What is Invincible VS?

Quarter Up’s debut title, Invincible VS, arrives with serious weight on its shoulders. The studio is led by veterans of the Killer Instinct (2013) team, and they’ve taken Robert Kirkman’s superhero universe and shaped it into a 3v3 tag fighter that wants to court both newcomers and tournament-hardened vets. After spending serious time across every mode, I can say the team mostly pulled it off. Invincible VS is one of the most mechanically satisfying tag fighters I’ve played in years, even if a thin story mode and a few rough edges keep it from greatness.

Developer: Quarter Up
Publisher: Skybound Games
Platform: Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, PC
MSRP: $49.99
Release Date: April 30, 2026
Reviewed On: Xbox Series X

Presentation & Soundtrack — Brutal Visuals and Cutthroat Bangers

• Crisp visuals and locked performance on Xbox Series X, with story mode cutscenes standing out as a genuine highlight
• Gore system layers blood and suit damage progressively, and pre-fight banter approaches Mortal Kombat and Injustice level
• The Glitch Mob’s original end credits song is a standout, though stage themes blend into the background
• Standard attack animations are stiffer than recent fighters and need a future polish pass

The character work is where Quarter Up’s love for the source material shines through. Mark, Atom Eve, and the rest of the cast look awesome in Invincible VS‘s stylized 3D look. The cinematic Supers and Ultimates also make every finisher feel like a money shot. The story mode cutscenes are the visual peak. It feels like you’re watching a special movie version of the animated series.

The gore sells the Invincible identity just as well. Suits get torn, faces get bloodied, and by the end of the match, your fighters look like they’ve been through a war. The one knock on visuals is that standard normals feel a little rigid frame-to-frame. Compared to Street Fighter 6 or Guilty Gear Strive, the moment-to-moment animation lacks that buttery flow.

The audio package tells a similar tale of two halves. The menu loops are the kind of tracks that you find yourself humming or bobbing your head to between matches, and The Glitch Mob delivers an original credits song that hits way harder than expected. Stage themes do their job but rarely stand out amidst the chaos. None has the catchiness that will make you select stages just to hear the track.

Roster & Arenas — 18 Fighters, 14 Battlegrounds

• 18 playable characters covering all the major Invincible heavy hitters
• 14 fully destructible arenas, each with its own visual identity
• Arena transitions trigger from stuns and knockbacks with cinematic carryovers

Eighteen characters at launch is a respectable number for a new fighter series, and Quarter Up hits all the major picks. Every fan-favorite from Invincible makes an appearance, from Viltrumites like Omni-Man, Conquest, and Anissa to Guardians of the Globe like Rex Splode, Dupli-Kate, and Atom Eve. An original character, Ella Mental, also makes her debut on the roster. They all feel great to play with, and because of the simplistic combat, it’s easy to pick up a new character and instantly know how to pull off some cool moves. My favorite team has been Bulletproof who’s a great all arounder, Thula who has great mid range attacks and Battle Beast who is slow but powerful with some great super armor attacks. They strike a really good balance that match up nicely with almost any opponent.

The 14 arenas all feel distinct, both visually and in how they break apart during combat. Quarter Up runs the gamut from a battle-torn city to the inside of an Egyptian tomb to an all-out brawl on the moon. The standout is Titan’s Penthouse, where the destruction unfolds in real time. The stage gets progressively demolished as the fight rages until there’s practically nothing left standing by the end. Arena transitions are the showstopper. Stun an opponent and then hit them with a knockback, and you’ll trigger a brief cinematic that hauls your opponent across the map before dropping them into a new arena. It’s pure spectacle and never gets old.

Combat (Mechanics) — Simplistic Depth

• No quarter-circles or Z-motions, every special is A plus a direction
• Tapping X chains a full auto-combo that finishes with a Super move
• Super bar maxes at five (Supers cost one, Ultimates cost three), with a separate Boost Bar fueling enhanced specials and Assist Breakers
• Newcomers can deal real damage in minutes, vets find depth in chaining and metering

Invincible VS’s combat mechanics can best be described as simple, but not shallow. Quarter Up found a nice balance between allowing newcomers to enjoy the flashy combat without alienating vets. Every character’s special moves are mapped to A plus one of the four directions. That’s it. No need for an advanced move list.

The auto-combo performed by repeatedly tapping X is a nice accessibility feature. New players can pull off a full string that ends in a Super and walk away feeling like they did something cool. It won’t get you to the top of the leaderboards on its own, but it’s a launching pad. Veterans, on the other hand, will quickly graduate to chaining everything the game has to offer: Ultimates, dashes, boosted special moves, active tags, and launchers.

Combat (Systems) — Marvel vs. Capcom 3 Meets Killer Instinct

• Tag-heavy assist combat draws directly from Marvel vs. Capcom 3
• Assist Breaker (LT+RT) cashes the Boost Bar to escape combos, mirroring KI’s Combo Breaker
• Receivers can counter incoming active tags, but attackers can feint to bait the counter and continue the combo
• Balance feels fair across the cast in early ranked play

Once you peel back the surface of Invincible VS, the system reveals itself as one of the most satisfying tag fighters I’ve touched in years. The DNA is unmistakable. The quick pace and assist-heavy gameplay come straight from Marvel vs. Capcom 3, one of my favorite fighting games of all time.

