Just like Destiny, The Division, Anthem, and most live service games, Marvel's Avengers suffered from a less-than-stellar launch. Both critics and fans alike praised its campaign, story, and gameplay, while heavily criticizing its repetitive and grindy leveling system, and lack of engaging endgame content. Back in March, Crystal Dynamics released a detailed content roadmap for 2021, and so far the team has done a great job sticking to it: Launching the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions, releasing the Future Imperfect operation with new playable character Hawkeye, and adding new limited-time events like the Red Room Takeover to keep players interested.

Marvel's Avengers first major expansion, War for Wakanda, is expected to release later in the year; adding new story content, a Wakanda area, and Black Panther himself as a new playable character. For many fans, the new expansion is a chance for Marvel's Avengers to usher in a new era for the game, Crystal Dynamics answer to the Taken King from Destiny. However, in order to get to that point, the foundation of the game needs to be refined and restructured across the board. Integrating new Daily and Weekly Milestones, content playlists for easy access to leveling, and making the endgame feel more compelling, these are all ways to improve the experience.

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Daily Missions & Activities

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Story Mission (Heroic) - The ability to replay the Reassamble campaign was a great new addition, but Crystal Dynamics needs to take it a step further and make that content more accessible. As part of the daily faction objectives, add a rotating Story Mission where players complete a specific Reassemble or character Iconic Mission with specific rewards like Units or Upgrade Modules.

Villain Sector (Heroic) - The Daily Story Mission would go perfectly with the already available Villain Sector from each of the factions. Give the missions randomized modifiers to make them a bit of a challenge and a great way to complete daily assignments with clear outlined rewards to chase. Daily activities don't need to be high-powered gear, scarce resources are more than enough.

Assignments - The assignments system is great just the way it is, offering players a total of twenty unique bounties to go out and complete everyday in any way they see fit. As Marvel's Avengers grows with each new expansion, adding brand new factions with their own of daily assignments for specific resources will do nothing but help gives players clear ways to progress.

Weekly Missions & Activities

Priority War Zone (Elite) - With a good range of daily objectives to help make the leveling process easier, the next step would be to look at some weekly objectives. Marvel's Avengers already has a few weekly missions called Priority Missions, with specific rewards and a good bump in difficulty. Priority Missions work well if they can be completed on a per-character basis each week for a specific reward and then farmed later for gear. The first should be a randomized War Zone, choosing either a Drop Zone, Threat Sector, or Vault.

Priority Faction Mission (Elite) - After War Zones, while some of these upcoming mission types are technically placed under the same category, there are other missions that feel a little more unique from Drop Zones or Threat Sectors, offer more variety in play, and generally deserve their own Priority Mission. Faction Missions have always been one of the more challenging base level mission, are fairly lengthy to complete, and appear in a number of main questlines so a weekly Faction Mission only makes sense.

Priority Harm Challenge (Elite) - Next up is the Harm Room, something that's already offered in Marvel's Avengers as one of the weekly Priority Missions. In this case, because variety is key in keeping players interested, the Priority Harm Room should be limited to one per week (mixing in one of the Red Room challenges for variety) and stick to defeating ten consecutive waves of enemies.

Priority Villain Sector (Elite) - Last on the list for Priority Missions is Villain Sectors. Fighting major Marvel Comics villains like Taskmaster or Abomination is exciting, so Villain Sectors should be utilized as heavily as Strikes in Destiny 2. The only issue right now is the lack of unique villains, but this will grow over time. For now, please put MODOK and the Super Adaptoid into the rotation.

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Permanent Activity Playlists

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War Zones - For players that have been around since the start and play Marvel's Avenger as one of their comfort games, most of the time it's not about leveling up or locating specific items - they're playing just to have fun. Choosing missions at the War Table can be a tedious process, which is why playlists are so attractive. Crystal Dynamics already has a 'Quick Match' playlist and they should continue to build on that idea. Keep the current playlist and set it to War Zones missions with the 10% XP bonus in place.

AIM Hives - Hives are one of the most commonly played game modes for leveling up in Marvel's Avengers, and that's ignoring the fact that there's a Trophy/Achievement where players need to complete a staggering 50 Hives. Just like Strikes in Destiny 2, Crystal Dynamics should add a default playlist for Hives at the War Table so players don't need to constantly look for things to do.

Shield Vaults - The other common mission type that players typically farm endlessly in Marvel's Avengers outside of endgame content are Shield Vaults. Adding these playlists means that players will have the option to search for specific missions at the War Table to complete quests or assignments, or jump into the War Zones, Hive, or Vault playlist if they just want to play and level.

Endgame Content

Mega Hive - Finally, with clear daily and weekly milestones to complete per character and a good variety of playlists on offer for players who just want to play the game, the only thing left to address is endgame content for reaching max level and creating new builds. Mega Hives are currently available to complete once per week, and outside of adjusting the length to make the mode feel less repetitive, it's fine the way it is right now.

Tachyon Rift - Next to Mega Hives, the other big endgame activity in the game right now is the Tachyon Rift: Breakout mission which can be completed once a day for the best gear, and farmed for high-level gear endlessly. As part of a very limited endgame, Tachyon Rifts should be utilized as much as possible and be Marvel's Avengers answer to Destiny 2's Nightfall Strike.

Secret Lab - The final endgame mission is one that is known to exist but has never officially been released — the AIM Secret Lab. Believed to be part of the Cosmic Cube update this summer, the AIM Secret Lab is expected to be a Raid-level mission that players can complete once a week for the best gear the game has to offer. All of these updates together would mean players have a variety of daily and weekly milestones for all levels, a variety of specific content playlists to farm with boosted leveling and XP, and three major endgame activities (including a Raid!) to complete once a week for the best gear.

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What's Next for Marvel's Avengers?

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Marvel's Avengers never had an issue with being short of content, having launched with over 80 unique War Zone missions, but Crystal Dynamics struggled to differentiate one mission from another or give players straightforward, compelling ways to interact with the content to level up. With a few minor changes to the games existing weekly milestones, playlists, and endgame, Marvel's Avengers would immediately be in a much better place, giving players clear ways to level, easier access to specific content and the ability to replay story missions, and objectives to complete each week per character and per account.

Once all of that is done, next on the checklist would be revamping outposts like the Helicarrier and Shield Substation Zero to give players more of a reason to visit, doing something about the cluttered Harm Room setup, reducing the number of resources there are, and cleaning up the menus.

Marvel's Avengers is out now for PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.

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