Sequels have a tendency to not live up to the promise and premise that the first in the series establishes. The Matrix movies come to mind immediately in regards to this, and in the realm of videogames there are many, many examples. The latest addition to this group is Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2. It is not entirely without positives though, the game does take things from the first game that worked well like the cel-shaded graphical style and the ability to actually be able to see what was happening on the playing field. Sure the camera this time seems a little more zoomed in, and this takes away from the ability to discriminate friend from foe, but thankfully there’s no penalty for pummeling a teammate.
Marvel: UA2 has a pretty big focus on the story, with the majority of the game delving into the Civil War storyline that the comic series went through in the mid-2000s. What it boils down to is that Nick Fury and his SHIELD crew have taken it upon themselves to perform an operation which resulted in the destruction of a castle in Latveria. Back home in the USA, the government didn’t appreciate the non-sanctioned action and passed a superhero registration act. This act proved to be a dividing line in the superhero community, with the likes of Iron Man, Venom, and Lady Deathstrike siding with the government and Captain America, Wolverine, and the majority of the Fantastic Four choosing the anti-registration side. The two sides eventually come together to take down a common enemy about 75% into the game, 
so the heroes you wished you could play as will eventually become available for use – so yes, Captain America and Iron Man can team up again.
As the story progresses in a very linear fashion, not unlike the first title, your team of superheroes will earn experience which is used to level-up not only hit points and damage given, but also allows unlocking of powers that use up quickly regenerated stamina. What this translates to is a flurry of powerful moves that can be executed, and only a short waiting period is required before spamming the moves again. Naturally, some are more powerful than others, so sections of the game can easily be trampled by using these powers. In addition to single-hero powers, the series is based around Fusion moves, a maneuver in which two heroes can combine forces and perform a ‘unique’ combo move. I emphasis the word unique because even though there are a lot of heroes to use and therefore theoretical combinations you can make, a lot of the moves are simply reskinned versions of others. For example when using The Thing, or Hulk for that matter – they rip up a chunk of the road/floor/whatever you’re standing on while Iron Man/Gambit/Human Torch somehow power it up before the chunk is thrown on enemies. So what starts out as looking cool becomes boring quite quickly thanks to the high levels of repetition.
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