Following the worldwide premiere of developer Crystal Dynamics' Marvel's Avengers, the game caught some flak concerning the character designs. This is somewhat to be expected considering the prominence of the MCU castings of each character, but some expressed serious dissatisfaction nonetheless. The developer discussed these choices at the E3 Coliseum Marvel's Avengers showcase, though it stopped short of directly addressing the aforementioned criticism.

The developer calls its approach to the character design as an "evolving process," thereby suggesting that it could potentially make some tweaks prior to Marvel's Avengers May 2020 release date, but when designing these characters, Crystal Dynamics looked not only at the MCU manifestations of the characters but the rich Marvel history and comic runs as well.

These characters, Crystal Dynamics knew, would be instantly recognizable, yet the developer still wanted to take a unique approach that made them stand out. In other words, certain tweaks were made that would associate the character with its Marvel's Avengers game instead of other manifestations of the character. One example of this is the developer's unique Captain America shield, and this approach presumably extends to the free post-launch Marvel's Avengers characters too.

Although the small Captain America tweak is hard to spot because Marvel fans immediately know his shield, it's not the standard design. Captain America's shield - comprised of the red, white, and blue with a central star - always had said star locked into the middle, but when looking closely at Crystal Dynamics' design, the star expands out beyond the center slightly. Beyond the major character designs of Marvel's Avengers, many will likely want to keep an eye out for these small and unique tweaks as more and more is revealed.

marvel's avengers captain america shield

Speaking of recent reveals, Crystal Dynamics also discussed the gameplay and four-player co-op of Marvel's Avengers during its E3 Coliseum panel. Players will be able to jump in and out of co-op, and it's not locked by story progress. The character design may require some warming up, but this 4-player co-op element probably will not.

Marvel’s Avengers releases May 15, 2020, for Google Stadia, PC, PS4, and Xbox One.

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