Marvel Cosmic Invasion Is December’s Big Retro Brawler Bet

Marvel Cosmic Invasion is not shy about what it wants to be. This is Dotemu and Tribute Games returning to the lane they helped revive with TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge, only this time the playground is Marvel’s entire cosmos instead of Manhattan’s sewers.

Due out December 1, 2025 on consoles and PC, Marvel Cosmic Invasion positions itself as December’s headlining retro brawler: a side‑scrolling, combo‑driven throwback that turns the Annihilation Wave into a four‑player arcade spectacle.

From Turtle Power to Power Cosmic

Dotemu and Tribute Games have quietly become curators of the modern beat ’em up. Streets of Rage 4 reminded people that the genre could have weighty animation and expressive combat in 2D. TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge proved there was still an appetite for licensed, couch‑co‑op chaos built on that foundation.

Marvel Cosmic Invasion builds directly off that pedigree. The camera angle, lane‑based movement and hit stop‑heavy attacks sit squarely in the TMNT mold, but everything is dialed up to match Marvel’s scale. There is more vertical layering in stages, more projectiles to juggle and a heavier emphasis on team‑up attacks that bounce enemies between players.

The most obvious evolution is the Cosmic Swap system. Instead of locking into a single hero from start to finish, you equip a tag‑team and can swap between your two chosen characters mid‑combo. It feels like the spiritual midpoint between classic arcade brawlers and tag fighters, with Tribute leaning into it through shared cooldowns, dual character supers and tag‑in strike attacks that rescue you from incoming damage.

The Full 15‑Hero Roster

Marvel Cosmic Invasion launches with 15 playable heroes, and the lineup strikes a deliberate balance between marquee names and deep‑cut cosmic favorites.

Spider‑Man and Wolverine are here as tone‑setters. Spider‑Man is the agile, crowd‑control specialist with launchers that pull enemies into aerial strings and web shots that pin priority targets for your partner. Wolverine is the close‑range brawler built to live in the middle of a mob, with invincible gap‑closers, rapid multi‑hit normals and a berserker meter that powers up his supers if you stay aggressive.

Captain America and Iron Man provide the classical Avengers backbone. Cap’s kit is all about spacing and control, with shield ricochet routes that reward precise timing and a defensive stance that can parry projectiles before converting into a team‑up counter. Invincible Iron Man leans into ranged zoning, with repulsor chains that can be canceled into flight dashes. He is one of the strongest partners for slower characters, buying them time to close distance or set traps.

On the cosmic front, Nova is effectively the game’s poster child. His dash speed and aerial mobility make him the most straightforward “starter” hero, but his super moves layer on cosmic‑charge effects that amplify your tag partner’s damage. Quasar is the more technical take on energy manipulation. She uses quantum constructs to create temporary platforms, walls and orbiting shields that change both enemy pathing and co‑op routes. Played well, Quasar turns the flat lanes of a traditional beat ’em up into a moving puzzle box for your team.

Phyla‑Vell operates somewhere between sword fighter and support. Her photon blades give her enormous reach and she has a suite of tag‑boosting abilities that buff your partner’s damage and defense if you time stance changes correctly. She rewards duo play, where one player keeps her on the field for buffs while the other swaps in a raw damage dealer for finishers.

Then there are the deep‑cut fan favorites. Beta Ray Bill brings heavy armor and huge hitboxes to the cast, a walking answer to armored elites and boss super armor. His hammer tosses create lingering lightning zones that lock down chunks of the screen, while his flight gives him unique angles of approach against airborne enemies.

Cosmic Ghost Rider feels like the purest risk‑reward pick. His chains and bike attacks devour entire waves when they connect, but his recovery windows are longer and he relies on parries and perfect dodges to stay alive on higher difficulties. He is the character for players who want to push the ceiling of the combo system.

Black Panther provides surgical precision and speed. His pounce routes send him leaping between marked enemies, letting advanced players maintain long hit streaks as they cross the screen. He also shines in co‑op due to his ability to relaunch enemies your partner has already popped into the air.

She‑Hulk and Rocket Raccoon give the roster one of its best pure comedy pairings. She‑Hulk plays like a grappler designed for this style of brawler, with command throws that slam enemies into each other and environmental interactions that let her tear debris from the background. Rocket is a gadget zoning specialist, planting turrets, mines and improvised explosives that combo cleanly into most other heroes’ knockbacks. Swapping between them turns the battlefield into a physics playground.

