images I've posted below you can also check out my current hero & weapon lineup for attack & defense fights. This is of course, more than likely going to change multiple times. Which heroes & weapons are you guys currently using for your attack & defense? What do you like & loathe most about this season?
^First 2 weapons in my attack lineup are the Cruel Glaive (from Spec Ops 13) & the Brute (SO 11). The second defense weapon is the Hotshot. Nightcrawler is the Swashbuckling Infiltrator version.

Before I end this SHIELD transmission I'd like to inform all those players who haven't managed to get Magneto yet- Magnetic Lockboxes are now on sale for a limited time period! So buy them now while you still can! Also Deadpool, Cable, Rogue, Gambit & Spiderwoman are all on sale. I have all of them so I don't know their prices but I'm very interested in finding out!

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10 Reasons why you should play Marvel Heroes

The original title for this post would've been "10 reasons why you should switch from Marvel Avengers Alliance to Marvel Heroes", but then again, I haven't been able to give up MAA completely (yet) & it does have it's good points for being just a Facebook game.

Marvel Heroes officially launched on June 4 this year & I've been playing it since February 2013 during the closed beta phase. I must say it's been amazing to see this game just grow & improve since then. Patches are released regularly & there's quite a few good things to look forward to in the latest Patch 1.2! So why should you be playing Marvel Heroes (MH)? Read on to find out...[Note: Some images in this post were taken during the closed beta phase so appearance in interface & overall look of the game will vary]

1. You get to play as your favorite Marvel hero! It's an action MMORPG, so you get to play as your fave heroes & interact with other players online. Hearing the dialogues that go on between heroes as they pass by is fun especially if you have more knowledge of the comics. But that's just a small part of the big picture- using the powers is absolute fun & you have roughly 20 powers to allot points to for each hero. Besides these powers is the Ultimate Power which you have to level up using...


2. Eternity Splinters- These are basically collectable drops from defeated mobs or bosses. Collect them & you can turn them in to Adam Warlock to get a new hero or to level up an ultimate power for a hero you already got or to buy various other items.
This is pretty cool cos it means that a casual player who has absolutely no intention of spending on the game can do so AND also end up playing as their fave Marvel hero!

3. It's free. Oh yeah, did I forget to mention that before? Yup, it's absolutely free & like I said, with the splinters you don't really need to end up spending a pie on the game if you don't want to. You get to choose a free starter hero from the 5 choices you are given. From then on you collect the splinters to get new heroes or other items.

4. Constant improvements- It's just been 3 months since the official launch so there's been a lot of patch releases for the game. Some have been small improvements & others have been much bigger changes that either include new zones, events, or major changes in hero mechanics. Also there's...

5. No rampant nerfing. Nerfing isn't taking place left, right & center like it does in MAA. All the heroes are going under intense scrutiny by the developers & in fact, there's been major buffs for many heroes especially Spiderman & Hulk. Melee heroes like Wolverine (image taken during closed beta phase), Colossus & Daredevil have had major work done on them to make them more durable & fun to play. Gazillion is always looking for feedback on heroes from the forums to improve them further which brings me to the fact that...

6. Gazillion actually cares. Gazillion constantly reviews forum posts to find out what it is they need to improve or change. Several changes that have happened in the game have been a direct result of this system. The devs are very much active on the forums & very often post their own replies to various posts in the forum. Gaz isn't just out to get your money- they actually want to make the game even more fun with every passing patch that it gets new players to play while also making the existing players happy. I seriously think it's commendable of them to introduce the ES idea. They could've easily forced players to spend money so that they can play as their fave hero, but no- they kept the big picture in mind & went ahead with the ES introduction.

7. Amazing customer support- Unlike Playdom, the customer support of Gazillion is great! Prompt replies to tickets & no copy-paste replies! Even posting your problem in the forums helps!

8. Play in Marvel environments- You can take your hero to the various places you've read about in the comics or seen in the movies, TV shows & cartoons. Right now there are 3 social hubs in the game- Avengers Tower, Xavier's School & the SHIELD Helicarrier. Asgard is going to be the next hub to be released (but there's gonna be some time before that happens). You get to smash & bash up enemies in the Savage Land, Latveria & Castle Doom, Mutant Town, Daredevil's Hell's Kitchen & many more.
^Some images from the Xavier School in the game.

9. Difficulty modes- Now once you've got your hero to level 60 you don't need to just twiddle your thumbs. You now have 2 new difficulty modes: Heroic & Superheroic. Normal mode can take your hero to around level 25, while Heroic will get you to about 45 & Superheroic should take you to the mid-50’s. These 2 modes also have boosted item find & special item find, with Superheroic having the highest bonus.

10. Emma Frost is now in the game! :P Yes folks, the White Queen is making her grand entrance into the game with Patch 1.2, & who wouldn't want to play as her?! Check her out in this trailer>

After her, the next characters in the works for release are Luke Cage & Gambit to be the next new heroes in the coming months. They are also working on adding Squirrel Girl & possibly Nightcrawler & Ghost Rider in the future.
^Emma Frost in the game. The first is her default costume & the other 2 are her alts. I just HOPE they add her Phoenix 5 costume!!!


