Where are all the great new X-Men video games?

The finale of X-Men ‘97 aired this week, and it’s making me reflect on just how important these mutants are. Ever since their emergence in the 1960s, this superhero team has served as a cultural touchstone, providing a fictional world where issues of social oppression can be explored. And on top of all that, they’re still superheroes with radical powers. X-Men ’97 has doubled down on that to create the best Marvel series on Disney+ yet. That’s exciting, but it’s made a certain void all the more tangible: Where are all the X-Men games?

Marvel games have made a resurgence over the past several years, leading to excellent titles based on the Midnight Sons, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Spider-Man. But outside of one Wolverine game on the horizon and guest character slots in Marvel’s Midnight Suns and Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 3, the X-Men have largely gone ignored in the game space. That’s a shame, as there’s one X-Men game primed for revival: X-Men Legends.

Remembering X-Men Legends

I mostly grew up playing licensed games, and while many of them were bad, games like X-Men Legends and Marvel: Ultimate Alliance were bright spots. They are superhero games developed by Raven Software and published by Activision in the early 2000s, and the quickest way to describe both is as superhero Diablo. They are approachable action RPGs that swap out the fantasy clichés for superhero ones.

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In single-player or co-op, X-Men Legends lets players control a team of up to four mutants. Action plays out from an isometric perspective, and the fun of combat comes from finding ways to combo and combine each character’s abilities and upgrade them over time with XP. In-between missions, players can also explore the X-Mansion as Magma, the game’s central character, and mingle with other members of the team.

The gameplay