
A few months removed from the release of Marvel’s Midnight Suns, we’re still not entirely sure what to think of it. The game certainly felt different to your bog-standard superhero fare: it fused Slay the Spire deck-building with grid-based strategy gameplay and a Fire Emblem: Three Houses-inspired social simulation aspect. It was bizarre – creative, yes, but given the release’s emphasis on constant communication, we found its writing to be a roadblock.
Given how unusual the game was, it’s perhaps not surprising to learn that it’s been a bit of a commercial flop. While we’re still awaiting the full interview for complete context, Take Two’s publishing bigwig Strauss Zelnick told Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier that he believes the December release window may not have helped, but that he’s hopeful the title could have a long tail, like other products from talented developer Firaxis.
We’ve already seen this release get some pretty deep discounts, and it’s possible that the generally positive word of mouth surrounding it will elevate its status over time. Ultimately, though, while we respect the title’s unorthodox approach, we don’t think the execution was quite strong enough to elevate it into must play status. And for that reason, it’s probably going to remain a difficult sell.
[source twitter.com]
Comments 61
Could have released it earlier than midnight.
I haven’t played it but it looked too much like that awful Avengers game so I didn’t give it the time of day. Same with that Gotham Knights game. I just wish they would make a single player, story-driven game with these characters instead of, well, whatever these games are. Insomniac have the right idea - I want more of that.
Suicide Squad is giving me similar vibes also but I’m more inclined to give that a chance because it’s Rocksteady.
@ItsBritneyB_tch To be fair, this is a single player, story driven game!
It's probably super-hero fatigue, just my thought.
It didn't sell well because no one asked for it. People want to play as the characters. Not strategize and tell them what to do.
as a fan of both the comics and firaxis' games this really sucks to hear, i've been playing the game off and on and think its really quite good, even if the writing is a bit inconsistent
The game is really good (and nothing at all like Avengers or Gotham Knights). The problem that all games are going to start running into is that at $70 a pop, players are going to be much, much more selective. Very few games, if any, are worth that asking price, especially when you start loading season passes on top.
I mean, the price point, okay visuals and some shoddy dialogue probably didn't help.
@get2sammyb Well I am surprised. I only watched one of the early trailers and saw the game artwork and assumed it was an Avengers/Gotham Knights style game (and wrote it off). I feel like I need to watch a few more trailers now to see if it’s something I might enjoy. I wonder if I’m not alone in thinking this?
I'm very much into tactical RPGs and 2022 had so many amazing heavy hitters like triangle strategy, tactics ogre reborn, etc. 2023 started strong with fire emblem engage and there is no end in sight. I wouldn't categorize it under the usual "super hero fatigue" (I hate that dumb term) but rather not enough time for games alone in this niche category.
Coming out the same time as the free-to-play turn based mobile Marvel card game may not have been a good look? I get that they are different games but they are both Marvels characters that you collect and strategize how to use. And 1 is free and 1 is $70.
I played the free one. 🤑
I think this game is kind of a tough sell. It's not easily explained for a bunch of reasons. It's a weird genre-hybrid, only dedicated Marvel fans know who or what the Midnight Suns are, etc.
I'm interested in it but probably for half the MSRP.
Hopefully this dissuades developers from relying on licenses. I like some of them, but it feels like there’s been a rapid expansion of Hollywood into games. Like during the Sony CES where Spider-Man, Hogwarts, and Jedi were the highlighted games.
@get2sammyb
Single player, story driven, slay the spire type tactical game? Sounds right up my street. But then is the social thing about? Is it online?
The thing is though, there is so much to play currently, and this seems more like a Plus game.
@RudeAnimat0r I am that dedicated Marvel stan that's been reading comics for 40 years and knows all these characters inside and out, adores everything Firaxis does, and was hyped as hell for this game...and I absolutely hate it.
I wanted a hardcore Marvel strategy game, not a terribly written dead-eyed mannequin Marvel dating sim with a poorly thought out and tacked-on feeling deck-building strategy mini-game it lets you play between fishing with Iron Man and watching the sunset with Magik.
I think it tries something super interesting, and fails about as spectacularly as a thing can fail.
It's a shame, since you don't often see a lot of experimentation with big budget releases like this, for... well, exactly this sort of reason. Get too weird/creative and you risk alienating your audience. Which becomes more damaging the more money was pumped into the production in the first place.
For myself, I'm just totally burnt out on Marvel superhero stuff. I haven't even played Marvel's Spider-Man yet, even though I'm pretty sure I'll like it.
Except for the fact that there are Marvel characters in the game, a turn-based strategy game with card mechanics was always going to be a tough sell. I don’t see how anyone would’ve thought otherwise, and thus set the budget of the game accordingly. If they didn’t, that’s their own fault.
