Avengers Alliance

Rating: 3 out of 3 Stars (why only 3 possible stars?)

Genre: RPG; Sub-Genre: Party-based, Turn-based, Social Game

ESRB: N/A (mild violence and shapely women, I'd give it an E10+)

Estimated hours of gameplay (thorough play/quick play): Infinite/40?

Developer: Playdom 

Wiki page

It's about time I review this game. Hell, I've been playing it for almost a year now. I've been putting it off for two reasons: firstly that I always want to complete a thorough play-through before I form an opinion. This game doesn't have an ending, but I'm level 200 and have 5-starred every single mission (except on chapter 11, which was released this week). The second is that it is a Facebook game and I generally don't consider those to be "games." That might sound like strange logic to some, but you can't compare your average Angry Birds to something like Mass Effect; that'd be like comparing apples to a seven course meal. The sheer quality and amount of content of this game makes me willing to consider it a full-blooded game so that's what makes me willing to review it. Don't be mistaken, though. This game still has all the normal pitfalls of a social game that runs on microtransactions. In that sense, it is EXACTLY as terrible as any other crappy Facebook or mobile game.

See that? $200! Just so you know, 1040 gold is definitely not infinite money.
Nor does it remove the energy or ISO limitations on play time.

At first I thought gold was just going to be something that allowed you to speed up the game. For example, you can use it to buy command points so you can unlock new heroes faster. But then there's a bunch of ultra powerful items and PvP bonuses that can only be purchased with gold. To be specific, you earn gold from leveling up and getting a 4th star on a mission. But the best items usually cost 64 gold.  That's either 64 levels or 64 four-star's saved up to buy one thing! And these items are generally only available for a week which makes it impossible to ever save up for something specific. Also, the sheer number of things that can be sped up with excessive amounts of gold is staggering. You WILL meet people who have clearly spent hundreds or thousands of dollars on this game if you try out the PvP, too. After my experience with MMO's and the never-ending war that is dealing with gold sellers, I can honestly say that I am now perfectly fine with a developer selling gold themselves. But to so blatantly exploit your own in-game economy and take it to such absurd extremes in terms of buying progression and power? It makes me dread the future. Let me get this off my mind by moving on to gameplay.

I would talk about the story, but honestly I've been skipping over it. I feel like I'm a teenager again skipping all these cutscenes... ugh. But it's just a bunch of name dropping of various Marvel characters while you fight through hordes of trash mob's before a major villain appears as a boss. The player character is actually a non-Marvel character. Rather, he or she is a personalized S.H.I.E.L.D Agent rookie. There's some crap about this substance called ISO-8 making all these petty thugs walking the streets into super villains or something. Whatever. The gameplay, on the other hand, is quite well done. It's an old-fashioned RPG where no one can move and each side just flings crap at the people in front of them (like the old Final Fantasy games and such). What makes it stand out from those terrible, terrible JRPG's is that you have actual variety and tactics to your abilities. Not only that, but there is no default attack and the game actually presents something of a challenge (especially when you are under-geared) so you almost never waltz your way through a fight by hitting the same attack button over and over again. The class system is a simple "rock, paper, scissors" design, but the unique abilities each hero has is what defines them anyway. And a lot of the heroes are pretty clever; they fight like they do in the comics using both active and passive abilities that fit their personality and backstory. Although some of them are remarkably bad, both power-wise and being completely off character in terms of what their move-sets are (Luke Cage and Gambit, for example). And I'm not convinced that Playdom has ANY idea on how to properly balance a character, but it is very clear they are at least trying to be creative, faithful, and make each character useful... well, the newer ones anyway. Ahem, CAPTAIN BRITAIN.

Regardless of whose turn it actually is, it is Captain Britain's turn. Don't ask questions.

The real deal with this game is the PvP, though. I was actually considering trying to cut this game out of my life because I felt I simply had enough. But then PvP got an upgrade and now I'm more stuck than ever before! Originally, the PvP was simply a way for players to goof around and have little exhibitions just for fun. And it isn't even real PvP because the player on defense is controlled by the computer. That made it seem even more frivolous. But then they started having tournaments and having prizes for placing anywhere from "participant" to "top 0.5%" (originally it was the top 1000 players). It still utilizes the computer to control players on defense, though. I could see how many would find just that element to make the game silly, non-competitive, and down-right cheap. But I'm very fine with it because I've played turn-based games with PvP before and it's always awkward as hell. Also, this means the game can retain what makes it fun by not having to worry about your opponent's connection issues or wait for them to take their turn. HOWEVER, as I pointed out earlier, you can cheat like crazy by simply throwing all your real world money away. I've competed in every tournament thus far, and have been as high as top 0.6% (sooo close to top prize, agh!). I do have a fair amount of gold-purchased items, but it's really modest. The point is, if you're willing to take the game seriously you probably should consider spending at least a few bucks on it. I mean, if you really LIKE a game then the developers deserve a little cash, don't they? So if you turn your RPG diligence up as far as it can go and shell out a few bucks you can enjoy yourself a little competition. Just try not to get too frustrated with these people who don't value their cash... or their lives.

This guy had Hank Pym recruited on just the second day of his Spec Ops. Just throwing gold away, huh?

I should point out that if you do start playing and plan on doing PvP that you will have a LONG road ahead of you. I'd bet about 40 gameplay hours will be required before you have any kind of gear, heroes, and proper strategies in your head. And then even if you do all that you will be missing TONS of limited edition characters and items that other players earned months ago. The lower level brackets are much more forgiving, though. Most of these badasses exist around level 150+. And there are some really good heroes and items you can get that are not limited edition (like Captain Britain and the generalist uniform, respectively).

Conclusion:

If you love RPG's and comics, this game is amazing. You can take it casually and play completely for free just by having a Facebook account. Don't spend any money on it unless you really want to take it seriously. You will also need an iron gut to stomach all the crappy "Social game" aspects.

As far as I've seen, this is the best Facebook game out there because it's actually a damn game. Shut up, Farmville and Angry Birds. Just shut up.