Responding to questions on Reddit, Vince Napoli, recently gave players an inside look at how some of the Avengers in the upcomingMarvel’s Avengerswill be able to traverse through the game world. The response began with an explanation about howThe Incredible Hulkwill traverse up and down buildings and eventually lead to a reveal about how Captain America approaches vertical traversal.
Napoli has previously, and continues to, given players an inside look at the combat ofMarvel’s Avengers, which he has intimate knowledge of thanks to his role as Lead Combat Designer at Crystal Dynamics. The developer has been fairly active online lately, filling players in on how characters will function, from news about Black Widow’s gadgets toIron Man’s abilitiesand flight capabilities.
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In his response about Hulk’s ability to perch onto buildings, almost making vertical traversal more like hoping from point to point rather than a standard spider crawl, Napoli also let it slip that Captain America can wall run. Further expanding on the concept in a follow-up post, the developer revealed that Captain America’s verticality comes with a short wall run that can be extended by jumping from wall to wall or using platforms and poles to continue ascending. So, while he doesn’t have the same kind of flight capabilities as Iron Man,Captain America’s abilitieswill allow him to scale buildings with relative ease, keeping the character from feeling grounded in vertical combat.
Along with the explanation about Captain America’s ability to utilize the vertical space of the game, players were also given a glimpse into the way that Hulk can climb buildings inMarvel’s Avengers. Acting as a more destructive force, Hulk won’t simply run up buildings like Captain America, or crawl like Spiderman, he will instead be able to ascend one step at a time by jumping and perching onto the crushed sections of buildings he lands on. This means thatall playable characterswill have some form of vertical traversal that could make them useful in certain situations without leaving any of them stuck away from the action in any given scenario.
Fortunately,Captain America’s wall runningshines a light on how Crystal Dynamics is approaching character designs to make sure that players won’t be handcuffed by which character they choose to play. What exactly that means for balance among other abilities is still yet to be seen, and with an expanding cast of superheroes to work with, it’ll be hard to avoid building one to be so powerful that they become the “right” answer for every encounter. However, balance is at least part of the design process and that can only be promising forMarvel’s Avengersin the future.
Marvel’s Avengersis set to release on September 4th, for PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One.
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