This was going to go on my Gamespot blog, but seeing as that's being a pain in the arse, I've decided to post it here. Because I know that this won't be a pain in the arse.

There's not going to be a traditional Level 3 podcast this week. Originally, the plan was to record yesterday about the 'Soul' series of games (cause, y'know, Soul Calibur IV comes out this week), as well as talk about loads of news items. Unfortunately, a series of events unexpectedly unfolded (me and Jason got called away to family things), and seeing as we're busy the rest of the week, Episode 20 will be delayed. However, in being relevant, there's one news story that we wanted to talk about on the podcast that has a LOT of tongues wagging.

New Marvel vs Capcom?

Long story short - Kevin Feige, who's the president of product at Marvel Studios, was asked about the possibility of a new Marvel vs Capcom game - to which he replied "Yes - and maybe sooner than you think".

Anyone who played any of the four Marvel vs Capcom games (X-Men vs Street Fighter, Marvel Superheroes vs Street Fighter, Marvel vs Capcom and Marvel vs Capcom 2) will know that anything new related to Marvel vs Capcom is a GOOD thing. I mean, we're talking about four great fighting games that people still play. Hell, any respectable arcade will at least have one of the VS games. The Playtime near where I live had one, and the one at Highpoint (look at one of my previous blogs) has THREE (one bigger unit and two smaller ones). I've given this news story some thought, and I've come to a couple of conclusions which, if true, would be awesome.

1. Marvel and Capcom are working on a PSN/XBLA Port of one of the previous VS games

With the popularity of downloadable services like XBLA or PSN, it does make some sense. It'd be less resource intensive to simply port one of the older games than to create an entirely new Marvel vs Capcom game. If this is the case, an online enabled port of Marvel vs Capcom 2 would do nicely. I mean, the game was originally scheduled to have online play (for the Xbox version), and it's bloody hard and expensive to find. Take it from me - I spent a good three/four years looking for a purchasable copy of the game, and when I found one, it set me back 95 AUD. Used.

Hell, Marvel themselves are interested in something like this.I pray something does come out of it. I'd gladly pay for an online enabled Marvel vs Capcom 2.

2. Marvel vs Capcom 3 will be the US Version of Tatsunoko vs Capcom

I was positively elated with the news that Capcom are getting back into cross
over fighters - even if it's a famous Japanese animation studio that few people in the west would have learnt of (look them up - they've worked on some legendary stuff). I make it a point that everytime new characters are announced, they're mentioned on the Level 3 podcast - and there hasn't been a disappointment yet. What's this got to do with MvC3? Let me explain.

Take them for what you will, but there's a good theory that's been reposted frequently on various message boards (and even alluded to in the initial article), that instead of seeing a US release of Tatsunoko vs Capcom, we'll get all the Tatsunoko characters removed and replaced with Marvel characters - and a retitling. After all, Marvel sells here. Tatsunoko...not so much.

The one issue here is IP rights. It'd be difficult to release Tatsunoko here because of how many companies own the rights to differeing characters (similar to how the brilliant Jump Ultimate Stars will never get released in English). With the Marvel franchise, really, only one company owns the rights to make games based on the comics (that'd be Activision - Sega own the rights to make games based off Marvel movies). Even with this interesting situation, it'd be slightly easier to at least negotiate the rights to use these characters than having to deal with a number of different copyright owners to use that character in their game.

Granted, there might be a year or so before we'd see this (unless Capcom have already gotten all the Marvel characters they wanted and have them implemented), but it would be interesting to at least have that game in some fashion. After all, if we could get Doki Doki Panic here (under the guise of Super Mario Bros 2), then something like this isn't entirely out of the question.

Again, this is all speculation and what not, so take it for what it's worth, but it'd be something spectacular to hear something to be released in 2008, or even in the next couple of years with the name "Marvel vs Capcom". After all, it'd give me a reason to post this: