Marvel United from CMON — Review

I take a cue from the Discerning Gamer and take a look at a game I passed on. Was I wrong to skip this one the first time around?

Publisher — CMON Games and Spin master

Designer — Andrea Chiarvesio and Eric M Lang

Art Direction — Edouard Guiton

Game Type — Card Game, Cooperative, and Hand Management

Initial Year of Release — 2020

Age Range — 14+

Expected Playtime — 40 minutes

Number of Players — 1–4

Theme and What is it?

Evil has struck and it’s up to Earth’s Mightiest Heroes to save the day. You’ll choose an iconic Marvel hero and team up with others to defeat goons, save civilians, battle henchmen, thwart plots, and defeat the mastermind to save the day. You’ll have to work together and will only make on another stronger through the effort. It’s time to assemble.

Marvel United is a cooperative game where card play will decide you’re actions and help the player that follows you accomplish their goals. You’ll need to complete goals by doing heroic actions of daring do and then face off against the mastermind to win this family friendly gateway game.

Initial Impressions

This is a bit of story. When Marvel United appeared on Kickstarter I thought it would be a fun family weight game. However, I was put off because of CMON’s practice of locking characters behind an exclusive paywall. Because of how annoyed at this I was I put off trying this game until I got our Discerning Gamers list of Gaming Resolutions for 2023. One of them was to look at games he had passed on for petty reasons. It inspired me to come back to this one and give it a chance.

On opening the box I noticed that the insert was good quality and the minis looked fine. I was surprised by the number of characters inside as I apparently misremembered that some of those appearing had been KS exclusives. In other words I was not expecting Venom or Ant-man to be included. Beyond that my initial opinion of the game looking very family friendly stood. The question is, was I right?

Game Mechanics

The mechanics are pretty simple. You’ set the game by dealing out six locations in a circle and add bystander and thug tokens to each location based on the card. You’ll then chose a mastermind and set them on one of the locations, take their scheme cards and deal one to each location, and set health for the thugs and the mastermind based on player count.

Each player chooses a hero and takes their mini and deck of cards. The heroes start on the location opposite to the mastermind. After that the mastermind takes their first turn.

On the masterminds turn you’ll turn over the top card of their deck. The card shows how far the villain move clockwise around the circle. This might trigger some location abilities based on the scheme card they end their move on. The card will also let you know if you trigger the villain’s special ability. After that you’ll either follow the special text on the card or distribute bystander and thug tokens as applicable.

The villain and his henchmen might damage the heroes at this point. If a hero takes damage then they discard a card from their hand to the bottom of their deck for each point of damage. Some cards offer alternatives to this. If a hero has zero cards in their hand then they are KO’d and are set on their side to represent that they are immune to damage until their turn.

Then the heroes go. On a heroes turn if they are KO’d they’ll stand their model and draw three cards. If they aren’t KO’d they draw one card. The hero plays one card from their hand and uses the symbols on the bottom of their card and the hero card played before them to take their turn. They can use the symbols in any order they wish. If the card has text then only the hero who played the card will follow the text.

The symbols are a move, attack, heroic, or wild symbol. For each move symbol the hero may move one location in either direction. The attack symbol will allow the hero to deal damage to thugs, henchmen, or the villain if the heroes have accomplished enough missions. The heroic symbol allows heroes to save civilians or be assigned to some scheme cards in order to thwart them. Wild can be used as any of the other symbols.

Play then proceeds to the left. Once three heroes have taken turns then the mastermind goes again.

The hero’s goal is complete two of the three mission and then defeat the mastermind. The mission are defeat nine thugs, save nine civilians, or thwart four schemes. After the first scheme is completed the villain ramps up their attacks and starts going after every two heroes. After the second goal is accomplished the villain is no longer invulnerable. If you complete the third goal all heroes get to draw a new card.

The heroes win if they defeat the mastermind. Evil wins if all of the heroes are KO’d at the same time, a hero has no cards in their hand and deck, the villain finishes their scheme, or the villain needs to draw a card and can’t.

Game Build and Quality

Everything is pretty good quality. The card are nicely done and could use sleeving but I don’t think the target audience will be doing that and it feels like it takes that into account. The minis are all a nice quality and look to hold paint well. The location cards are a nice card stock. The tokens are all a good thickness and clear to figure out what each one means. The only negative I had was I wish the mastermind card was a bit thicker.

Artistic Direction

The location cards are all done in a traditional Marvel Comics style. The characters are all done in a chibi style. I think they look fine, but your mileage may vary.

Fun Factor

This is a family friendly cooperative game. I feel like it’s been designed for new people to the hobby or folks with kids who love superheroes. The puzzle of the game is how to play your cards to help the other players and do your best to deal with the mastermind and their changing schemes.

Age Range and Weight

The box says 14+ and that feels way older than intended. I can only assume it’s based on component size. The base game doesn’t have any hero whose cards felt too difficult to figure out. I think kids as young as 8 could easily play this one. Possibly younger if with adults.

Conclusions

This is a good game. I think it hits the family game target pretty straight forward and does a good job of balancing being challenging, thematic, and fun for that audience very well.

Do I think it’s a great game for hobby gamers? I don’t think so. I feel like the challenge level isn’t there for gamers who like heavier games; even with the built in difficulty levels. I’m led to understand that some of the expansions address this. But I’m not reviewing those and might circle back to them later on.

As for me, I think I’ll hang onto this one and try it with my family and friends who aren’t super into gaming but like superheroes. I feel like this will be a good fit for them. The mechanic of using your card and the card of the player who went before you to determine what you can do on your turn is really solid. Characters like the Hulk don’t have a lot of movement cards but when teamed with someone like Iron Man they’ll be able to use his movement to get around the board easier.

I had fun with this and will bring it out again. I’m still disappointed that a game that feels like I was for my young cousin who loves superheroes but doesn’t play a lot of board games has characters locked behind a Kickstarter paywall. I bring up my Cousin because he feels like the perfect audience for this one but his favorite character is Hawkeye and he’ll never get to play him. I understand that this is CMON’s whole business model, and for most games I get it but when you’re doing an IP based game it just rubs me the wrong way. If it doesn’t bother you then great.

Does that effect my overall score? Maybe. Am I still giving it a high score? I think so.

As I said, I’m hanging onto this one and will probably look to expand my collection later on.

Anyway, I’d love to hear your thoughts. What are some expansions I should look at moving forward? Who’s your favorite Marvel Character? Are you looking forward to the new Multi-Verse Kickstarter? Let me know in the comments, reach out on twitter @stevemayne2 or head over to our discord.

Until next time, stay safe and be well.

Overall Rating — 8/10