Marvel vs. Capcom 3



After the release of Marvel vs. Capcom 2, Capcom lost the Marvel license and the two companies split off. For their side, Marvel tried another crossover fighter, this time with Electronic Arts, entitled Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects in 2005. Many early announcements identified the game as "Marvel vs. EA", and if you're having trouble naming any iconic EA characters (John Madden aside), then you understand the initial skepticism the game received before it was announced that the non-Marvel characters would be all Original Generation. It sank so hard, Marvel ultimately cut all ties to EA and returned to Activision for video game business.

As for Capcom, they did their own thing, and went on to do some more crossover games with other companies like SNK vs. Capcom, Namco X Capcom, and even animation giant Tatsunoko Productions.

In 2008, after massive fan demand (and the success of Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix), Marvel vs. Capcom 2 was rereleased for Xbox Live Arcade and the Playstation Network, with online play built in to boot. Little did anyone know that this (and the arrival of Tatsunoko vs. Capcom worldwide) would be a harbinger for a true sequel, after a decade, entitled Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds, which is a standalone disc release for both the Xbox 360 and the Play Station 3. The playable roster of characters are:

Marvel
 * Returning: Captain America (comics), Doctor Doom, Hulk, Iron Man, Magneto, Sentinel, Shuma-Gorath, Spider-Man, Storm, Wolverine
 * Newcomers: Deadpool, Dormammu, MODOK, Phoenix, She Hulk, Super Skrull, Taskmaster, Thor, X-23

Capcom
 * Returning: Akuma, Chun-Li, Felicia, Morrigan, Jill Valentine, Ryu, Tron Bonne
 * Newcomers: Amaterasu, Albert Wesker, Arthur, C. Viper, Chris Redfield, Dante, Hsien-Ko, Mike Haggar, Nathan "Rad" Spencer, Trish, Viewtiful Joe, Zero

The characters are rendered in full 3D, with the gameplay stuck in the traditional 2D plane (think Street Fighter IV). The plot of the game revolves around Dr. Doom and Wesker assembling a team of villains powerful enough to destroy both the Capcom and Marvel universes. However, a greater threat arises from their plans that may affect the fate of two worlds... The game was released on February 15, 2011 (February 18 for the PAL region).

Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3, with more characters, stages and gameplay improvements, was released in November 2011.

Ultimate-introduced characters
 * Marvel: Doctor Strange, Ghost Rider, Hawkeye, Iron Fist, Nova, Rocket Raccoon
 * Capcom: Firebrand, Frank West, Nemesis, Phoenix Wright, Strider Hiryu, Vergil

""Marvel vs Capcom 3 is here. I'm gonna take you on a wild ride.""
 * All There in the Manual: The main game says practically nothing about the plot, and even the intro movies aren't particularly telling in that regard. However, the tie-in comic that came with the special edition explains that Wesker had joined forces with Dr. Doom's newest incarnation of the Masters of Evil (composed of M.O.D.O.K., Super-Skrull, Taskmaster and, oddly enough, Magneto), and they plan to steal energy from Galactus himself in order to seize both worlds (hence the big purple guy's involvement with the whole mess). However, it still doesn't say how the worlds crossed over in the first place, especially since the main characters from both universes are engaged on Let's You and Him Fight next thing we know.
 * Alternate Universe: The game has a storyline handled by comic book writer Frank Tieri, which takes place in an alternate universe, Earth-96169, which is somewhat similar to the mainline 616.
 * Ambidextrous Sprite: Averted for much of the cast, but forced to be played straight with others. The gameplay is still 2D, but the character models are 3D, just as it is in Street Fighter IV. Most characters who are visually asymmetrical will have their core appearance visually reflect changing from left to right. For example, Haggar's shoulder strap remaining over his left shoulder regardless of which side he's facing. Nathan Spencer isn't so lucky, as his arm has to switch sides in order to keep his gameplay balanced for both sides of the field. Characters who use a 1-handed weapon, such as Wesker's Samurai Edge gun, will switch the arm they fire with.
 * Announcer Chatter: In addition to the normal announcer that declares simple fighting game terms like "Air Combo!", "Crossover Counter!", etc., a second, female announcer adds color commentary to the match. On the title screen, both the male and female announcer do a Title Drop on the title screen. The male announcer also says stuff like "A new character has been unlocked!" or "Thank you for playing!"
 * April Fools' Day: In the decade in between 2 and 3, there were more than a few jokes played with fake (although convincing) MvC3 screenshots whipped up. On said day, in 2011, an Event was made available where all opponents were teams of M.O.D.O.K.s.
 * Arbitrary Gun Power: All the characters who use firearms, to the point where a good series of kicks can do more harm than a bullet.
 * A-Team Firing: Subverted. In the first intro Movie, Deadpool and Dante can't seem to land a single bullet on the other despite shooting at point-blank range. But damage to every other object in sight, including Dante's longcoat, reveals the truth: they are each deflecting the other's bullets with their own shots.
 * Art Shift: The move from the 2D sprites of the previous games to full 3D rendering --which means that Capcom no longer has to reuse Morrigan's original sprite.
 * Ascended Meme: At the character select screen (courtesy of the announcer) in reference to the infamous "Gonna Take You For A Ride":

