The DS nearly had a Smash Bros.-style Marvel game

Someone needs to make this happen!

26 December 2022
by rawmeatcowboy 1
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There have been plenty of games over the years that have cribbed Smash Bros. style, none of which have managed to surpass the original. That said, you never know what combination of Smash Bros. gameplay and popular I.P. could pave the way for the next big hit. Unfortunately, there’s one tie-up that might have had a chance, but it ended up getting squashed during development.

The video above details a number of games that never saw the light of day, and one of them was a Marvel-related Smash Bros.-inspired game for the Nintendo DS. This title was in development at Halfbrick, who was working on the game on behalf of THQ. The game would basically take all of the best ideas from Smash Bros. and swap out Nintendo characters for familiar Marvel faces.

Roughly halfway through development, THQ realized their contract required them to publish a game that was a street brawler, rather than a Smash Bros.-style title. This forced the devs to take what they had and rework it into a new genre, resulting in Marvel Super Hero Squad. Unfortunately, this game received a pretty negative reaction when it finally hit DS in 2009.

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Comments (1)

the_crimson_lure

1+ y ago

>"Roughly halfway through development, THQ realized their contract required them to publish a game that was a street brawler..."

So weird that THQ didn't realize this until the development was already underway...