'Marvel's Midnight Suns: The Art of the Game' Book Now Available in Stores

From Titan Books, discover the official art book of the Marvel’s Midnight Suns video game, packed with interviews with the creative team behind the game, as well as stunning concept art created during the development process.

When the demonic Lilith and her fearsome horde unite with the evil armies of Hydra, it’s time to unleash Marvel’s dark side. As The Hunter, your mission is to lead an unlikely team of seasoned Super Heroes and dangerous supernatural warriors to victory. Can legends such as Doctor Strange, Iron Man, and Blade put aside their differences in the face of a growing apocalyptic threat? If you’re going to save the world, you’ll have to forge alliances and lead the team into battle as the legendary Midnight Suns—Earth’s last line of defense against the underworld.

Marvel’s Midnight Suns: The Art of the Game captures the creative process of this much-anticipated game. The exclusive concept art and in-game renderings created by the talented development team—creating the game in collaboration with Marvel—are shown in glorious detail in this lush, hardback volume. Characters, locations, gadgets, weapons, monsters, enemies, and much more are all accompanied by unique insights from the artists and developers behind the game. So, step into the world of Marvel’s Midnight Suns—and rise up against the darkness!

Read an excerpt from 'Marvel's Midnight Suns: The Art of the Game' and get a sneak peek inside the book here!

 

THE HUNTER

With a biography that hails the character as a “legendary warrior” and “offspring of the mother of all demons”, the physical form and personal expression of the Hunter varies across every mind’s eye. To claim the avatar as their own, players may customise appearance, paying attention to hair, eyes, skin tone and gender. While the Hunter’s true identity is tantalizingly laid bare through storylines, players earn costumes and armor to further distinguish their perfect vision of a féted hero—attire is chosen largely for style and visual effects that emphasize powers.

Creative director of Marvel’s Midnight Suns, Jake Solomon, explains: “Heroes like Iron Man, Captain America, and Wolverine are established characters that have been developed and fleshed out over dozens of years, by dozens of creators, throughout multiple dimensions of time and space. The Hunter, on the other hand, comes into our game without that extensive history. Even Lilith has featured in very few Marvel properties, but we’re asking both of these characters to stand on equal ground with heroes supported by generations of lore.”

One guiding principal unites all iterations of the Hunter: acknowledging this child of Lilith, prophesied to be resurrected and fight against her. This applies whether sporting ancestral robes, Salem Witch Trial-style armor plating, or the futuristic tailoring of the core super suit. The player’s Hunter outwardly reflects aspects of their lore through costume, and receiving glimpses in the company of fellow Midnight Suns: Blade, Magik, Robbie Reyes and Nico Minoru.

There are outfits that speak to profession, such as Demon Hunter. Others celebrate the player’s preferred approach during combat, ranging from the mystical to melee-oriented. The most elaborate sets are composed of items that are hard to come by, rewarded upon achievement or points of discovery, tiered according to rarity: special; superior; legendary.

Such qualities must be made obvious from the concept stage, so that specialty items scream importance when worn. The gilded and bestudded jackets of the Midnight Suns collection, for example, show allegiance to the group. Some players may gravitate toward the Demon Child origin of the Hunter and an organic suit that clearly designates a hero unlike any other.

The Firaxis narrative team speaks to the Hunter’s conflicted nature, and confronting dark forces that rage within them. There are strong echoes of Nico here, fans of the Runaways may resonate with this theme of internal struggle. Alternatively, Firaxis has options to compose armor sets aligned emphatically to the darkness or the light. But, in any case, the artists have left details to dwell on: symbolic shoulder pieces and belt buckles; incandescent chest sigils; humble clasps; ceremonial cummerbunds—every component required to tell its own story.

Marvel design values are embodied in all aspects of the Hunter’s costume. This makes the Firaxis achievement even more extraordinary, enabling a multifaceted avatar to project Marvel qualities, and appear perfectly at home among the established, time-honored cast. This same thrill is passed along to the player, fashioning a personalized representation of the hero and what the story means to them. In the best of Marvel tradition, deeper meaning is evolving all the way to the climactic scenes, whereupon players can enjoy organizing the Hunter’s wardrobe; to reminisce and assemble a few favorites to take into the endgame.

In this era where games increasingly exist as engaging, deep role-playing experiences, the Midnight Suns’ Hunter has everything that any successful contemporary avatar requires.

 

LILITH

In its insatiable quest for power, the evil military outfit Hydra takes one step too far: the resurrection of a Fallen Immortal. How unprepared Hydra’s brightest scientific minds are—they are soon to be humbled by dark magic older than the world to which they lay claim.

The saga of Marvel’s Midnight Suns traces the aftermath of the Hydra experiment, which did prove wonderfully successful—just not at all in the cultists’ favor. Lilith has a long history of running riot with her demonic offspring, a warning Hydra fails to heed. They would have been wise to remember the part where this Fallen Immortal could bend minds to her will.

Although Lilith retains some power ‘out of the box’, she is not yet fully charged according to Firaxis. Similar to Mephisto’s Soulless creatures, Lilith passes through several stages of rejuvenation: her initial vessel appears deceptively weak, in time healthier and physically more confident, until her final form resembles the Immortal that all should fear.

Lilith is a well-known and much beloved anti-hero in the Marvel Universe, making her debut twice owing to having two different guises. Firaxis was most attracted to the 1992 persona from writer Howard Mackie and artist Andy Kubert, which ties into the Ghost Rider mythos.

While Firaxis’ own team of artists had a certain amount of creative freedom in imagining how a Mother of Demons might look, in the end she must be recognizable as a Marvel entity. Fortunately, much of Lilith’s uniqueness resides in two prominent horns crowning a ghostly stare and stern expression, permitting further extensive research on regal gowns and such. It allowed Firaxis to perceive Lilith as a creature not of this Earth, something ‘alien’. She might also have two forms: human, allowing her to walk freely among her Earthly subjects; and ‘Immortal’, for when the time comes to lead her own children, the Lilin. In human form, only the eyes tell the truth. As an Immortal, her celestial origins are clear. This could be Lilith’s greatest Marvel outing yet, but that is for players to decide.

 

Marvel's Midnight Suns: The Art of the Game hits shelves, everywhere books are sold, on April 18, 2023!

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