Props to the MPQ Art & Character teams for the female heroes

Zifna

This is something I've been thinking for a while. Given the limitations of the source material, the MPQ team has clearly made an effort to handle female characters in a respectful way. While there are sadly far more male heroes than female, and I'd like to see more ladies highlighted, that is also true of superhero-dom as a whole and you can tell that MPQ is doing their best to keep ladies represented well given the many iconic male heroes the playerbase expects to see. (For example, I don't think it was an accident that Invisible Woman was one of the first 4****, and many of the military goons are women.)

More than that, I think the art team does a really nice job making the ladies look like fighters rather than creampuffs. Psylocke may fight in a bathing suit, but the first thing you see are her blades, fists, and muscles, not her T&A:



The ladies have dynamic poses that make you think "Time for an **** kicking" not "Time for the bedroom", even when, like Original Black Widow, they are apparently going undercover as exotic dancers. =D



It would have been so easy to go a different way with this, to put your female heroes in passive, sultry poses. But you didn't and the game is better for it! So thanks!

Looking forward to She-Hulk and Storm*** (and maybe Rogue, Scarlet Witch, Mystique, and Emma Frost sometime soon? Can't blame me for trying!)

Unknown

And then you look at the art for Invisible Woman and wonder what went wrong.

Though I do agree for the most part - case in point modern black widow. The cover art is gratuitous cleavage and the character art is a bit more modest thankfully.

Zifna

mcheath wrote:

And then you look at the art for Invisible Woman and wonder what went wrong.

Haha, I will admit that after I looked at her art I asked a friend who knows more about Fantastic Four if she had some kind of Elasti-Girl powers... But even so, at least she's not deformed in an exploitative Escher Girls kind of way ( http://eschergirls.tumblr.com/ )

Unknown

Psylocke's symbol though, it's a photo of her thigh. I thought it was a psychic bee at first, but yeah, on closer inspection?

Unknown

synthorange wrote:

Psylocke's symbol though, it's a photo of her thigh. I thought it was a psychic bee at first, but yeah, on closer inspection?

Yeah...I'm not seeing it. It's a butterfly. I has a couple of horizontal bands, like Psylocke's arm/sock bands, yes, but...it's a butterfly.

As for Invisible Woman, I'm kind of surprised she was an early four-star. I don't think there are many superheroes out there who are *less* badass.

Zifna

Yeah I'm pretty sure that is a butterfly.. it looks like one and apparently butterflies are a big motif with her: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psylocke#Characterization


...As for Invisible Woman, I have to admit I am not a big fan of the Fantastic Four. I have read a little, but the group just doesn't seem anywhere near as compelling or interesting as the X-Men, Iron Man, etc. But I know what you're saying... that's why I'm saying it seems like such an intentional decision.

JamieMadrox

The fact that they used the gorgeous cover art of Steve McNiven's Marvel Knights 4 for IW and then sullied the experience with that grotesque character art is my biggest grievance with MPQ.

I showed it to Steve at a recent con and I think he may have cringed on the inside a bit.

Unknown

Psylocke is one of my favorite characters in the game when it comes to art. I also think all her animations are great, although her black needs to be 1-2 sec shorter.
Psylocke and IW covers are also 2 of the best in the game. I generally like covers that show a lot of the featured hero. They don't belong to females, but imo, the worst covers in the game are Punisher's and M.Hawkeye's. You can barely see the characters on them.

farlus

Narkon wrote:

Psylocke is one of my favorite characters in the game when it comes to art. I also think all her animations are great, although her black needs to be 1-2 sec shorter.
Psylocke and IW covers are also 2 of the best in the game. I generally like covers that show a lot of the featured hero. They don't belong to females, but imo, the worst covers in the game are Punisher's and M.Hawkeye's. You can barely see the characters on them.

The Psylocke cover art is my favorite in the game. Then again I'm a big fan of Psylocke.

Chrono_Tata

Talking about female character art, isn't Grey Widow's Pistol animation one of the laziest attack animations in the game? She's literally firing her gun at the floor.

Unknown

Chrono_Tata wrote:

Talking about female character art, isn't Grey Widow's Pistol animation one of the laziest attack animations in the game? She's literally firing her gun at the floor.

Yep, it's called ricochet.

Renaldoo

I totally agree with OP. It's nice to have a game I can actually recommend to female friends and work friends without feeling any embarrassment.

HairyDave

Narkon wrote:

They don't belong to females, but imo, the worst covers in the game are Punisher's and M.Hawkeye's. You can barely see the characters on them.

I don't mind the Hawkeye one - it's not great but at least you can see him, unlike Punisher. I had to actually go and check to see if I could spot Punny and it turns out he's hidden behind the sell button

Mawtful

HairyDave wrote:

Narkon wrote:

They don't belong to females, but imo, the worst covers in the game are Punisher's and M.Hawkeye's. You can barely see the characters on them.

I don't mind the Hawkeye one - it's not great but at least you can see him, unlike Punisher. I had to actually go and check to see if I could spot Punny and it turns out he's hidden behind the sell button

I think the cover art of choice for Lazy Daken is the worst to date, but I would have preferred the 2010 Daken: Dark Wolverine #1 (http://marvel.com/comics/issue/30054/da ... ine_2010_1) and the black/gold ninja suit outfit to go with it, just to differentiate him from Wolverine a bit.

I think Spider-Man might be my favourite cover. It's got *the* Spider-Man pose just right and in the centre.

over_clocked

I didn't even know the Punisher was actually present on his cover until a friend pointed that out for me.