The new Champion System from Marvel’s Avengers allows max-level characters to continue earning XP for newly implemented skills. This is good news, given that the Marvel superhero game is set to continue updating for the foreseeable future. Crystal Dynamics revealed a roadmap for the game a couple of months ago, detailing a lineup of events set to launch in the next few months and beyond. The Red Room Takeover event will launch later this month, and the more substantial Black Panther expansion will arrive sometime around the summer.
Recent attention for Marvel’s Avengers has centered around newly announced skins inspired by the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Both Black Widow and Hawkeye received skins modeled after their outfits in Avengers: Endgame, which are fairly accurate despite some noticeable changes to the characters’ hair. Though these updates were decidedly cosmetic, it appears that more substantive changes for the game are on the way.
In a post on Square Enix’s blog, Crystal Dynamics announced the Champion System for Marvel’s Avengers, allowing fully-leveled characters to keep gaining XP for newly added skills. Characters at the max level will earn Champion XP, which unlocks Champion Skills that affect stats like damage, perk chance activation, and heroic charge rate. The four categories for the Champion Skills are Combat Boosts, Tactical Boosts, Utility Boosts, and Defensive Boosts. The new system appears to arrive on May 20 with Black Widow’s event.
The blog post also detailed the upcoming Red Room Takeover event, which will feature multiple single-player HARM Room challenges hacked by Yelena Belova, the mastermind behind the Rooskaya Protocols. That event will run from May 20 to May 31. Crystal Dynamics also revealed Hero’s Catalysts, which will essentially serve as XP boosts to quickly level up characters. These Hero’s Catalysts will periodically appear in the game’s marketplace.
A lack of substantial reasons to jump back into Marvel’s Avengers has plagued the game for a while. Despite some character drops with Kate Bishop and Clint Barton, the superhero game largely features repetitive content that quickly bored players. Fans even criticized Marvel's Avengers newly released content and skins for being locked behind a paywall. Though the new Champion System doesn’t offer a dramatic change to the game’s content, it is certainly a welcome addition that encourages fans to progress their favorite heroes. Similar multiplayer games like Destiny feature new XP categories once a character reaches max level. Now that this system is being implemented into the game, players will be able to finely tune their characters to their liking.
While the Champion System is likely the main draw for veteran players, the Hero’s Catalysts seem like a nice addition for new owners of the game. Running some missions with the boosts applied will allow new players to level up characters quickly to achieve parody with their friends’ max-level characters. With this addition and the newly-added campaign replay option, Crystal Dynamics is certainly incentivizing fans to jump back into Marvel’s Avengers.
Marvel's Avengers is available now on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and PC.
Source: Crystal Dynamics