Maximum Letdown: Iron Man and X-O Manowar in Heavy Metal (Playstation, Saturn, PC, Game Boy, Game Gear)

Since Iron Man 2 hit theaters this past weekend, this special Maximum Letdown will take a look at one of his misadventures. This disc from Acclaim teamed old shellhead up with Valiant comic’s legendary hero X-O MANOWAR!!! No doubt many of you poweteers are jumping in complete joy over the fact that they finally bought Manowar to video game form. Okay, not really. Many of you are more likely asking just who in the hell is X-O Manowar. X-O Manowar, a.k.a Aric of Dacia is a former Visigoth tribesman who ended up in the modern era after escaping from an alien spaceship and stealing a suit of armor. He ends up teaming with Iron Man to stop Baron Zemo and Mistress Crescendo from stealing fragments of the cosmic cube. It’s crossover madness, but sadly the game isn’t nearly up to snuff. The graphics are horrid, the levels are generic, and the two heroes are interchangeable as they have the same punch, kick, and laser attacks. Supposedly there was some heavy CGI work employed, but the characters are so small and the backdrops are nondescript, it’s hard to tell where. Of course, being that this was an Acclaim game, the play controls are clunky. In short, while this crossover video game received a lot of hype, it failed to live up to any of it. Thankfully, Capcom would do the crossover thing right a few years down the line.

On a side note, isn’t it cold that the SNES and Genesis were left out the loop? Even the Game Boy and Game Gear got a port.