Is a new Marvel vs. Capcom game imminent?
That is definitely what would happen if Capcom had their way. Shuhei Matsumoto, the producer of Street Fighter 5: Champion Edition and Street Fighter 6, revealed this tantalizing tidbit to Dexerto during a recent EVO 2024 interview. But there's a catch.
"The development team at Capcom has big dreams,” said Matsumoto. “Maybe there is an opportunity for a new Marvel vs Capcom game. Maybe there is an opportunity for a new Capcom-based SNK game."
"I don’t know. But, if that were to happen, that would take some time and effort in order create and release those kinds of games, but the short-term with what we can do now is at least reintroduce these past legacy games to a new audience, to people who may not have the opportunity to play it, because it might not be out on modern or current platforms."
“What we can at least do now is to show that, hey, these series exist. We love these games. We hope that you do too, and maybe in the future, if people get to familiarize themselves with these series, then there may be future opportunities to make bigger games."
Matsumoto is referring to the recently announced Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics, which will be released on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and PC. Of course, with backwards compatibility, the game will be playable on the PS5 (sorry, Xbox owners).
This compilation contains a total of seven games that were released between 1993 and 2000. One noteworthy (non-fighting game) title that is included is The Punisher, a beat-'em-up that served as the catalyst for Marvel and Capcom's collaboration.
- The Punisher (1993)
- X-Men: Children of the Atom (1994)
- Marvel Super Heroes (1995)
- X-Men vs. Street Fighter (1996)
- Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter (1997)
- Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of the Super Heroes (1998)
- Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes (2000)
The game is without an exact release date but is confirmed to release sometime in 2024.
Hopefully, the collection has high sales and shows Marvel and Capcom that there's still high interest in the franchise.
Marvel versus Capcom was once the crown jewel of the fighting game community, but many were turned off by the shift in graphic style in the series' last installment, Marvel vs Capcom: Infinite, released in 2017.
That game failed to meet Capcom's sales expectations, selling just 1 million copies while the publisher expected 2 million.