Marvel is unleashing a new character named Morningstar at New York Comic Con, which takes place this weekend. Morningstar will be rolled out on Contest of Champions later this month, but fans at NYCC can try out the character early at booth #1466. Contest of Champions, of course, is a free-to-play mobile fighting game from Kabam, which Marvel initially released on iOS and Android in 2014.

Marvel is rich in video game IPs right now: LEGO Marvel Super Heroes 2 is gathering hype for its upcoming release with various cool trailers; Square Enix is working on a hotly-anticipated Avengers action-adventure game; 20th Century Fox is said to developing a Marvel-based RPG; there's a Spider-Man PS4 game coming up soon; and rumor has it that a Secret Wars video game is in the works, as well.

Related: Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite Adds Black Panther & Sigma

With all that going on, it’s pretty impressive that Marvel has also found time to add new content to a Contest of Champions, which has been on the market for almost three years now. Newsarama shared the Morningstar news from NYCC online, alongside some eye-catching imagery and this description of the character:

Morningstar 3

"She started out as a bloodthirsty and tyrannical queen at the turn of the 10th century who was overthrown and imprisoned in a specially-built 'iron maiden' torture device made to trap the soul of the tortured beyond death. After many years, she has been given the chance for revenge by Mephisto, Lord of Lies, and her iron maiden prison has been transformed into golem-like armor as she wanders the land in search of her infamous demon sword - La Fleur du Mal - currently in the possession of Guillotine, another Marvel character that debuted in Marvel Contest of Champions."

It’s very cool that Contest of Champions gets to introduce its own new characters to the much-loved Marvel canon. It’ll be interesting to see Morningstar in her fully rendered form, and to get an idea of her fighting style. The powers-that-be have certainly come up with a visually impressive design, and hopefully, the in-play payoff will be just as strong.

However, die-hard Marvel fans will remember that there have already been a couple similarly-named characters in the comics: a cult leader named Schuyler Belial took the alias Morning Star in a 1983 Moon Knight run; and a Russian superhuman named Marya Meshkov used Morning Star as her superhero name in a string of Avengers comics, starting in 1992. It is something of a shame that Contest of Champions’ brand new character couldn’t have a brand new name, sans Marvel Universe baggage. But still, Morningstar looks pretty cool, and she should be a fun addition to the game.

NEXT: Avengers Video Game is a Third Person Action-Adventure

To get an early look at Morningstar, head to booth #1466 at NYCC.

Source: Newsarama