The Killer Instinct (2013) influence shows up in the Assist Breaker. When you’re trapped in a combo and watching your health bar evaporate, you can spend 2 out of 3 of your Boost Bars to have an assist character punch your attacker off you. It’s the great equalizer, and it changes how you build pressure.

The mind game gets deeper at the active tag layer. The receiver can time a counter to push the attacker away, but the attacker can active-tag and feint to throw off that timing and continue the punishment. That’s the kind of layered systems that keep a competitive scene alive. Quarter Up nailed the delivery here.

Another cool system is when a match runs out of time. Instead of the player with the most health automatically winning like usual, you will go into sudden death with the characters currently on the field. Any surviving teammates contribute their health to the fighter, topping off their bar before the final battle begins. If no teammates remain, the fighter carries whatever health they had when the timer stopped. Whoever wins this final battle is crowned the victor. It’s a nice touch to evolve a system that has been stagnant in the genre for decades.

Story Mode — A Disappointing Filler Episode

• Cinematic story mode follows the Mortal Kombat template of swapping fighters between chapters
• Original character Ella Mental plays a major role and was created for the game
• Newcomers to the show can follow along without spoilers from current arcs
• Mode is short and ends on a cliffhanger, with the rest seemingly reserved for DLC

Invincible VS‘s story mode borrows the Mortal Kombat template, swapping fighters between chapters as the plot unfolds. The narrative is original, which I appreciated as someone who isn’t fully caught up on the show. The story starts with Invincible, Rex Splode and Atom Eve fighting Omni-Man, Conquest and Thula. But something is wrong. The characters start to glitch as if they are digital. Invincible’s costume changes mid-fight. I went in worried I’d get spoiled and walked out without many narrative beats ruined, although it did feel a lot like a filler episode.

Ella Mental is a fun addition to the cast and plays a big role alongside Invincible, Rex, and Atom Eve. She’s an original character created specifically for Invincible VS, and she felt natural blending with the rest of the cast. She’s also pretty badass and seems pretty powerful compared to the other characters.

The execution falls apart at the finish line. The mode is short and ends on a cliffhanger that’s clearly being held back for future DLC. That’s the wrong call. The base story should be a complete arc, and any bonus tales should be the DLC. Having to wait months or longer to find out what happens next leaves a sour aftertaste on what’s otherwise a competent campaign.

Modes & Online — Checks All The Boxes

• Arcade Mode offers difficulty ladders but pays off with minimal rewards
• Versus covers local, online Casual, online Ranked, and 8-player Lobbies with simultaneous fight and spectate support
• Crossplay supported at launch with global leaderboards for competitive climbers
• Collection screen tracks unlockable music, cutscenes, art, and comic covers

The mode list checks the boxes a 2026 fighting game needs to check. Arcade is the weak link. The ladders are there for replayability, but the payoff at the end is a couple of still images and a few lines of dialogue. The real reason to grind it is character leveling, which unlocks costumes and profile customizations the more you play a specific fighter.

Online is where this game lives. Lobbies handle up to eight players with proper spectating, which is exactly what a community-driven fighter needs. Crossplay being in at launch removes the matchmaking fragmentation that has crippled other recent fighters in their first months. Rollback netcode has made my online experience flawless. And the leaderboard gives competitive players a clear ladder to climb.

Training — Missing a Key Feature

• Free-form Practice mode covers character testing and combo experimentation
• Tutorial walks players through every system mechanic from the ground up
• Accessibility options are limited to reducing or removing gore
• No mission or trial mode for learning specific character combos

The tutorial is genuinely good. It walks you through the whole system bottom up, and respects your time. Practice mode does what it needs to do for free-form lab work.

What’s missing is the kind of guided trial mode that Street Fighter 6, Tekken 8, and Guilty Gear Strive all ship with. A mode that teaches you specific character combos and lets you grind them until they’re muscle memory has been the single most useful training tool for me in modern fighters, and its absence here is a real bummer. Hopefully it’s on the post-launch roadmap. Accessibility is also sparse. The only meaningful option is reducing or removing gore. There’s room to do more here in future patches.

Conclusion

Invincible VS gets the hard part right. Quarter Up delivered a fighting game that opens its arms to newcomers without hollowing out the experience for vets, and the combat is the most fun tag fighter I’ve touched since Marvel vs. Capcom 3. The visuals pop, the gore sells the Invincible identity, and crossplay at launch is exactly what the genre needs. Where it stumbles is around the edges. Animations could use polish, the story mode ends on a cliffhanger that should’ve been a complete arc, and the absence of a trial mode hurts long-term skill development. Even with those misses, this is a confident debut and an easy recommendation for Invincible fans and tag-fighter diehards alike.