Until recently comic-book devotees had assumed they should ‘only’ expect a PS4 exclusive Spider-Man title and a genre parody with South Park: The Fractured But Whole this autumn, but evidently that’s far from the case.
Enter LEGO Marvel Superheroes 2, the de facto follow-up to 2013’s LEGO Marvel Superheroes which, unlike recent franchise spin-off LEGO Marvel Avengers, looks set to embrace the sheer lunacy of the superhero world via a gleefully ridiculous original plot.
Whereas Avengers kept its focus firmly on the various MCU movies released to date – from Age of Ultron to The Winter Soldier to Ant-Man – this long-awaited sequel will bring together characters and events from across Marvel’s printed lore as classic and modern heroes and villains team up to wage war on the open-world plane of Chronopolis.
The action won’t be limited to one period of history either; the 23rd major LEGO licensed console effort since 2005’s LEGO Star Wars will let players deploy time-warping mechanics to battle Kang the Conqueror across multiple settings – including Sakaar, NYC and the Wild West – in the campaign as well as in four-player competitive arenas to boot.
If that premise didn’t already sound bonkers enough, then the first full trailer ups the ante considerably, initially playing with fans’ expectations via a neat homage to MCU blockbuster Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2‘s opening set-piece before throwing in waves of comic-book characters from myriad alternate realities for good measure.
Indeed, from Spider-Man 2099 to Spider-Gwen, from Captain America to Captain Texas and from Groot to the ever-adorable Baby Groot, the array of caped (or branched in Groot’s case) crusaders seems staggering at this point and knowing TT Games’ past LEGO rosters, what we see here will probably represent but the tip of the iceberg.
LEGO Marvel Superheroes 2 will assemble worldwide on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and PC this November 14th. Until then, be sure to follow the mantra ‘Keep Mine D-pad’ and stick with us for further details on the crime-busting sequel.