c"I am, inevita-"
Wait, he didn't finish his line. I- I was waiting here with a really great comeback, but he didn't finish his line.
And now the moments gone.  SERIOUSLY it's not easy for a human to hold all these Infinity Stones at the same time.
I am LITERALLY dying here. and I was willing to do it for the big reveal.
Is NO ONE a professional in this town? Wrecker of worlds? More like destroyer of iconic movie moments. (Nice one)
Forget the multiverse, the meme verse was gonna love this thing. Seriously, though this guy go to crafty or what?
(eating sounds)
Fex Department got a little bit too overeager with their particulate effects. Why is he gone now?
"And I am Ultimus"
What there's a BLUE one now? and he's bigger? AND HE STOLE MY LINE. My agent is gonna be hearing about thi-
*chuckles* Always thought talked too much
*Intro*
Hello Internet, welcome to game theory, covering games both big and small.
Today we're diving deep into one of the biggest games stuffed into a phone yet
Marvel strike force. Now if there was ever a game to prove that big things can come in small packages
Well, this one is it my friends. Strike Force is an official Marvel mobile game operating at
Not just the universal scale, but at the multi-versal scale. Thanos snapping away half of life in the universe big woof
Forget that shriveled up raisin
We got ourselves Ultimus, the big bad blueberry out to take down the entire Marvel multiverse and in strike force
It's up to you to assemble your own squad of Marvel's biggest heroes and villains to stop him.At last count I think there's like
124 different characters to choose from including some familiar faces that haven't even appeared in the MCU yet like the Fantastic Four and x-men
So eat your heart out endgame. This is the most ambitious
crossover of all time but outside of the strategy components
I'm concocting the ideal team structure and figuring out how to best use their abilities and what can sometimes be very long challenging battles
What most surprised me was the amount of plot that's actually put into this mobile game mission by mission
It tells the story of Nick Fury's newest team S.T.R.I.K.E
And since you know that man loves his acronyms more than he loves cats and eye patches
You know that those letters are gonna stand for something strike, in this case, stands for,
special tactical reserve for interdimensional key events
It's not to be confused with the strike that's appeared in the movies a special tactical reserve for international key Emergencies
now if that sounds familiar while it should those guys were in Captain America the Winter Soldier and Avengers  endgame as the undercover Hydra agents
So important distinction to make here early on in the video Marvel strike force equals good guys
MCU strike force equals undercover Nazis
anyway ...
the key event that S.T.R.I.K.E has to deal with in  the game is the threat of Ultimus. Ultimus is a kree warlord and
Eternal wink wink for the new movie who basically played Smash Brothers one too many times and started thinking
Hey brainwashing the good guys to do my bidding is a pretty good evil plan
And so he set off across the multiverse to collect the free will of every character that you know
And love and shove them into red orbs. he's kind of like the Ash Ketchum
the Marvel multiverse. in the game
We are on Nexus earth the center of the multiverse
Which if it falls gives Altimas a gateway to all the other universes and here's where things get weird
you see to stop him Nick Fury hands complete control of strike over to you you the player are simply known as
Commander. Heck! you're not even asked your name until you level up a bit and yet nobody so much as questions your absolute authority
We're talking spiderman Kingpin,Punisher and Nick Fury himself
These are people who do not like to play nice and yet they just kinda accept you as protector of the multiverse
And so that's not me thinking a little bit. Who are we?
Like obviously we're the player but who in this canon has the power to boss around?
everyone from Nick Fury to kingpin with no questions asked in such a
high-stake
Scenario? the likelihood of you just being a nameless higher up leading a command seems highly unlikely considering how robust the Marvel fictional universe is
So then what character do we play here?
Who is the all-powerful commander that we're in charge of in the face of Earth's new greatest threats? Well be prepared to be shocked
it's a name that you're all gonna recognize but never in context like this one and remember since this is JUST A THEORY my
Personal theory these are my personal findings and did not reflect the opinions of Marvel or Fox next the game's maker
they wanted me to include that because
*Whispering* Apparently they're not all that confident in my conclusions
Knowing that we were a commander of some kind I started in the most obvious place
Looking at all the characters from the comics universe with
Commander in their title commander A, commander America, commander Kraken and Commander cypher and all of them washed out pretty darn quickly
Commander Kraken was pretty easy to discount considering he's dead
well
Most likely he's been shot and confirmed dead in the underworld and has also been killed off again in an ironic twist by his namesake
a Kraken
(Trombone noises)
Which honestly is too bad because this guy is a pirate with a rocket pegleg and a lazer
Cutlass. regardless any way you slice it,
This guy is just not gonna be commanding a whole lot of respect from Earth's greatest heroes and villains
Plus he isn't quite fit for space
He is purely a seaman first and foremost .our second candidate commander cypher only appeared in four comics as part of the limited
saber-tooth and mystique series
she's key leader of A, an organization of scientists dedicated to overthrow of governments by
Technological means which didn't seem like the type to join up with Nick Fury's cause here and sure enough
She isn't. no other aim members are a part of Marvel's strike force, or at least not yet
which means that commander cypher also is striking out. bachelors number three and four actually introduced some interesting possibilities the first
commander A real name Kyoshi Morales
He's a Captain America who comes from the 25th century and exclusively appears in the Captain America Corps comics with his signature
Plasma throwing shields. Meanwhile, we had ourselves commander America yet another limited run comic character who's yet?
