Returning to Firaxis’ Marvel game has been a great reminder of its relationship-heavy mechanics and characterization of the Marvel pantheon.
Firaxis and 2K’s Marvel’s Midnight Suns was one of my favorite games of 2022, but it ended up falling by the wayside in 2023. Amid a deluge of great games and an busy year, it was hard to carve time out for the tactical RPG. But as 2023 wound down and with 2024 just days into being, I’ve come back to the game and found myself easily re-charmed by what seemed like a fairly unconventional game.
There are plenty of reasons to love Midnight Suns, but all of it is ultimately rooted in just how well it establishes its own spin on the Marvel universe and the characters it has on hand. Much of this can be owed to the game’s social elements—your player character the Hunter has to build bonds with the other Marvel heroes through dialogue, training, and just plain hanging out with them either in the middle of the morning or after a daily mission.
During the social segments, Midnight Suns leans hard into fanfiction sensibilities, which proves to be the right move. An early scenario sees Nico Minoru ask Hunter to help throw Magik a secret birthday party, a thing Blade stresses is a bad idea. Going through with it and not telling Magik leads to a party so awkward that she just eventually leaves and it falls on Hunter to find her. In another, Blade asks Hunter to be a part of his book club so he has an opportunity to talk to Captain Marvel, but Captain America joins the club and ends up thinking Blade’s doing all this to impress him.
