There are some absolutely degenerate mix ups and tactics in Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3. The incoming mix up situation is notorious for having some of the dirtiest, “can’t tell what side the point character is on” plays that you could ever see in the entire game, and the one we have here honestly has to be the filthiest of them all.
Longtime Marvel player pzpoy recently shared a clip on Twitter of a real UMvC3 match that features an absolutely mind blowing mix up that not a soul alive could have blocked.
The clip begins with a team of Dr. Doom, Vergil, and Hsien-Ko having just KO’d Spencer on the opponent team and leaving the anchor, Magneto, as the final obstacle. Things kick off with the incoming mix up situation, and we see Dr. Doom walking forward a few steps before jumping up to meet Magneto in the air when he appears on screen.
As Doom jumps up, he calls in Hsien-Ko’s assist to further lock the opponent down after keeping them in place with a quick jumping jab that gets blocked. Now, with Magneto being locked down by Hsien-Ko, Dr. Doom has free reign to maneuver around and oftentimes in this situation you’d see a few empty air dashes or some kind of slick movement to confuse the opponent into blocking the wrong way.
What makes this particular set up so devastating is that Dr. Doom really doesn’t do any of that… Instead, Doom just simply keeps walking forward, and while this could see the point character travel underneath their opponent for a side switch in many cases, in this scenario Magneto is too low to the ground for that to happen. Or so you’d think.
Somehow, miraculously and within a blink of an eye, Doom just clips to the other side and ends up side switching behind Magneto into the corner, which opens him up to a full combo. Literally, if you slow it all down and watch incredibly carefully, Dr. Doom just seems to magically snap to the other side without any real indicators, which would be hard enough to block in slow motion and would be impossible to stop in a real match — especially if you’ve never seen that mix up before.
It is incredibly tough to figure out what is going on here exactly, but pzpoy describes why this mix up works the way that it does. “Hsien can steal the corner position when she lands, even if you’re grounded,” they said in response to a comment on Twitter.
In layman’s terms and taking my best stab at explaining this, it seems that despite Dr. Doom being on the ground and walking forward with Magneto at a height where Doom cannot pass under him, he is still able to get to the other side thanks to the priority Hsien-Ko has here to take the corner. If I’m understanding this correctly, as Hsien-Ko’s assist animation is ending, she comes down and takes the corner, effectively pushing Magneto out of it, which causes Dr. Doom to actually pass through and get to the other side creating a side switch mix up that basically can’t be seen.
Over the years, I have seen a lot of Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 set ups and mix ups and have created quite a few of my own. But I don’t think I have ever seen a side switch on incoming that is quite as gnarly as this one.
You didn’t block pic.twitter.com/8GRUO8m9Yt
— pzmeats (@pzpoy) July 3, 2024