X-Men: Destiny

I stopped having "true fun" about halfway through X-Men: Destiny and sadly finished out of obligation and a curiosity to see how the story would unfold. Hopefully, if you're a bigger fan of the X-Men franchise than I am you'll have a better time. Casual gamers should probably skip – this is one for true X-Men aficionados.

The action is fun, if not monotonous, and there is simply nothing special about it at all. Still, I had fun the entire time I was playing the game, and that speaks volumes in my book.

Add in some middling environment and character visuals on top of the lackluster gameplay, and X-Men Destiny has some big problems.

There's no reason to play it, but it is not actively bad the way that some games are. It simply exists to kill time, and to make you think of the six thousand ways it could be better.

Unfortunately it feels like Silicon Knights wrote the story on the back of a cocktail napkin and employed absolutely zero imagination in building the enemies we'd be facing.

X-Men: Destiny feels like a demo for a bigger game that never was. Little of the excitement that could have followed in the booted footsteps of X-Men Legends or Marvel: Ultimate Alliance is buried within its too-short campaign and thin smattering of gameplay. It's Dynasty Warriors for mutants; it can be fun at the outset, even with all the button-mashing, but the boxed-in world is not enough to distract from the hollow feeling of this particular destiny.

We expected so much more. [Christmas 2011, p.65]

Despite a few interesting game mechanics and Mike Carey's writing, X-Men Destiny is a pale adventure with no challenge whatsoever and really outdated visuals. Fans of the franchise would rather play as one of their beloved heroes or villains instead of a generic super kid, that's for sure.

The premise is full of universe-expanding potential, but ultimately, it's undermined by mind-numbing gameplay.

Small annoyances like low quality environments and repeating enemy models may deter some players. One bright spot is the dialog, written by longtime comic book writer Mike Casey.

The good news for beat-'em-up fans is that the combat is fast, furious, and mostly satisfying. The bad news is that repetitive enemy types, lack of cooperative play, and confining levels are decidedly not. Even on the hardest difficulty setting, you'll beat the game within seven hours.

Even for an action brawler, this one is as mindless as they come.

The new adventure of the X-Men is poor and simple. Although the story looked interesting, the result is an average action game, without anything remarkable, that only hardcore X-Men fans will enjoy.

Destiny promised to bring a lot of choices – side to choose, moral choices… but despite on how you decide, the game won't change – you will beat hundreds and hundreds similar enemies. [Dec 2011]

Between those passive tendencies, the lack of strategic combat, a smattering of trite escort missions and the lack of much R in the RPG equation, the total X-Men Destiny package ends up kind of boring. It would've been nice to see Silicon Knights right its up-ended ship, but this game makes me seriously wonder if the studio's ship has already sailed.

About as middle of the road as it's possible to get without being some kind of pedestrian crossing. X-Men Destiny does everything in as average a fashion as possible and then some. Even hardcore X-Men fans will feel let down by the story and action that is served up, and even the few good ideas are rapidly swamped in mediocrity.

Although X-Men Destiny is extremely short, wrapping up at six hours or less, the game's many customization options, including three power sets with multiple individual power options, three playable characters with different backgrounds, and two factions to join, give it a lot of replay value. Unfortunately, other elements of the game are not up to snuff, and it's difficult to recommend as a full-priced product.

We can accept that X-Men: Destiny doesn't look the part, but the gameplay isn't anything to write home about either. The only thing it has going for it is the ability to combine mutant power.

X-Men Destiny is a very boring game. The gameplay is nothing special, the graphics are just not good and we haven't even begun talking about all of the glitches. It's great however that you can make a lot of choices while playing the storyline, but it's too little too late.

A straightforward 5-6 hours action game with very tiny RPG elements. Even a true fan on the X-Men series should think twice about buying this.

Overall, X-Men Destiny is a game you should avoid. It has little in the way of redeeming qualities and other than racking up some relatively easy Xbox Achievements or PlayStation Trophies, X-Men Destiny comes across as an unfinished product that will likely hit bargain bins come boxing day. Sadly, Silicon Knights' slump continues on.

A disappointing game, with interesting premises but with a boring gameplay and underdeveloped RPG elements.

If you can swallow the pad-mashing mechanics and wince your way through Silicon Knights' ham-fisted attempts at delivering back-story, there's a certain satisfaction to be had replaying to unlock new suits and powers.