I'm not really into Marvel much besides Spider-Man and X-Men. I'm also not much of a fan of X-Com so this one didn't really have a chance for me but still sad to see any game that reviews well flop.
If there was not an emphasis on relationship building, I would have made an attempt to play
I've had it since launch day and i'm probably in the minority but I will say I'm actually enjoying it. Shame it's been a flop though 😕
@GeneJacket DC fan?
I kid. I’m actually surprised that it rubbed you the wrong way. I fell completely head over heels for it. It’s a bit ugly, but I found the card mechanics addictive and the social elements felt very classic Marvel. The only thing missing was a Claremont style softball game on the Abbey grounds.
I didn’t find much to fault in the writing either, though the voice work took some getting used to. Then again, I’m a sucker for old, corney Marvel. You know, “by the hoary hosts of Hoggoth”, “I say thee, nay!”, “no quarter asked, none given.”, and all that. ‘Nuff said.
I have never paid 60$ for a game and I will certainly never pay 70$ for a game. PSPlus provides enough "free" games to pay day 1 prices for anything. Gamepass is the way of the future.
@thefourfoldroot1 The "social" aspect is that you just talk to the different characters, and they start clubs, have stories, work better in the team, stuff like that. It's similar to how Fire Emblem does its "Support" mechanic, how Persona does its "Social Link" mechanic, or even similar to Mass Effect's "Loyalty".
It is not an online thing.
@Constable_What
Great, thanks.
I can't help but wonder if these superhero IPs have a stigma attached to them because of all the mediocre and cynical Gaas games that have come out using it.
Regardless, Midnight Sun is a great game. They really should have marketed it better as a single player tactical RPG though. Marketing really failed this release.
@Oscarjpc welp, MS pays less to devs for their games than what they could make in a successful launch having small developers like STALKER devs asking people to actually PAY for the game. MS can do that because they know 90% of people who play on xbox (or consoles in general) don't pay for a lot of games anyway (other than cod).
Obviously you can say the same about Sony and their service so ... a future where big companies decide how much devs are going to make sounds like a sad future for medium size and small devs.
Super Heroes are more mainstream than ever, you can't ask to that population to play an rpg, it's that simple and it's not an "insult" it isn't their thing that's all. Game looks like fun, have heard lots of good things.
I didn't like at all the whole "gold" art direction but I'm interested, maybe in a sale.
It definitely came out too late in the year. They should have delayed it. It missed black friday and came out a couple of weeks after when everyone had already completed their christmas shopping.
There was lots to choose from. Things like GoW2. There was no reason to old out for midnight suns.
I am gonna get it, but i am in no rush. I do agree that it may have a long tail.
I tried playing it, but the dialog was just very, very, very terrible. Really terrible. Not good. I quit after 30 minutes.
Very sad news as its a fantastic game and i really wanted another one.
Still no news on a ps4 version?
I bought this game after Ragnarok and finished it first. Hooked me just like an X-Com game. I hope it eventually finds the audience it deserves!
It came out during a terrible time so it got lost in all the sauce. There was just too many highly anticipated games that came out at the same time as this one.
Because its a card game. imagine hearing a marvel game as cool sounding as ''midnight suns'' and looking at the sick cover only to find out its a card game....
I just lost interest in the game and pretty much forgot about until this article.
One thing that people might not realize about this game is that even though you’re using cards, when your team does their moves it looks f’n sick EVERY TIME. It’s seriously so satisfying.
I plan on getting it at some point for sure, but their CEO couldn't have made a more obvious comment. It was absolutely idiotic to release it when they did. Getting it out before Christmas isn't always the best thing. It also doesn't help that there wasn't a last gen version of the game at release. I get why, but that helped make sure it wouldn't sell that well.
I still expect to have a lot of fun with it whenever I do end up buying it, and I hope they continue to release the rest of the characters for the DLC.
Hopefully things turn around for this game, was a much better outing than The Avengers and Ultimate Alliance 3 imo, and the card gameplay was pretty damn fun.
It did release at a weird time in December though.
Shame. it is one of my favorite games this gen.
I can recommend it very much!
I dont like the strategy games so no matter how good it is i have no interest
I mean, if I play a super hero game, I want to play AS the super hero. Not move them around a board or tell them what to do.
The entire genre just didn't feel like the right fit to me.
I'll pick it up and play it at some point this year
@Oscarjpc Do you really think Gamepass is the future? I keep hearing all these streaming companies (Disney, Netflix, HBO) are losing money.
Once MS starts putting a lot of in house Triple A (50-300 mill costs) games into gamepass and they still don't reach 50 million subscribers I think they'll start to doubt their business decision.
They are the only ones with the money to do this anyway, atm.
If you are a physical collector I'd grab a copy sooner than later. I have a feeling stocks of this aren't that big.
