Recent rumors suggest that Iron Man's character in Marvel’s Avengers and his appearance in the Marvel’s Midnight Suns.
These games continue Iron Man’s streak of appearances in ensemble Marvel games like the Marvel Ultimate Alliance series and the Lego Marvel titles (not to mention unexpected crossover appearances in Fortnite and the Capcom Vs series), but the chrome champion’s solo gaming outings have been less than stellar. A pair of tie-in titles based on Iron Man’s first two MCU films were met with a lukewarm reception when they were released during the PS3/Xbox 360 era, and it wouldn’t be until nearly a decade later that another standalone Iron Man game would come in Marvel's Iron Man VR release - which itself received a mixed reception and suffered several delays and production issues brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. Still, with Iron Man as popular as he’s ever been thanks to Robert Downey Jr.’s acclaimed performance in the MCU, and the hero making several notable appearances in recent Marvel games, the case could be made for the armored adventure to receive his own solo triple-A action title.
Gaming industry insider Jeff Grubb listed off several unannounced games that he believes EA is working on during his Game Mess Mornings show (via a previously rumored Black Panther title. While Grubb didn’t know which Marvel character will be the focus of this new game, fellow industry insider Tom Henderson would follow up on his Twitter page by claiming that he heard a few rumors that this project will be centered around Iron Man - though he hasn’t heard anything concrete to confirm this yet.
An Iron Man Game Could Learn From Marvel’s Avengers
Like all rumors surrounding supposedly in-development games that haven’t been officially announced yet, it would be best to take Grubb and Henderson’s claims with a grain of salt for the time being. However, there is little denying that Iron Man would be a prime candidate to receive the kind of triple-A video game treatment found in Insomniac’s lauded Marvel’s Spider-Man game universe or Rocksteady’s previous Batman: Arkham titles.
Tony Stark employs a wide range of impressive gadgets and armored suits to tackle any threat, which could make for some interesting combat and transversal gameplay in a hypothetical Iron Man game. A small taste of this potential can be seen in 2020’s Marvel’s Avengers, which allows players to blast A.I.M. forces with Iron Man’s signature hand-mounted Repulsors and take to the sky with some surprisingly solid flight mechanics. However, significantly more could be done with the concept on a larger stage, allowing for free-form flight controls, a wider open world to explore (and fly over), and an expansion of both aerial and close-quarters combat. With a decent budget, Iron Man has potential to look unlike most of the other superhero games available on the market.
The aforementioned Marvel’s Avengers mechanics could be advanced, serving first as a steady foundation for a hypothetical standalone Iron Man video game before opening up to new possibilities. There's a huge ceiling for doing something new - assuming that the recent rumors around the possible EA project are indeed accurate. Iron Man has become one of Marvel’s most popular characters over the past decade, and the time could finally be right for the armored Avenger to take flight in his own gaming adventure.
Source: Tom Henderson/Twitter, The Gamer
