Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy

I am just as surprised as the rest of you that there’s a great Guardians of the Galaxy game that vaguely resembles Mass Effect’s squad-based third-person shooter action, but it’s true! Eidos’ stab at Marvel’s beloved found family of screw-ups and intergalactic criminals has way more going for it than first meets the eye. I don’t love the characterization of some of the Guardians in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but this game takes them surprisingly seriously, and characters like Drax and Mantis benefit greatly from a story that lets them shine rather than relegating them to the role of bit player. It’s also just fun getting to play in Marvel’s cosmos rather than settling for looking at it on the big screen.

Its gameplay, which places you in Star-Lord’s boots, allows you to issue commands to the likes of Groot, Rocket Raccoon, Drax, and Gamora. It’s a bit simplistic in action, and never grows too deep in complexity, but it’s also a fluid system that rarely falters. It gets you from point A to point B, which is all you’re really going to want to accomplish, because the real draw of the game is its characters, the banter between them, and the direction of its story, which centers their individual grief and troubled pasts. It’s familiar territory for Guardians of the Galaxy, and just like the movies and comics about them, the resolutions are heartwarming—except now all of that charm is blown up to a game that takes all of about a weekend to blast through. You can and should pick up Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy while it’s on sale for $12.