""Sorry guys, I've tried to be nice with my clarifications, but you're simply off-base. The MvC3 control scheme is overwhelmingly similar to MvC2. Imagine there was a contest between TvC and MvC2 control schemes, with some people arguing for each side. With the way the controls are at the moment, the "We want controls like MvC2" team has unquestionably won.""
 * A couple of the select songs are also remixes of "Wanna Take You For A Ride" (e.g. the character select screen for the Training Mode).
 * One of the earliest hints of MvC3's release was a tweet on Capcom's official twitter page, noting that they would be making announcement later in the day that was "so pringles."
 * Ultimate ascended a few memes which had become popular in Vanilla, such as a reappearance of Arthur's "Huzzah!" and Deadpool pointing out the resemblance between "Phantom Dance" (i.e. Maximum Wesker) and "Maximum Spider."
 * The term "Stream Monster" is now a displayable title in UMVC 3.
 * Ascended Extra: Ghost Rider, Phoenix Wright, Firebrand, Nemesis, Iron Fist, and Doctor Strange, who all only had cameo appearances in the original game (mostly in endings; a Red Arremer could also be seen in the Ghosts 'n Goblins stage), make the jump to playable status in Ultimate MvC3.
 * Author Appeal: Marvel confirmed that the reason Iron Fist is wearing his classic costume & not his post-Civil War attire is because Capcom specifically asked to use that costume.
 * Avengers Assemble: Put Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor together, and the one on point (only Cap and the Shellhead; Thor will only say his usual quotes) will shout this. Becomes somewhat ironic if Iron Man's on point, as this makes it so that he's calling for the Avengers to assemble, when he's the last to get there. And unfortunately, the other Avengers like Spider-Man, Wolverine, and the Hulk don't count towards this, although Ultimate adds Hawkeye in a similar manner to Thor (He won't say it, but Cap & Iron Man will).
 * The X-Men characters (if Wolverine is the point man) also get a variant of this.
 * Badass Normal: Chris, Haggar, Phoenix Wright and Frank West are a cop, a wrestler-turned-mayor, a lawyer and a journalist respectively, amongst a cast of half devils, planet destroying mutants and demigods. Hilariously, Phoenix Wright in Courtroom mode has the second most powerful hyper in the game, while Frank at Level 5 is arguably the most capable fighter in the game. On the Marvel side we have Hawkeye whose "superpower" is being a damn good archer.
 * Berserk Button:
 * In Real Life, several "fans" pressed Seth Killian's button:

