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[dragonzdogma]

As a casual MVC player, I was so excited back when Marvel vs Capcom 3 came out,
I didn't have a PS3 at the time, but when I finally did I got ultimate version,
then my PS3 was stolen and I only got to play the game for about a week.

I fell in love with the roster, the awesome game modes and the online play was not bad at all.

Fast forward some years later and it seemed like the game died, it never reached the hype or popularity of Marvel vs Capcom 2.Funny thing is that the game was still showing up on Evo years later(Game was not as broken as some people thought?).

I never bought a ps3 again I would have liked to see a Wii u or ps4 version of the game,
perhaps a remaster of it?

I wish the game would have gotten more updates and characters and with all the new avengers movies I would have loved to see them add ant man, star lord,and release movie costumes like freakin captain Americas soldier outfits, there was so much potential no?

TLDR; Real reason why the game never was as popular as Marvel vs Capcom 2 and not just your personal feelings, such as "Phoenix is OP, game sucks"

 

[Skilletor]

Your thread premise is wrong. The game never died.

What went wrong? Capcom went broke. Marvel got super popular. That combination meant the license was too expensive to pursue further games, I'd guess.

 

[Warxard]

"Phoenix is OP, game is ass."

So are we like talking about launch Marvel or something

Marvel is (unfortunately) not dead. Marvel will never really 'die.'

 

[Gipsy Danger]

The game couldn't be updated or changed in any way because of licensing reasons I think. And in today's gaming climate that's a necessity.

Although yeah. It never died. It's still at every major tournament for the most part.

 

[GuardianE]

Licensing killed potential updates, but the game has been alive for a long while. I don't think it's quite the failure you're making it out to be. That or MVC2 isn't as big to the casual market as you might think.

 

[akilshohen]

That revision released in less than a year, and then just about nothing afterwards.

 

[Jawmuncher]

No Dino Crisis reps for starters

 

[bigkrev]

Capcom lost the Marvel rights. They can't sell the game (it's why the digital versions were taken off of PSN/XBLA), and because of that, they have no incentive to patch the game.

The game still has popularity, but most people would agree the game really needs some balance tweaks it's never going to get, and it has no chance of ever growing it's playerbase because it's a "dead" game, so it's player population will shrink over time until the game fades away to Salty Suites and side tourneys

 

[JazzmanZ]

It never came to PC thats whats wrong.

Imagine the mods that could be made.

 

[Platy]

I think your question should be more "Why Marvel vs Capcom 2 was such a hit" because Marvel vs Capcom 3 was MORE famous than Marvel vs Capcom 1

 

[jbug617]

If I would like to guess it's probably due to licensing issues and Capcom not spending money on a patch. Capcom had to rush out 2 releases of the game in the same year because of licensing and never really had a chance to patch UMvC3. Also Marvel restricted what characters Capcom could use.

 

[laserlaser]

Not sure but I don't think it was capcom goin broke. It's Marvel sayin "nah we good." Marvel wanted control of their properties, that's why there's only DI and f2p bs right now. No more license shovelware.

 

[Sephzilla]

The game needed balance tweaks for one. It also needed an overhaul of it's matchmaking system because that was hot garbage

 

[kurahador]

The game came out too early. Would've been a huge hit if it was released after Avengers movie.

 

[ZeroCDR]

The first mistake was not making Ultimate a DLC expansion in addition to a new disc release.

The second mistake was releasing Ultimate less than a year later against Skyward Sword and Call of Duty. They should have delayed it to add the 8 remaining planned characters and launch alongside Avengers.. which had no tie in game!

 

[LakeEarth]

As a spectator sport, Morrigan/Doom and TAC infinite really hurt. But as the game progressed, the former became less common due to its strain on the hands.

I'd never say that the game is dead though. Not competitively at least.

 

[The Abominable Snowman]

MvC3 didn't have a huge marketing budget when it was released. Imagine if it got the marketing that Street FighterXTekken had.

Also, UMvC3 got released 8 months later in the same year, Capcom reneged on MvC3 being upgradable, they couldn't do any further DLC characters, reneged on seasonal content outside of Heroes and Heralds mode (even "We've got even cooler stuff coming" from Seth I think turned out to be a lie ), and UMvC3 also didn't get a big push. Sadly it just felt like Capcom was ready to move on from UMvC3 not too long after it was released.

Sadly, Capcom couldn't keep a fire going for MvC although Marvel properties just keep getting hotter and hotter.

 

[L Thammy]

Didn't UMvC3 suffer a lack of updates due to licensing issues? That's usually what I've heard take the blame.

Unless you mean vanilla MvC3, which I'd figure would have been killed by UMvC3.

That revision released in less than a year, and then just about nothing afterwards.

Wasn't that also a licensing thing?