Phoenix and other high‑power psychics introduce controlled chaos. Rather than making her a pure nuke button, Tribute gives Phoenix a burnout meter that tracks how far you are pushing her telekinetic and flame‑based supers. Spend too freely and you will temporarily lose access to some abilities, forcing you to tag in your partner or play more defensively until she stabilizes.

Rounding out the roster are utility picks that glue everything together. Characters like Rocket and Quasar excel at setting the table, while brawlers such as Wolverine or Beta Ray Bill cash out damage. The tag system encourages you to think in “duos” rather than solo mains, and the 15‑hero cast is tuned around complementary pairs more than isolated archetypes.

A Star‑Spanning Arcade Campaign

Structurally, Marvel Cosmic Invasion keeps one foot in arcade tradition and one in modern progression design. The campaign is broken into discrete stages grouped into sectors of the galaxy, each with branching paths and optional challenge rooms. You can treat it like a straightforward left‑to‑right arcade run with continues and score chasing, or lean into exploration to unlock alternate routes, character skins and lore drops tied to classic Annihilation‑era story beats.

Co‑op is clearly the focus. Up to four players can jump in locally or online, with seamless drop‑in and drop‑out support. Each player selects a two‑hero tag duo, and the game scales enemy health and aggression based on the number of active players. Tag supers become more elaborate with three or four people on the field, chaining multiple heroes’ signature moves into screen‑filling finishers that feel like panel spreads ripped out of an event comic.

Replayability comes from the way stages remix under different conditions. Clearing a level without losing a life might unlock a cosmic rift variant of that stage, with alternate enemy types or hazards. Playing the same mission with different duos reveals new banter, unique team intros and context‑specific assists that underline how aggressively Tribute has leaned into Marvel’s roster depth.

Difficulty Options Built for the Whole Couch

Where TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge already made strides in accessibility, Marvel Cosmic Invasion goes further by tearing down some of the tension between “arcade hard” and “family night friendly.”

There are three core difficulty tiers, each with its own tuning for enemy health, aggression and trap damage. The lowest setting keeps attack windows wide and generously refills your limited lives between sections. It is well suited to casual co‑op sessions or younger players who just want to see every location and unlock favorite heroes without hitting a wall.

On the standard setting, enemies gain new patterns and counter options, demanding more from the dodge and parry systems. Boss fights introduce phase transitions that require coordinated tags or specific mechanics, nudging players to experiment with roster synergy instead of brute force.

The highest difficulty is where Dotemu’s arcade heritage really shows. Continues are sharply limited, friendly fire can be toggled on and enemy elites come in formations that punish sloppy positioning. Late‑game stages begin to resemble pattern‑dense action games, with Bullet Hell‑lite projectile spreads layered over traditional brawler mob management. It is a mode specifically tuned for duo and trio teams that want to grind out perfect runs and compete on leaderboards.

A suite of assist options sits orthogonal to these presets. You can tweak revive timers, set per‑player damage modifiers and toggle simplified inputs for special moves, letting a mixed‑skill group tune the experience without fracturing the difficulty identity of the campaign itself.

Beating Up the Competition

Marvel Cosmic Invasion lands in the middle of a quiet boom for licensed beat ’em ups. In the last few years, series like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Scott Pilgrim and even indie takes on Batman and Power Rangers have all returned to the brawler format. What differentiates Dotemu’s Marvel project is how fully it leans into tag mechanics and cosmic scale.

TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge built its co‑op identity around expressive single characters and simple team‑up specials, a very pure reading of its arcade inspirations. Marvel Cosmic Invasion feels like Tribute asking what happens when you fold fighting game‑style duo design and raid‑like boss patterns into that same template. The answer is a game that still works as a 20‑minute drop‑in session but also supports weeks of experimentation with duos, routes and difficulty modifiers.

It also helps that Marvel’s cosmic bench runs deep. Where many licensed brawlers lean hard on nostalgia for one specific era, Cosmic Invasion cherry‑picks from decades of spacefaring stories. One stage might be a street‑level defense of New York against the first wave of Annihilus’ forces, while the next hurls you into the Negative Zone or has you fighting across the hull of a Kree battleship under incoming artillery.

Crucially, this preview cycle has focused on systems and roster chemistry rather than physical collector’s editions or packaging. Dotemu seems content to let the play speak for itself. If they can deliver the same crisp feel and mechanical generosity that defined TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge, Marvel Cosmic Invasion has a real shot at being the co‑op staple for the tail end of 2025, whether you grew up feeding quarters into cabinets or you are meeting the genre for the first time through the lens of the Power Cosmic.