"So to understand you correctly, we can't use Mega Man in any form or make any references (other than as a playable character) without pissing some folks off? I think you need thicker skin. I'd also think as a fan, you should like to see any/all exposure for Mega Man to raise awareness for the brand in any form, even if you personally aren't satisfied by the execution."
 * Seth's boss, Capcom VP Christian Svensson also had his moment, after Capcom's forums were filled to the brim with questions about the game, this force the normally fan friendly VP to declare that no more MvC3 related questions would be answered by him or Seth.
 * An odd example is the X-Factor ability, a literal Berserk Button for your characters in the game. It temporarily powers them up in relation to how many characters you have left on your team.
 * Blind Idiot Translation: The icon for the "Galactic Smasher" achievement has "GARACTIC" on it.
 * Book Ends: In the first moments of the intro movie, Ryu and Wolverine are fighting and Ryu is knocked onto his back. After a dazed second or two, Ryu sees a hand reaching to help him up. He grasps for it to find nothing actually there, then he heaves himself up and goes on. At the end of the intro movie, Ryu is again thrown on his back, this time by the Marvel villains, and is unable to get up. Ryu sees the hand reaching for him again, this time finding that it's real, and that it's Wolverine, who pulls him to his feet.
 * Boring but Practical: Bread-and-butter combos. Also spamming projectiles.
 * Button Mashing: As demonstrated here, this can be done in Ultimate to extend the damage on a hyper combo attack.
 * Calling Your Attacks: You'd expect this with the Fighting Game characters, naturally. But it even extends to the Marvel Superheroes, among others. For this game, this trope was not only kept, but applied to the new characters, both Capcom and Marvel.
 * Card Battle Game: Ultimate adds a new "Heroes and Heralds" mode for DLC that takes the classic Marvel vs. Capcom fighting gameplay and applies ability cards to the mix. To be exact, the player chooses their favorite three Marvel or Capcom heroes (or villains) and fight against heralds of Galactus (read: a team of other characters who have the chrome color scheme of the sub-bosses) to defend and save the Earth. The cards in the game give status buffs to stuff like combo ability, X-Factor, vitality and others.
 * Christmas Rushed: Apparently, Niitsuma wanted 58 characters on the UMvC3 disk, but the game was scheduled to be released in November to boost sales. So we have "only" 48 (or 50, counting the DLC characters that will stay as DLC).
 * Chrome Champion: Galactus' Heralds. The "Heroes & Heralds" mode for Ultimate allows any character on the roster to have this appearance.
 * Clothes Make the Legend: Well, naturally. Though alternate costumes (three for each fighter; increased into five for Ultimate) can represent or homage outfits from past events or continuities (see the Shout Out page).
 * Combination Attack: Double and Triple Supers.
 * Comeback Mechanic: X-Factor boosts the speed and attack power of the current player character. The fewer characters the player has remaining on his or her team, the stronger X-Factor becomes. In addition, it heals HP where indicated on the bar as red--the closer a character is to being knocked out, the bigger the red portion and thus the more a character can feasibly heal via X-Factor.
 * The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: It's very subtle for a fighting game, but the last few teams on Very Hard difficulty gain some bonuses not available to the player, mostly in terms of increased attack speed and priority, as well as the ability to block in the mid-attack. Ultimate ramps this up by making sure that enemy fighters will use the best combos possible to trap you in a loop, and will almost always end it with a hyper.
 * Continuity Cameo: There are quite a few in the Daily Bugle stage, which takes place during a parade. There are balloons of Spider-Man, Viewtiful Joe, and a Servbot. A poster of Spider-Man that says "Hero or menace?" Posters of several playable characters such as Ryu, Chun-Li, Morrigan, Captain America (comics), Iron Man, and The Hulk. Many signs appear on the sides of buildings, such as "Nelson and Murdock: Partners at Law", Oscorp, and "Heroes for Hire." Also, the Daily Bugle (obviously) and the Baxter Building are visible in the background, when the elevator reaches the top.
 * The night-time version of the stage in Ultimate adds a signs referencing Damage Control and F.E.A.S.T.
 * Cool Versus Awesome: The whole reason the game - nay, the series - exists.
 * Curb Stomp Battle: Online battles can be this.
 * Damn You, Muscle Memory!: Try playing Marvel vs. Capcom 2 after getting used to this game.
 * Dear Negative Reader: Christian Svensson (Capcom of America's Vice President) has had enough with the Mega Man whiners so he replied with this on a question of the apparent 'Trolling Mega Man fans':