another descendant of the cap that we all know and love he's a bit closer to the present time operating in the
22nd century. the result of generations of genetic engineering his name Steve Rogers five
Well, it's technically Steve Rogers V
But I'm assuming that he is just a Roman numeral v and while both of these were promising candidates at first what?
Eliminates him both are actually the problems with their universes
You see unlike other main line characters who appear across pretty much every other reality out
there these specialty versions of Captain America aren't
Guaranteed to exist in any given reality with commander A coming specifically from earth
One one eight three one and Commander America hailing from Earth nine Oh, two one Oh. sorry, that's commander, Beverly Hills
I'm an earth nine zero one one zero in Strikeforce. We're on Nexus Earth. Presumably earth-616, and we need a commander
Who either spans all possible realities or just has himself a copy in each possible reality.
These guys are just too special, too limited-edition to do the job. So those four commanders out of the way
I started to broaden my search who would want to protect the multiverse and would have such incredible trust from good guys and bad guys
Alike, well, who else but the creator of the multiverse? big problems like Ultimus require even bigger
Solutions and yes
Canonically there is a character who did make this multiverse and no his name is not Stan Lee, instead
This character is known as the one above all. while often referred to as a he the one above all can take any form that
They choose and so could just as easily be any gender
Just like any of the players out there could be in Marvel strikeforce
But you see there's one major issue with this guy and that's the other players in Strikeforce
The other players are all
Canon as well. You're working with them as an alliance to take down Ultimus
Uniting with other commanders to complete large raids and participate in Alliance Wars. players can even communicate with each other using the in-game chat
Application which is on an unexplained interdimensional network
the one above all
Exists beyond the multiverse having created it themselves
And thus doesn't have infinite different copies of himself running around in all the different universes
So we have to think a bit
Smaller scale and think about a character who exists independently within each multiverse one that can also communicate with other versions of themselves
Freely, luckily Marvel Canon provides us with the perfect candidate and it's one that we all know and are familiar with : Merlin
Yes that Merlin magic wizard tall hat King Arthur's Merlin that guy he is a canonical figure inside of the Marvel Universe except
You know in the Marvel Universe
His name is spelled with a Y because it makes him that much cooler and also that much higher scoring in a game of Scrabble
Provided you're allowing proper names. Anyway, it's worth noting that Merlyn isn't just lightly canonical either not just some passing character in these universes
He's a key player in huge
Multiversal events from the Marvel Canon to be more specific Merlyn has existed in the Marvel Comics universe for eons
appearing as early in the timeline as
18,000 BC but also is capable of traveling through time to be the Merlyn that we all know from Arthurian legend. canonically it
Was believed that Merlyn was born on an alternate earth as a member of a race of immortal
Powerful beings, only to eventually become a student of the world sorcerer supreme
Eventually rising to the role of sorcerer supreme himself. eat your heart out, Dr. Strange. from there
Merlyn becomes a pivotal character in the black knight story arc where Percy ,one of King Arthur's knights ,takes on the secret identity of the
Black Knight in this fight against Arthur's evil nephew, Warden, when Percy ends up losing the battle and dies
Merlyn keeps Percy spirit alive by casting a spell allowing it to pass on to new
Generation of black knights the black knight then goes on to be a recurring member of the Avengers
Even taking over the leadership role at times when Captain America's absent
It's also worth noting that both Merlyn and the Black Knight in the comics have been known to get
With the Eternals every now and then. in the modern age Merlin lives on to protect the marvel omniverse to this very day
in fact Merlin's official title in the comics is
Protector of the omniverse. the title he passes on to his daughter before taking it back after her death. if that sounds a bit confusing
well
That's the point, actually. Merlyn's story even his name changed frequently throughout the comics as his character
Purposefully attempts to confuse and misdirect other characters about his true nature which, wouldn't you know it, is also true of all the players playing
Marvel strike force all with radically different names all with radically different appearances and background stories all within their own universes
But communicating with each other also importantly unlike the one above all there are canonically multiple Merlin's in different universes
exactly what we need for a game that has itself a multiverse of commanders across it's player base and not only that, these
Infinite Merlyn's in their stories have been known to form a gestalt allowing them to freely communicate with each other in order to solve
