As is customary with games-as-a-service titles, Marvel’s Avengers will have a loot system. This was revealed when WCCFTech (with some questions by Trusted Reviews) interviewed creative director Noah Hughes at E3 2019 following a behind-closed-doors gameplay presentation. Trusted Reviews started off by asking about the endgame loop and how gear customization and loot would work.
Though more details will be provided “down the road,” Hughes said that “It is very much the ability to tailor your build of a hero to a play style, and in some cases, gain additional abilities.”
“One of the things that’s a little bit different than some versions of the loot system or the gear system would be the visual look of your hero is defined by outfits that you’ve earned,” he continued. “And the equipment, your slotting is often something like a layer of armor inserts or technology upgrades or things like that.
“So you can choose your gameplay style through that gear but also still express your visual style. For us, we really felt like if you have a favorite outfit, you want to look right.” This seems to indicate that players will be able to mod their gear for gameplay purposes, while also having a distinct look (which is pretty much standard for action RPGs).
The loot will also have a rarity system, which seems to follow the standard tiers of Rare, Epic, Legendary, and so on. “Yeah, definitely the equipment, the gear that you’ll be collecting,” said Hughes. “There’s plenty of gear that is much more difficult to acquire and it’s going to give you additional benefits. Part of the fun is to start as a very powerful superhero, but through the acquisition of skills and gear, I really feel like your tailoring that character. And part of that is a sense of difficulty to acquire that gear so that when you finally have it, it feels like a story. ‘I did this and now I’m ready for this bigger fight’.”
That doesn’t mean you’ll be swapping out Thor’s hammer or any of the other iconic weapons that the Avengers use for something else entirely. “That’s the balance between the outfit and the gear,” said Hughes. “And in this context, we treat the design of the owner as part of the outfit. So he may have an outfit that expresses the beholder that was appropriate to that outfit, but he may have equipment that he can equip that is not visually expressed.”
Marvel’s Avengers will support multiplayer for up to four players. However, it can also be played offline, and has a “huge spine” of cinematic story content for solo players. The game is out on May 15th 2020 for Xbox One, PS4, PC, and Google Stadia. Stay tuned for more details in the meantime.
