Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy Review: a Spectacular Experience

Eidos Montréal’s Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy is an action-adventure game in which you play as Peter Quill (Star-Lord) from a third-person perspective. Apart from Star-Lord, none of the titular characters can be controlled by the player; instead, they are controlled by AI. On the plus side, you may give them orders while in a battle. But that really doesn’t change the fact that it’s one of the most enjoyable single-player narrative games I’ve played this year. So finally, after a couple of sessions averaging about 16 hours each and multiple save files, I’ve seen everything the game has to offer. So let’s take a look at why Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy is likely to be a jewel in single-player games this year, and why you should check it out, in our review.

GOTG Review – A Space Opera with 80’s Beats

Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy game didn’t get my attention when it was revealed due to my expectations being shattered at the time of the Avengers game. But this time Square Enix managed to get it right by removing unwanted online content and tedious repetitive online missions. So to address the elephant in the room, no, the game has nothing to do with the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This is also not a GoTG origin story showcasing how everyone meets each other. In the game, the Guardians are already a well-established team and known for their accomplishments in their sector. But staying true to the comic roots, Peter and his team don’t shy away from dabbling into some smuggling and some non-lethal illegal work here and there.

The story kicks off with the Guardians being completely broke, looking to make some quick bucks by venturing into the illegal areas of the galaxy to capture and sell a rare monster to someone they know will pay good money for it. But Guardians being Guardians, things go haywire, and long story short, they end up being arrested by Nova Corps and get fined for trespassing the zone. But this is not even the main part of the main story. This session is just to introduce you to characters you might not be familiar with. These new characters were known to comics fans, but they have not been given screen time in MCU yet. So without giving any spoilers, the story involves everything from a happy wacky space llama to the mighty soul stone and everything in between. Anything more I say will be considered spoilers and suggest you enjoy the story for yourself.

Just Gun Blazing Takes You Nowhere

The player can use Star-Lord’s elemental guns to shoot at the enemies. Star-Lord is not at all-powerful as his counterpart in MCU. Even though the game shows us that they acknowledge and reference Ego as Peter’s father, the gameplay makes you feel like Peter is just another generic space marine in a familiar universe. And it is supposed to work just like that, and I understand why. The main aim of the game is not to be a one-man army with just playing Star-Lord, but you need to focus on your squadmates. And the real magic happens when you issue commands to your AI controller teammates. With each character taking up the special role as a tank, assassin, and ranged attack with four abilities each, you can chain up some pretty amazing combos and attack patterns once you get the hang of it. The gameplay can be described in one sentence as Gear of War 4 gunplay meets Mass Effect squadmates gameplay, but with no option to take cover. It’s fun for a single-player-focused game.

One major feature I missed was a dedicated Sprint button! Having a sprint button should be the norm especially in games where half of the time all you do is walk and talk. Yes, it really enjoyable to listen to the chatter of the team, and indulge in it with Peter’s own replies. But if a game is giving you a dialog tree option, and expect you to play the game twice, then I expect at least to sprint towards the objectives in the second run. Although you can overcome this by spam hitting the dash button to keep going ahead. But there are times where you are just thrown off the edges of the world map if you were careless in tight places.