multiversal threats sounds kind of like hundreds of players using an unexplained multi universal communication system to unite against the big blue baddie himself of
Ultimus. most important to the core of the strike force experience though is Merlyn's ability to travel through time
Merlyn is described as being able to travel through time forwards backwards and sideways
It's a very interesting description of travelling through time
But one that actually makes sense in the context of strike force
You see in strike force a few different campaigns play out simultaneously
The primary heroes assemble campaign starts just before the villains united campaign
But it's clear that they're not totally in sync with one another. at the end of the third chapter of hero's assemble
Nick Fury gets stuck on the wrong end of an interdimensional portal and gets himself captured. this launches an entirely new
Nexus campaign to save Nick Fury
So the player can freely play across any of these three ongoing campaigns at their own pace
but that also means that sometimes Nick Fury will simultaneously
Be captured in an alternate dimension while also giving orders during the villains united campaign
That doesn't make a whole lot of sense right? to a human shield agent
This would be madness but to Merlyn this of convolution of time and space is just his bread-and-butter
Merlyn is one of the very few characters of the Marvel Universe who has such masterful control over time. time travel comes into effect again
as you have the option to replay old battles for rewards.
Clearly going back in time to redo a battle isnt
something in the capacity of SHEILD. Nor is it
within the capacity of most of the franchises' heroes.
I mean, it could be dr.Strange,
but he's already a useable character amongst
the game's 100+ character roster, so it's not him.
Merlyn on the other hand, is
not only an important, well known
figuire, he doesnt appear in the character roster
leaving him open to be the secret
identity of US, the player
character. Even things that are less about
plot but more ovbiously about
standard gameplay actually start to make more in-universe
sense if Merlyn is the character
that we're controlling.As you travel through
your campaigns and raids you have the ability to see
what's coming down the line in the campaign
we get to see all the information about your upcoming
fight's opponents. In raids,
you have a clear vision from the get-go of
all the enemys that you're going to have to fight along the way,
right down to their power ratings so you know exactly
how strong they are. That is not
trivial information, as you can decide
what paths to go down based on what enemys your team is more likely to be taking down and
wouldnt-cha know it, Merlyn, in addition to being a multi-versal being with time travel abilities
also happens to be gifted with foresight. He's able to look into the future and get the
details that no one else is gonna have.In the end it is so obvious
to me and to you, i'm sure, that I've over-thought this game. This is my own personal head-cannon and
and honestly, there's a lot of evidence to back it up. In the end, there's not really one
key element that lets you know they you're Merlyn, but instead, it's a series of hints and clues
that could only lead to one character. One, across the hundreds of characters that have appeared in the marvel
franchise over the decades. The multi-versal nature of the commander character limits our selection massively from the get-go
but once you also factor in the natural cross universal communication systems and time travel,
the foresight, not already appearing in the roster of playable characters in this game only
Merlyn checks all of those boxes. As the protector of the omniverse, Merlyn
is exactly the person to call when a threat like Ultimus shows up trying to take it all over.
He's capable of commanding the respect of both heroes and villains, while being one of the only characters in the marvel system to get
To get away with giving orders to Nick Fury himself. But Merlyn is also limited. He's not some godlike entity that can
change the nature of the game itself, but he's a player in it. His enigmatic nature makes him a perfect chameleon
who can be represented by any one of us playing the game, and he's been known to pass on the protector of the omniverse
title to others, like his own daughter. but today it looks as if though he's
passed on the power to us. Trading in a magic wand for a magic smart phone. Fingers that we don't let that
universe down- BUT HEY, that's just a theory! Mt PERSONAL theory.These are my findings
that do not reflect the opinion of Marvel or Fox Next game maker, Thanks again
to marvel strike force for sponsoring today's videos. If you're interested in plot based strategy games, with
gacha elements then I absolutely recommend giving strike force a try. You know the drill, link is in
the top line of the description.And, to celebrate the new year, the marvel strike force team is giving players a special gift:
A guardians of the galaxy favorite , groot. "I am Groot. You are Groot. We are all Groot, or
at least, we can all be Groot if we play strike force some time in the next 30 days.
I was going to get you all flowers and chocolate for the holidays but I figured why stop there when I could get you all a giant
warrior tree for free in this game! So take on the on the mantle of Merlyn and guarantee get yourself a valentine's day Groot
by downloading and playing the game for free today.