 

[Ryce]

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is by far the most commercially successful game in the series. I don't think anything went wrong with it. It stopped receiving support because of Marvel.

 

[LakeEarth]

MvC3 didn't have a huge marketing budget when it was released. Imagine if it got the marketing that Street FighterXTekken had.

Also, UMvC3 got released 8 months later in the same year, Capcom reneged on MvC3 being upgradable, they couldn't do any further DLC characters, reneged on seasonal content outside of Heroes and Heralds mode (even "We've got even cooler stuff coming" from Seth I think turned out to be a lie ), and UMvC3 also didn't get a big push. Sadly it just felt like Capcom was ready to move on from UMvC3 not too long after it was released.

Stupid H&H mode. What a waste of recourses that could've been spent on a patch. Overpowered healing card combinations meant only 1 hit kill characters/teams were viable.

 

[NEO0MJ]

The second mistake was releasing Ultimate less than a year later against Skyward Sword and Call of Duty. They should have delayed it to add the 8 remaining planned characters and launch alongside Avengers.. which had no tie in game!

Actually, it was Marvel who demanded that the game not release alongside Avengers if I'm not mistaken. It seemed the year it released was the only year Capcom could touch the game.

 

[Anth0ny]

morrigan doom

zero

game felt stagnant. amazingly, marvel 2 never felt this stagnant. probably because the characters were just more cool to watch/fun to play than morrigan, doom, wolverine, zero...

 

[ZeroCDR]

Actually, it was Marvel who demanded that the game not release alongside Avengers if I'm not mistaken. It seemed the year it released was the only year Capcom could touch the game.

It was still a huge mistake, no matter who made the call.

 

[BiggNife]

The game came out too early. Would've been a huge hit if it was released after Avengers movie.

The game sold fine. The main issue was that the lack of updates/patches has resulted in the playerbase getting progressively smaller and at this point only the super-competitive diehard players are still into it.

If UMvC3 got patched to nerf Morridoom and further reduce the severity of X-Factor I feel like there would have been much less of a drop-off.

Although, as others have said, the Marvel community is far from dead. It's still around, just not nearly as big as other fighters like SF and Smash.

 

[TheSeks]

Your thread premise is wrong. The game never died.

What went wrong? Capcom went broke. Marvel got super popular. That combination meant the license was too expensive to pursue further games, I'd guess.

This. The fact Capcom only had the license for two years to where they couldn't make an upgrade killed Marvel, not the community.

 

[collige]

Phoenix fucked up the balance of original, Capcom went full Capcom and forced everyone to upgrade to Ultimate after less than a year, and then they lost the license. It's a shame too, 'cause I would play the shit out a PC version if it existed.

 

[WrenchNinja]

No mega man

 

[MoxManiac]

It could be argued that Capcom forcing everyone to buy a whole new release with Ultimate was kind of shitty, but MvC3/UMvC3 was not a failure. It's a great game that's still played very competitively.

 

[Ōkami]

People seem to forget that Marvel 2 wasn't really all that popular when it came out back in 2000, the game developed a cult status since then.

Given how big Marvel became since then it's rather lucky that we got the game in the first place, not as if the game sold poorly either 2.2m for Vanilla and 1.2m for Ultimate.

 

[-tetsuo-]

Nothing went wrong. Best fighting game made by men. Most ridiculous. Most amazing. Most entertaining. Most broken. Most best.

 

[Hoya Destroyer]

I was super disappointed with MvC3's poor online. Thats what killed the game for me. I thought the actual gameplay was pretty great though.
Im not a part of the FGC, but maybe MvC3 was overall less popular than MvC2 because there were too many people focused on SF4/SSF4? Back when MvC2 was popular, did 3S have SSF4's (peak) level of popularity?

 

[secretanchitman]

Licensing. Marvel (Disney) just didn’t allow Capcom to patch or update the game in any meaningful away aside from character, stage, and battle DLC. I believe that Capcom had financial issues as well but honestly (and thankfully), the game is not dead and is far from it.

The game is set as it is unless Capcom gets the Marvel license back and renegotiates a much better deal (if it’s possible). That being said, I’m really happy it’s still being played today in tournaments (EVO 2016 UMVC3 is going to be a blast!). It is also the most fun game to watch of all time IMO. Justin Wong's performance at EVO 2014? Bionic Arm by Combofiend? So much fucking fun and hype. UMVC3 *always* brings the hype.

I really want to play UMVC3 via bc on my Xbone, or figure out a way to port the game to PS4/Xbone/PC or hell just give us MVC4. MVC is one of my favorite franchises of all time!

 

[Holygriever]

MvC2 only lasted as long as it did because of the Fighting Game Drought of 2000-2008. Once more options appeared, it got phased out. It was indeed very broken. But that doesn't make it bad or a failure.

