Marvel has dominated the box office for the past several years, and is now looking to achieve the same level of success on game consoles. In an interview with GameSpot, Marvel Games Vice President and Executive Producer Mike Jones said the company is looking at just about every opportunity to see where new games can be made and who will star in them.
We know that Spider-Man is coming to the PS4 and it’s also been confirmed that Square Enix is working on an Avengers game. However, Marvel wants to see characters who aren’t on the big screen become a focus of new games. “I think we're also interested in plucking some characters from obscurity that you may not have not heard of and making a game around them,” Jones told GameSpot. “I never would have thought my mom could be an Ant-Man fan; she even didn't know what an Ant-Man was until she saw the movie and then, boom, she loves it.”
Not all of these games will be big-budget console releases, however. Marvel has found success in the mobile market, and is looking to expand to other new areas of gaming. “We're looking at mobile and we're looking at VR,” said Jones.
The goal right now is for Marvel to establish the big names first, then the smaller games will come after. “I think from a strategy and portfolio standpoint, we're making sure to get our big behemoths set up first. We have our live-service games, mobile games, and big console games,” Jones said. “But once all of those tent poles are established, I think our next step would be to create smaller, interesting indie-made games. I'm not announcing a new game, but as an example, Skottie Young's artwork would be a perfect match for a fun indie game. There are all of these little things that we think about that we're eager to look into.”
The goal for Marvel games is to be something similar to Marvel movies and comic books: a new way to look at a character. “Reinterpreting characters over the years is what has made so many Marvel characters and stories great,” said Jones. “We absolutely want to carry that philosophy into gaming, which is a space that has had such rapid experimentation and strong artistic vision.”
So what do you think? Are you interested in seeing more Marvel video games? What character do you think would make a great video game star? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.
