Marvel assembling new Avengers game for iPhone, iPad

Marvel has sent out some teasers for a new iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad game that looks decidedly Avengers Assemble-ish. The image above was shown first, with the Hulk prominent and the classic comic versions of the modern movie Thor, Captain America, and Iron Man (with round unibeam/arc-reactor) shown in a broken cityscape within. The title: Something massive is smashing onto mobile from Marvel.

The trailer below below came next, with the Ultimate/movie version of SHIELD's Nick Fury announcing a space pulse and resulting super-villain escape from the Vault prison, and giving the go order on the Avengers Initiative. Again, that pulls a thread from the Marvel Cinematic universe, but ties it into plot points from Brian Michael Bendis New Avengers comic book run. In addition to Cap, Iron Man, Thor (with helmet), and the Hulk, there's also Hawkeye with a mask but not his classic comic get-up, and the Black Widow.

For those not as familiar with comic lore, Bendis destroyed the classic Avengers (Thor, Captain America, Iron Man, Hawkeye, etc.) in a Disassembled storyline, then blew open a prison full of super-villains in order to re-assmble a new team of more popular, Justice-League style marquee names (Wolverine and Spider Man among them).

The Vault files show a ton of classic super villains, though not all in their classic incarnations. Humanoid, Wendigo, Zzzax, a Skrull (replaced with the Ultimate Universe's Chitauri in the movie), Kronan, are focused on.

Nick Fury's final words are that he's going to be splitting up the heroes into individual missions, even while enacting the Avengers Initiative. (Likely to keep gameplay manageable.)

Everything in video games is a re-mix, so it's hard to tell who or what -- or which versions -- will be involved here, though it looks like the classic/movie team with a heavy dose of modern/comics plot points.

Marvel's had a lot of games on iOS already, mostly timed to coincide with their big budget movie releases. Avengers, the smash hit of the summer, didn't get a game day-and-date, so maybe this is it. Everything from the original Xbox Hulk game to the Ultimate Alliance console games to the Spider Man iOS games to date have been good, engaging, action gaming fun, so it's hard to imagine this won't be more of the same.

In the meantime, check out the video below and let us, and Marvel know, what do you want to see in an Avengers game for iPhone and iPad?

Rene Ritchie
Contributor

Rene Ritchie is one of the most respected Apple analysts in the business, reaching a combined audience of over 40 million readers a month. His YouTube channel, Vector, has over 90 thousand subscribers and 14 million views and his podcasts, including Debug, have been downloaded over 20 million times. He also regularly co-hosts MacBreak Weekly for the TWiT network and co-hosted CES Live! and Talk Mobile. Based in Montreal, Rene is a former director of product marketing, web developer, and graphic designer. He's authored several books and appeared on numerous television and radio segments to discuss Apple and the technology industry. When not working, he likes to cook, grapple, and spend time with his friends and family.