So there you have it. Need I say more? If you aren't playing already just head to their website, download the game & start playing! Also, I have an MH group going on in Facebook called Comic Book HEROES Are Hot which is the official group for the Comic Book Nerds Are Hot guild in MH. If you are a regular player already do join in & geek out about the game in there...Till next time, happy gaming!

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My (Spoiler-free) Review for The Wolverine

After the horrid mess that was X-Men Origins: Wolverine, producers Hugh Jackman & Lauren Shuler Donner decided to dig deeper into the fan-favorite hero & take him to Japan by adapting the 1982 limited series by Chris Claremont & Frank Miller. Of course, as with any comic book movie adaptation liberties have been taken, but unlike Origins (where the changes made to the source material were rather cringe-worthy), here all the changes work & add to the story.

The film opens with Wolverine being down in the dumps (almost quite literally) after the events that took place in X-Men: The Last Stand. He is being tracked down by Yukio who tells him he has been sent for by Yashida, who Logan knew during his prisoner of war days in 1945 Nagasaki, Japan. Yashida is now on his deathbed & wishes to bid farewell & thank Logan who saved his life. And so begins Wolverine's journey of self-discovery in Japan where he meets his new flame, Mariko Yashida.

The story was obviously one of the main issues with the previous Wolverine movie. This one doesn't waste time in introducing useless mutants just thrown in for the heck of it. Each character in this movie, whether mutant or human, has a purpose & helps drive the story forward. I must warn you though that the film does take time to find it's groove & the first half of the movie seems to be paced a tad too slow. But what's good is that it takes time to get under the skin of Wolverine's character & his whole attitude towards his immortality.

Direction by James Mangold is pretty good. What I loved most about the film were the action sequences- fast-paced but not in a manner where you feel you're losing track of what's going on. The parkour sequences are filmed excellently. Loads of slicing action out here too- if only it was R-rated so we could enjoy a bit more blood, but they are supposedly releasing an R-rated version of it too. Also I must add that it was great to see the gals in the film get their fair share of action. It was really nice to see Mariko not portrayed as a complete damsel & all the action scenes with Yukio & Viper were fun to watch.

Now onto the acting. Hugh Jackman as Wolverine- The man's dedication & love for the character truly shows in this film. You can tell that he's really worked hard at getting the Wolverine that all the fans have been dying to see on the silver screen. It's most definitely the best portrayal of Wolverine on film till date. I must add that his physique in this film is the best it's ever been. And I just have a suspicion that Mangold increased the shirtless scenes after seeing the extra work he put into it. So that's an added incentive for the ladies.

I must really hand it to Tao Okamoto & Rila Fukushima who play Mariko & Yukio respectively. Absolute newcomers from Japan coming fresh into such a large-scale Hollywood production. Really good acting from them, especially Tao. And she's beautiful as Mariko. And even though Rila's looks aren't in the least bit conventional (I have to admit I was disappointed when she was announced), she does look pretty good in the film too!

Svetlana Khodchenkova as Viper is amazing! This character is completely different from what she is in the comics but I absolutely loved it & I did have a hunch I would from the glimpses I got of her in the trailers. She's great as the menacing villainess trying to hunt down Wolverine. And the climactic fight scene between her & Yukio is a joy to watch.

It was great to see Famke Janssen reprise her role of Jean Grey here. Though she only appears in Logan's dreams she still ends up making an impact by helping you get further insight into Logan's current psyche & his undying love for her. In the midst of all this, it's nice to see the relationship he forms with Mariko. The chemistry between them is not as great as the one Hugh had with Famke but it is nonetheless heartwarming to see the violent Wolverine become the calm(er) & protective Logan when he's with Mariko. The interaction he has with Yukio is also very interesting as well. I think it's sort of like the Wolverine-Jubilee relationship in the comics.

The Visual Effects. This time around the VFX in this film was pretty good. The claws look great & the Silver Samurai looks even more awesome than that little glimpse you got in the trailers. They've really worked hard to make it look larger than life & make the Silver Samurai truly a worthy opponent for the Wolverine. All the effects for the Viper's character look really cool too. All in all, the effects don't take away from the story this time but rather aid it.

Other noteworthy mentions before I wind up this review: The film is interjected throughout with some funny one-liners, almost all coming from Logan, that truly delight & a few really hilarious moments as well. Viper's costumes were, in one word- hot. They aren't direct copies of her comics counterpart, but are really well-designed with Svetlana looking amazing in all of them. AND finally, the after-credits scene! It's fantastic- leading into X-Men: Days of Future Past. Enjoyable cameos, dialogue & little clues that you should not miss out on at ANY cost!

So what's the final verdict on the film? It's a well-made film but suffers from a slow pacing at the start, the 3D doesn't really add to the film in any way (surprise, surprise) & one scene did manage to irk me as well but that's a minor bit that I won't get into or things will get spoilery. But with a well-written story, good acting & great action it definitely helps you forget about Origins. It gets a 6/10 for me. Now I know that I rated Iron Man 3 the same & called that movie disappointing. This film, however, was not a disappointment at all but as I left the theater I didn't find any reason to go gaga over it & rate it higher. All I can say is that if they continue in this direction in the same way it can only go up from here for future Wolverine & X-Men movies.

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