The crossover tag-team lineup of Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite will welcome Gamora from Guardians of the Galaxy, Nemesis from Resident Evil, Haggar from Final Fight and Street Fighter, Frank West from Dead Rising, and Spider-Man from Spider-Man, Capcom confirmed over the weekend. You might notice that none of those revelations are X-Men. MvC Infinite is X-light because, according to the official explanation, who even remembers X-Men anyway? Anyway, watch ’em fight: Biffo! And yup, these confirmations line up with the leaked and datamined rosters – which don’t include a single X-Men character. X-folk have been a big part of MvC all along but it’s looking like they’ll be absent from Infinite. MvC Infinite producer Michael Evans talked a bit around this in a recent interview with GameSpot, saying that the lineup was decided by considering character types and movesets, how they would fit into the Infinity Gem-y story, and popularity. “Then also we talked with Marvel very closely about their future roadmap, about what’s gonna be happening. Your modern Marvel fan, maybe they don’t even remember some of the X-Men characters, but they know some of the Guardians characters or Black Panther. You know what I mean? Captain Marvel may seem like a strange pick, but she’s fantastic. She fits the gameplay. She fits the story, and they’re gonna be really pushing her as a strong female lead all the way up into the movie. We’re trying to take everything into account and choose the best characters.” And yet the incarnation of Gamora in MvC Infinite looks almost nothing like the one known to “your modern Marvel fan” through the Guardians of the Galaxy movies. I do know what you mean though, Michael. X-Men, X-Men, let me think… they have an angry fella who hides cutlery up his sleeves, don’t they? A bloke who sees lasers. Her with a disguise kit. I vaguely recall a lady who makes the weather worse, though that seems a rubbo superpower so it might have been a dream? Doctor Magnethands, the villain of Grant Howitt’s RPG? Oh! There was a girl who hid knives in her shoes. I saw a moody arthouse flick about her – you probably wouldn’t know it, it was pretty obscure. Ah, I shouldn’t be unkind. Neither the decision to exclude X-Men nor presenting nonsense reasoning as the official explanation would have been decisions Michael Evans made. The Internet will tell you that Marvel are trying to downplay the X-Men because Fox still hold the movie rights and Marvel want to focus on comics and characters they can give the full transmedia experience. Conspiracy theories get a touch carried away with the accusations of self-sabotage but yes, Marvel certainly do seem to be shifting focus away from the X-folk who ruled the ’90s. Source: Rock Paper Shotgun
