Marvel: Avengers Alliance

About

Marvel: Avengers Alliance casts you as a SHIELD agent tasked with assembling heroes and stopping villains from exploiting a mysterious energy source called Iso-8. The turn-based combat focuses on building teams, managing resources, and timing attacks to overwhelm enemies. Each hero has distinct abilities and progression paths, letting you tailor strategies for different missions. The game blends base-building elements with structured campaigns, requiring careful planning to tackle escalating threats from Hydra, the Serpent, and other Marvel baddies. The game’s strength lies in its deep roster and narrative scope. Over 200 playable characters from across the Marvel universe join the fray, including shifts in alliances like Magneto’s SHIELD partnership. Two major seasons adapt events like Fear Itself and Secret Wars, with story beats that surprise even long-time fans, like Thor’s tragic fate. While the 2012 launch feels dated visually, the layered strategy and Marvel lore integration kept it competitive in the free-to-play space for years. Community hubs still buzz about its ambitious take on superhero team tactics.

Storyline

The player is a new S.H.I.E.L.D. recruit, dispatched by Nick Fury and Maria Hill, as an unknown event, referred as "The Pulse" causes a strange material known as Iso-8 to emerge on Earth. The material has various properties, but is primarily used in the game to power up characters. The player is charged with joining various heroes in battle to take down numerous villains who are all aiming to gather and use Is-8 for their own nefarious purposes. As the game advances, more heroes join the conflict as playable characters. The game had 2 seasons; Season 1 was an original plot where Hydra was eventually revealed to be using Iso-8 to resurrect Red Skull, which results in Magneto turning over to fight alongside S.H.I.E.L.D.; Many other villains would follow suit. Season 2 was heavily inspired by the Fear Itself story-line but also contained other details such as Incursions as part of Time Runs Out, that would eventually lead into Secret Wars. Season 2 ended with the defeat of the Serpent, at the cost of the lives of Thor and Jane Foster (as Mighty Thor, who arrived via Incursion).