I'm still waiting for some big price drops. 30 Euros for a physical copy is the max I can spare.
3 things turned me off
1) Card based combat. I just don't like drawing cards to fight.
2) Awful team drama writing. Blade at Yoga or Book Club?
3) Superhero burnout
I completed the game just last week, and my honest opinion is that it was a very good game, brought down a notch or two by much too much talking between the characters. I did everything possible in the game, did way more of the side missions than I needed to (which in turn gave me many more rewards, and maxed me out well before the final fights). I probably did something in the order of 100 hours in the game, but the 'social interaction' aspect, which though often interesting, was also often not, probably accounted for around 20 hours of that in total. There was simply too much. I can understand if people simply skipped through the talking. I didn't, but could understand if people did. The battling, though, was truly fun, especially on the harder difficulties, where it certainly was extremely challenging. Honestly, I would recommend the game, and whilst you do need to talk to people in order to level up, you can literally press a button to skip through each conversation, so if the talking aspect is putting you off, you can at least reduce the 20 hours I engaged in that aspect down to more like 20 minutes...
As for the card based nature of the game, I found this to be very good. You had to make a hand of cards with which to battle, you couldn't simply take all the cards in that you had unlocked, and I found this added a lot of depth. I spent a long time considering each characters 'hand', and very much enjoyed the way this was handled. Problem is, I think many people will have been put off by the Developers not going with the traditional XCOM style of battling, but I would honestly say, give it a go, it's a lot better than it sounds on paper.
Overall, I would highly recommend the game. I think many people will have dismissed it rather than give it a go, but if you ever get a chance to play a demo, I would suggest you do, as you just maybe swayed...
I would play it for the tactics and cards, but I just can't be bothered with subpar, soapy "character interaction". I will get it if they offer a gamemode that ditches that aspect and just randomizes the outcomes and rewards.
@Oscarjpc Sustainable for one company indeed and where you have to blast through a game yeah sounds like a horrible future.
Still haven't heard about their massive profits with gamepass certainly at this price point. The US technique is to kill of the competition by bleeding them dry and set their own price point.
Its a Netflix with games the only difference is a movie is 2/3 hours games are like how long so rush through you game or spend not playing 75% of the games before their of the survice.
Multiple versions day one.
Cheapest £70
So much content locked behind different versions.
Much delayed.
Obvious and deep sale prices incoming….
The industry is in a phase of self harm and most gamers are sensible and know how to shop savvy. We won’t pay £70 and still be locked away from content.
Games that do this don’t sell well.
That’s demonstratively true.
@Fiendish-Beaver The problem is the killing amount of games released in such a short amount of time.
I think it's a little bit of overkill that's why it didn't sell that much and it's niche so a little lower price point would have helped and why do they always need 3 versions.
As a niche game it should have had 1 version with everything at a €60 price point maybe a steelcase and artbook at €70 for the fans.
I've been a die-hard Marvel-fan for about 40 years, my superpower is that I'm impervious to "superhero fatigue" and I even bought the Emil Blonsky that was Marvel's Avengers... but at the price they demanded for Midnight Suns gave even me pause, so I can only imagine what that price point did for the more casual fans.
That said, I love the game, warts and all. I'm with @Amnesiac, I love all the old, corny Marvel stuff
If it had been XCom I would have bought it day 1. This looks cool and all, but I'll wait for either a deep sale, or to have less on my backlog.
I'll bet. Haven't even watched a single trailer or gameplay since the meh debut trailer. And I'm still not bothered whatsoever.
@Deadhunter This is very true! I have about 10 PS5 physical games, and 9 have been bought when they went on deep discount, Dearhloop, The Quarry, Saints Row, Returnal off the top of my head.
Only GOW was purchased at full price.
@Deoxyr1bose I don't see a big movie licensing trend, as a matter of fact it is far less now if you think back to the NES days where LJN practically made a video game to anything really.
The price of this in shops has been fluctuating madly: £30 on pc, £40 in some stores, £50 in others and £60-70 online. Every one has criticised the sometimes shoddy script writing, and the graphics look last gen at best. I'm keen to grab it for 40 quid, when it's more widely available at that price, but for anything more, seems a bit of a joke.
No one mentions it, but I think the fact that it was Marvel IP actually hurt the game. A ton of people wrote it off and basically all the xcom/firaxis fans skipped it because of the IP.
I was interested in this turn based game and then heard about the card portion of it and immediately lost interest. Not interested in card based games.
If it weren't for the strategy and card game battles this would have been a day 1 purchase for me.
Now I keep waiting for the day when the complete edition with all DLC is on sale for $25 New or cheaper.
Incomplete product (standard edition) for £70 is joke. Give me complete product (legendary or - how the hell you name it - edition) for £50 and we can start to discuss some business.
Still waiting on the switch release.
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