For anyone that missed this one when it was first announced last year, EA Games’ Motive Studios is working on a Marvel’s Iron Man game, so here’s the latest on the release date and age rating. With the success of Marvel’s Spider-Man series, there’s definitely a lot of love for single character narrative games, so hopefully Motive manages to make it work for Iron Man.
It seems like a simple formula to take a hugely successful character and turn it into a winning AAA game, but history paints a slightly different picture. Marvel’s Spider-Man is the much-loved anomaly, because a lot of huge comic book game adaptations either to under-perform or under-deliver.
AdvertisementPerhaps the biggest example was Marvel’s Avengers, which had the huge success of the movies to build on. However, reviews weren’t particularly strong and gamers didn’t massively take to the title, so the question in whether or not Marvel’s Iron Man can deliver the same kind of captivating experience that the Spider-Man games have.
The responsibility rests on the shoulders of Montreal games studio Motive, which has a back catalogue that includes Star Wars Squadrons and 2023’s Dead Space remake. The Star Wars experience should mean that we’ll get some good flight mechanics for Tony Stark and the Dead Space credits should add in the required Iron Man suit factor and visceral combat experience.
AdvertisementAs things stand, we don’t know that much about the story, so we’ll keep you posted on big things like who the villain is going to be. We should start to hear more from EA and Motive Studios over the next six months or so, which will help to fill in any gaps and narrow down the release date and age rating look ahead.
Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter to see more on the latest video games releases, and you can see more on the game in the run up to the release with the official EA Games Twitter page at www.twitter.com/ea.
Marvel’s Iron Man game release date latest
As things stand, EA and Motive hasn’t confirmed when the game will be coming out, but we do know that is was in the pre-production phase when it was announced in September 2022. Based on this, a Marvel’s Iron Man release date of Q3-4 2025 is a good possibility.
Triple A games take between 2 and 5 years to develop and with Iron Man and a good size game world to put together, a 3-years window is a good starting point. However, it’s worth bearing in mind that Spider-Man Miles Morales came out just two years after the first Insomniac game, so it can be done quickly, although SMMM had a smaller story and benefited from the game world already created for Marvel’s Spider-Man.
Nobody wants Motive Studios to rush the game, so a 2024 release date is probably out the question, but you never know. Realistically, if it was coming out next year we’d probably know a lot more about the title and have a trailer already, so we will probably be looking at 2025 or even 2026 at the earliest.
Age rating latest
Short of Motive Studios throwing in too much of its Dead Space experience into the mix, the Marvel’s Iron Man game age rating should be similar to other superhero games, so a T for Teen ESRB rating is likely in North America. This usually translates to a PEGI 16 certificate in the UK and Europe, which seems a little high for us considers the movies are usually given 12 age rating classifications.
Advertisement16 is also a lot older than the US T for Teen from ESRB, which recommends being older 13+, so clearly there’s a bit of a divide between the two regions when it comes to Marvel games. There probably won’t be a change to the convention in time for the Marvel’s Iron Man game release date, but we’ll keep you posted.
It’s also worth bearing in mind that there have been plenty of superhero games that have a higher age rating in both North America and the UK. For example, Batman Arkham Knight was given an 18 certificate from both ESRB and PEGI, so a lot depends on the direction that Motive Studios decides to go in for its Iron Man Game.
Marvel’s Iron Man villain options
While the story for the Marvel’s Iron Man game hasn’t been announced as of yet, there are a number of main contenders to choose from in terms of his main villains in the comics. Thanos is probably too much to hope for, but it would be nice to run it back after the bitter sweet ending to Avengers Endgame.
Another good option would be Ultron with the story begging with Tony creating the advanced AI villain only to see it slowly turn against him with notes of Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein. Whiplash is another possibility, but the fact that all of these have already featured in MCU movies as the main villain could mean they’re not on for Marvel’s Iron Man game, and it’s a similar story for Justin Hammer.
AdvertisementOur favorite villain pick is The Mandarin. He was amazing in the comics, but turned into a joke in Iron Man 3, so it would be good to see the character returned as one of Tony’s most feared opponent. The main villain from the third film was Aldrich Killian, but The Madarin is way more impactful.
Another top pick for us is Doctor Doom, but with the Fantastic Four film coming up it seems unlikely. We’ve also recently seen MODOK in both Ant-Man and the Wasp Quantumania and the Marvel’s Avengers game, so it’s unlikely he’ll be the villain again either, and Fin Fang Foom was one of the bosses in the Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy game.
More Marvel upcoming games
In addition to the Marvel’s Iron Man game, EA has also announced that it will be partnering with the comic book giant on a Black Panther game too. This will be developed by a new EA studio called Cliffhanger and was initially announced in July 2023, so the release date will probably be even later than Iron Man.
There’s also a Wolverine game in production with Insomniac Games, which is the might behind the Spider-Man Series, but it’s probably going to be 2024-25 before it comes out. If that isn’t enough Marvel gaming excitement from Insomniac, we’ve also got the brilliance of Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 to look forward to this Christmas with a release on October 20th, 2023.
We’ll update you with more details on the EA Marvel’s Iron Man game as anything new gets announced. You can also check out our computer games section to keep tabs on other releases. Visit the EA website at www.ea.com.