"Hulk: "Puny man not Phoenix! Phoenix a bird lady. Hulk confused.""
 * The Dev Team Thinks of Everything: The developers put in a feature in the game that monitors the connection habits of players and isolates habitual rage quitters.
 * The training mode has an Internet Lag Simulation setting.
 * Down in the Dumps: The Metro City level.
 * Even worse is the Days of Future Past stage in Ultimate, complete with the "Apprehended"/"Slain" posters having characters of the previous Marvel vs. Capcom games on them as well. Creepy. Plus all the Sentinels Hunting mutants down.
 * Dual Boss:
 * Dummied Out: Frank West and Doctor Octopus's existence in Vanilla Edition, although, Frank was finished up and brought back for Ultimate.
 * Dynamic Entry: Most of the tag-ins.
 * Early-Bird Cameo: Several characters who had brief cameos in MvC3 were added to the playable roster in Ultimate.
 * Enemy Switch-Out: The "Snapback" command that forces your opponent to tag out if possible.
 * Evil Versus Oblivion: The only reason most of the villains are in this fight at all.
 * Executive Meddling: In Ultimate, while the new Capcom characters chosen were staff and fan favourites, the new Marvel characters were suggested by Marvel themselves and Capcom agreed to the choices.
 * Five-Bad Band: Galactus and his heralds.
 * Big Bad: Galactus
 * The Dragon: Dr. Doom
 * Evil Genius: Wesker. Well, he's a cunning bastard.
 * The Brute: Dormammu. His powers are probably the most destructive of the four, at least.
 * Dark Chick/Sixth Ranger: Akuma (he doesn't care much about the fate of two worlds, nor about being an underling; he just wants a perfect opponent.)
 * Floating Head Syndrome: The American boxart, which has Doom and Wesker's heads looming in the background.
 * Freeze-Frame Bonus: Every character in Ultimate is in the full intro, which focuses a close-up on almost everyone and the ones that don't can be glimpsed in certain seconds having battles with other characters like Amaterasu vs. Dormammu (2:53), Jill (She Hulk gets the close up), or Akuma vs. Storm {5:20}.
 * Fun with Acronyms: Marvel vs. Capcom 3's subtitle, Fate of Two Worlds, can easily be abbreviated as "FTW" (For The Win).
 * Idiosyncratic Combo Levels: See it here.
 * Intelligible Unintelligible: All the non-verbal characters (Amaterasu, Nemesis, etc.) can be understood by their teammates while tagging in and out.
 * Ironic Hell: The game has an innovative new precaution against people who disconnect in the middle of the match: Make all their battles against other rage quitters.
 * Jiggle Physics and Most Common Superpower: Most of the Marvel ladies and a sizable number of the Capcom females. Tron Bonne is a notable aversion. So is Maya.
 * Kick Them While They Are Down: The Off-The-Ground hitting attacks, which usually opens a chance to another combo.
 * Let's You and Him Fight: The first intro movie plays the whole "Marvel vs. Capcom" thing straight (according to the tie-in comic, there was apparently a world-merger that neither party was aware of, so both groups believe that the other are invaders) by pitting Wolverine, Iron Man, Hulk, and Deadpool against Ryu, Morrigan, Chris, and Dante. This is interrupted by the advent of Dormammu at the end of the first intro movie. By the time the second intro movie rolls in, the heroes of both sides have banded together to deal with their mutual enemies.
 * Low-Angle Shot: The vanilla character portraits depict the characters as if standing slightly above the viewer.
 * Mood Whiplash: The cinematics tend to cut from dead-serious action to mildly comic slapstick, as in the second intro movie, where Joe and Ammy charge up the Super Skrull's arm, miss, and discover that Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress, or the opening scene in which Thor's battle with Dormammu is interrupted by a comic sequence of Haggar and Felicia failing to save one of his campaign billboards.
 * Muscles Are Meaningless: Generally averted; the characters who are physically-oriented brawlers have the build to match, while those who play keep-away or use weapons tend to be lighter and smaller.
 * My Friends and Zoidberg: When you win a match, the results screen reads "Winner (name of character that got the final blow) ...and Your Two Allies".
 * Name's the Same: In 's ending, the screen says the next match is between Ken and Mr. X. Mr. X is the name of Tyrant in Resident Evil 2, an alias of Dr. Wily, and the name of a character from the Marvel comic Thunderbolts who is also a Wolverine villain. Given that the ending is set in the Bloodsport tournament in Madripoor, it's safe to say it's the latter they're talking about (who has faced Wolverine in Bloodsport before).
 * Marvel also have their own character named Firebrand.
 * With Ultimate's new characters announced, we also have Phoenix, aka Jean Grey, and Phoenix Wright. The game solves this problem by having most of the characters call him "Mr. Wright."
 * The above is Lampshaded by The Hulk of all people.