X-Men: Destiny isn't a bad game -- it just plays like an unfinished one.

Some boss battles are absolutely thrilling, and the plot, while somewhat convoluted, definitely feels like a proper X-Men story, but the dull, monotonous battles and lack of polish hamstring the game.

It's a shame that a clever concept was not given the care required to shape an epic quest with a completely fresh hero. From the short story and flaccid combat to the poor technical skill in the music and visuals, a few scattered collectibles and a handful of Achievements/Trophies are not enough to justify a sixty dollar purchase. In fact, it's probably not even worth the few dollars to rent unless you're a diehard fan of the series who must play every game, whether good or bad.

The worst thing about X-Men: Destiny however is the complete lack of any multiplayer whatsoever. A game like this screams for at least 2 player co-op, along the lines of far superior games like X-Men Legends. Even if it's just so you can share your pain with someone else.

I wish it wasn't true, but X-Men: Destiny is a dud

It's about as bland as a game can get.

It is an amateurish approach to see a waste of the X-Men: Destiny game's potential. It is a pity that another game title of the famous comics brand did not work out and that the reasons to play it can be counted on four fingers of a single hand.

This game's destiny? The bargain bin. [Issue#78, p.84]

X-Men Destiny has only one positive aspect: the screenplay, written by Mike Carey. Everything else, gameplay, graphics and sound, is difficult to define, if not with a peremptory: disaster.

The newest game from Silicon Knights is so mediocre and bland, it's very hard to believe that it was made by the same people who brought us Too Human and Eternal Darkness.

It's as if Silicon Knights threw together a boring action brawler and slapped the X-Men name on it to sell more copies.

The argument has been made a lot in the video game industry. Which is better five hours of exceptional gameplay or twenty hours of good gameplay? Don't worry about that with X-Men Destiny it's not only short but it's just flat out a bad game. Unless you want easy achievement points there are far too many great titles this holiday to waste your time with this one.

Top to bottom, this game feels rushed, a supposition backed up by Silicon Knights' history of protracted development cycles, from which X-Men: Destiny did not benefit. While politics of why that's the case, as well as speculation on the impact more time and money would've had on the game, are ultimately irrelevant to the game's failures as they are, it's not that hard to see how it could've been something great.

In X-Men: Destiny, mindless combat and meaningless choices combine to create a new mutation of boredom.

This game should not have made it past the concept stages, not for a property so well-loved like Marvel, since there's no execution that could have fixed this, either.

X-Men Destiny isn't inherently bad; it's just unfinished and unpolished with a few poor design choices that make for a shallow experience.

If you're a fan of the X-Men, you might find something to enjoy in this game, since there are tons of characters, and lots of powers to try out. But the game is so fundamentally flawed it will undoubtedly disappoint even those committed fans.

An absolute mess that isn't worth your time.

Destiny is so bad that it could force players to question their cherished memories of Eternal Darkness. [Issue#115, p.106]

With a running time of just about 4 hours from start to finish, it seems obvious that you're meant to play X-Men Destiny with all three characters, but there's no reason to. It's repetitive, ugly, stupid, and boring.

If you are an X-Men fan, save your money. If you must, give it a rental. But under no circumstances should you waste your money on this. The less people buy it the better, maybe then Activision will get the message that they can't get away with substandard rubbish like this.

The X-Men don't have a great history in video games but this is possibly their worst outing yet and offensively poor value for money even for fans.

It's a careless, cynical, opportunistic mess that Silicon Knights and Activision should be ashamed to release. In fact, its concision almost comes back around to being a virtue, because at least you can quickly move onto something more pleasurable, like selling X-Men Destiny to a stupid friend you hate, or burying a beloved family pet.

Thankfully short lived, X:Men: Destiny fails to capture the fun and excitement of the Marvel Universe.

X-Men: Destiny fails as a game and as an X-Men property and there isn't an X-Gene in the world that can fix it.

X-Men: Destiny is an ugly, boring, lazy little game. Even if it were free, it would be insulting to have one's time wasted in this way, but the fact it's being sold for sixty dollars rubs salt in the wound. It tries to eke out an existence by pretending to be a far richer and more satisfying game than it is, but the promise of a better experience only serves to hammer home just how bad the final product actually is.