While Marvel has very recently made the promise to go back into console gaming with titles like the PS4 “Spider-Man” game and the Telltale project that’s not currently announced, for the last few years their output has mostly been on mobile devices and PC. Some of those games have been GREAT (“Future Fight” I believe I’ve mentioned on this blog before as one of the finest examples of a mobile game ever, and “Contest of Champions” is immensely popular, to the point where it makes something like $8 million a month), while others… Not so much (stop trying to make “Marvel Heroes” happen, Marvel, it’s not gonna happen). But you might not have even heard of one of their cutest mobile offerings, which, while not a great game in and of itself, is some of the most fun I’ve had with a Marvel product in ages… And that’s saying something!
The premise of “Avengers Academy” is very simple – gone are the avenging, the threats to all cosmos, the struggles and high stakes. Instead, all of our favorite characters have been de-aged to their late teens and placed into an academy under the guidance of Principal Nick Fury where they need to learn how to be better heroes. Iron Man is an annoying teen genius with a gigantic ego, Wasp is a quirky social media star, and Black Widow is… Well, she’s the same old Black Widow, only 16. The game’s biggest strength are definitely the interactions between its various characters, which are taken from all over Marvel canon. The dialogue is tight, adorable and, at times, absolutely hilarious, and the writers at developer TinyCo deserve a HUGE thumbs-up for not only getting the characters so right considering the unique setting, but for also being able to utilize them in such a unique way. As you progress through the storyline, each of the characters you recruit into the academy will have his or her own character arc – often several – that will make them a better person by the end of it, in some way or another. It’s great stuff!
But how does the game actually play out? Well, you’re responsible for three things, basically – one, recruiting Avengers into your academy, which you do by providing them with the necessary material (like books and whatever else they require to agree to study with you), two, building various facilities on campus to provide for the students’ needs, and also sending the students on various missions (studying, working out, training, etc), which earns you materials and progresses through the story. Occasionally, you might enter a themed event which spices things up somewhat (for example, the Guardians of the Galaxy event allowed the characters to combat alien invaders) and allows you to recruit some unique characters to your Academy.
Unfortunately, “Avengers Academy” isn’t perfect, by any means – one common complaint is that there’s not too much “game” in there, so if the story and Academy customization options don’t appeal to you, then you probably aren’t going to find much to like here. Additionally, one aspect in particular that annoyed me was that, unlike other Marvel mobile games (and many mobile games in general) where paying gives you a boost, but is otherwise completely optional, here you absolutely need to pay if you need some characters. Certain fan-favorites such as Quake, War Machine, Vision, Lady Sif and Captain Britain are (or were, at the time when their events happened) premium-only characters with no way to get them for free, which left a very bad taste in my mouth. Still, if you can overlook that and what I described in the earlier paragraphs sounds appealing to you, then you should definitely give “Avengers Academy” a shot! It’s free… As long as you don’t want any premium characters, that is.