"Announcer (before the Boss Battle): "The battle for Earth! Live and let die! FIGHT!""
 * Nerf (and Buff): Several characters have been nerfed and/or buffed in the Ultimate version. This is the complete (not final) list.
 * Non-Lethal KO: As standard for a Fighting Game, enemies are simply knocked out, not killed (you can even see the prostrate fighter still breathing). However, the dialogue options for some villains suggest that it becomes the Lethal version shortly afterward -- or worse.
 * Old Save Bonus: Ultimate players have access to the DLC alternate costumes from vanilla as well as Galactus Mode right off the bat if they still have a save state.
 * Perfectly Cromulent Word: DECONFIRMATION
 * Perfect Play AI: This trope returns with a vengeance, particularly on the harder difficulty settings. The computer shamelessly uses input-reading to fight against the player, using the perfect counter to the player's actions within nanoseconds. For example, let's assume that you attempt to jump against Super-Skrull or She-Hulk--instant anti-air grab! Now try to attack Wesker or Taskmaster--immediate counterattack hyper combo! Granted, this is the only way an AI has a chance against someone who actually knows how to play the game, because once a veteran player lands a single hit, the typical combo will automatically KO the character(s) being attacked.
 * Power Creep, Power Seep: Power scales are all over the place. How can Jill Valentine hurt the Hulk with kicks and guns? How can anybody stand a chance against galactic/universal entities like Galactus, Phoenix, Dormammu and Shuma-Gorath? Are Morrigan and Dante fighting at their full power or holding themselves back? Who the hell knows and who the hell cares?
 * Thanks to Ultimate, you pretty much have to expect it for Phoenix Wright or Frank West to be able to fight almost anyone on the roster.
 * Pre-Ass-Kicking One-Liner: There's plenty of it.
 * Rage Quit: The dev team worked to subvert this, with a dose of Anti-Frustration Features for online players. They've been savvy enough to match up ragequitters against fellow ragequitters.'' This also brings the side effect of pairing ragequitters with people with poor connections, but those with good connections don't mind, anyways.
 * Random Power Ranking: The Marvel Power Grid is used to measure the powers of the characters, shown in their bio. In vanilla it had many discrepancies concerning Capcom characters but has since been fixed as of Ultimate.
 * Story and Gameplay Segregation: Some of the ratings should be taken with a grain of salt in regards to how a character plays. For example, Thor is ranked 7 in speed, the highest number on the scale. In-game, he's a Mighty Glacier GLACIER!
 * Say My Name: Characters shout the names of their teammates while tagging out, although several of them vary it up depending on who they're paired with (i.e. Spidey calling Magneto "Maggy", Trish calling for Amaterasu with "Here, pooch!", Morrigan referring to Felicia as "Kitty", the several examples of First-Name Basis, etc.). When used in rapid succession (such as during Team Aerial Raves), it borders on Rocky Roll Call.
 * Sequential Boss:
 * Shout-Out: Check the page.
 * Shown Their Work: The amount of the nods to both the Marvel and Capcom mythos is staggering. Capcom promised that the game would be filled to the brim with Fan Service, including character-specific quips and in-match events. They weren't kidding. For the list of references tropers have compiled, see the game's character sheet and the series' Shout Out page.
 * Strip Club: Wolverine's ending has him going into a strip club to drink and decompress. Then he notices that the girl calling him from the pole is Morrigan...
 * Strong as They Need to Be: You've got more or less "regular" fighters such as Captain America (comics), Ryu and and a Arthur, mixing it up with planet-busting immortals like Hulk and Thor... or even universe-ravaging entities like Shuma-Gorath and Dormammu, who each literally make Doctor Doom seem like less than an insect in comparison.
 * Super Move Portrait Attack: Like Tatsunoko vs. Capcom, the portraits are actually close-ups of the character preparing to use their hyper combo.
 * Synchronization: The end-game Dual Bosses (Galactus' heralds) share a single life-meter.
 * Tag Team
 * Third Is 3D: Or rather 2.5D. Considering that there's a leap of 10 or 11 years between 2 and 3, this is to be expected.
 * This Is the Final Battle:

""I am that god. I... Galactus! And now, because of this great insolence... the FATE OF TWO WORLDS hangs in the balance!""
 * Timed Mission: The final boss.
 * Title Drop: The opening narration for Ultimate drops the subtitle that accompanied vanilla MvC3.


 * Totally Radical: The announcer dips into this with "Dude!" and "Sweet!"
 * Trash Talk: There's plenty of this throughout battles.
 * Troper Critical Mass: When the game was announced, every example of it went into the Capcom vs. Whatever page. It eventually grew so big, (even with all the sorting--as in, subjective tropes to YMMV, etc.--) that halfway it had to be cut into three other pages (Marvel vs. Capcom, Capcom vs. SNK, and Tatsunoko vs. Capcom). And then, the Marvel vs. Capcom page became SO big, with half of it being MvC3 examples... so it had to be cut again. Cue this same page. The best part? The game wasn't even on the shelves yet.
 * Turns Red: X-Factor, which temporarily increases your team's speed and power, as well as slowly regain health. Unlike most examples of this trope, you can Subverted Trope this since you can use it as soon as you start a match. Waiting to use it when 2 out of 3 of your characters are knocked out follows this trope more closely.
 * The Unfavorite: Invoked by Word of God. A tweet by one of the devs cited the targeting of overseas markets as the reason Breath of Fire will once again be absent from a Capcom crossover game, despite that the series has received localized ports.
 * However, Breath of Fire characters do show up in the Heroes and Heralds mode. As power-up cards, but at least it's something.
 * Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Zigzagged. Put a green-haired woman, a white wolf, and a little man in red up to fight a green giant and two people with metal claws coming out of their hands and the characters in some backgrounds will ignore the scuffle -- but others will avidly watch. Even the fighters themselves seldom comment on the strange assemblage that's trying to take them down.
 * You Keep Using That Word: "Deconfirmation". "Disconfirmation" is the correct word in this case.

HYPER COMBO K.O.!!