Neither is MvC3. Other posters already expressed why.


EDIT:

I think your question should be more "Why Marvel vs Capcom 2 was such a hit" because Marvel vs Capcom 3 was MORE famous than Marvel vs Capcom 1

Yep, what she said.

 

[Krammy]

Licensing issues as many people have said. Also if I remember correctly, Marvel wouldn't let Capcom use key characters from the previous games, in favour of characters that were currently being used by Marvel.

The whole thing was a mess, and that's not even talking about the game balance.

 

[iBlue]

I would love to see a MvC 4

 

[Producer]

Other than no updates to umvc3, nothing. Obv there is some fuckery going on with some characters but otherwise its well balanced for vs title and it still gets played regularly 5 years later.

 

[DrArchon]

I'm convinced they rushed the game out so as not to compete with SFxT releasing that spring, so UMvC3 wasn't as big as it should've been. Updating MvC3 in the fall after release sounds cool now in the era of season passes and shit, but buying a brand new $40 disc less than one year after getting your brand new $60 one left a horrible taste in a lot of casual players mouths.

Doesn't matter in the end though. The game is still played competitively, which is insane given the lack of balance updates and monetary support from Capcom.

 

[Mesoian]

From a purely gameplay prospective, there was a lot of imbalance, and rather than punching up characters who didn't have the tools to compete, they nerfed the better characters unevenly, resulting in an even deeper separation of the tier lists, which leads to the situation where almost every high level match is some combination of Morrigan, Doom, Zero, Virgil. The online was initially terrible, there was no matchmaking, lobbies barely worked and the game did a fairly poor job of explaining how to play, even if it had simple mechanics that anyone could learn after an hour's worth of play. The single player elements were paultry and Capcom and Marvel, much as they did with SF5, promised a robust story comparable to a comic book issue, and failed to deliver. Basically, similar to other Capcom fighting games, if you weren't playing with someone directly next to you offline, the game had nothing to offer you. They cleaned up a lot of this with UMVC3, but for a lot of the casual elements, it was too little too late.

From a business prospective, Marvel license becoming dramatically more expensive on top of the parent company (disney) not wanting to deal with traditional gaming outside of mobile due to risky bets on other projects in the past meant there was no reason for them to stay in the game. That and neither side, Capcom or Disney, wanted to do their due diligence in promoting the game outside of competitive scene. They had the FGC lining up at bestbuy's to play the game in kiosks a week before it came out while the rest of the world didn't know the game existed. Something super crazy considering it could have been tied into the promotion of Cap 1 and Avengers 1, and a spirited DLC campaign could have been followed the entire movie MCU to this day.

 

[ZeroCDR]

Yeah in the end it's hardly a failure, despite Capcom's restrictions and Ultimate not seeing any balance patches outside of a few early glitches. It just could have been so much more.

There's enough viable characters for enjoyable high-level play, and the online netcode is fairly competent on Xbox 360 (but paying for online play, yuck). I wish there would be a PC version someday.

 

[tilomite!]

I really didn't like that there was an updated version so soon. Soured me on Capcom and the game.

 

[Jotamide]

It never came to PC thats whats wrong.

Basically.

 

[Deleted member 59090]

The fact they can't sell it because they don't have the license anymore still boggles my mind.

 

[Mesoian]

It never came to PC thats whats wrong.

Imagine the mods that could be made.

Also this.

 

[Mokubba]

Still in the EVO lineup and IIRC Mr Wizard said Marvel's not going anywhere.

 

[Mesoian]

The fact they can't sell it because they don't have the license anymore still boggles my mind.

This too.. Why is this even a thing? With the digital marketplace, you theoretically have an evergreen game. Marvel hates making money instead of kids buying up overpriced used copies?

In a world where this trash makes a million dollars a day, it's pretty easy to see why Disney and marvel don't want to pursue traditional gaming.

 

[SatoAilDarko]

What's crazy to me is that new players who get a physical copy can never get the two DLC characters.

 

[ZeroCDR]

The fact they can't sell it because they don't have the license anymore still boggles my mind.

This too.. Why is this even a thing? With the digital marketplace, you theoretically have an evergreen game. Marvel hates making money instead of kids buying up overpriced used copies?

 

[NEO0MJ]

What's crazy to me is that new players who get a physical copy can never get the two DLC characters.

Yeah, it was a terrible decision locking them like that.

 

[CrashPrime]

Licensing.

 

[PSqueak]

The disney buy out and them beginning to clean up the absolute mess that videogame rights to marvel properties was.

Eventually, i hope, all rights will be sorted out in all media, and talks for MVC4 will begin. They have to! She-Hulk made a promise to deadpool, she'd beat him up in MVC4 too!