Welcome to 2025 friends, I hope you all enjoyed your holidays. For me, the end of 2024 was marred by illness but I did manage to finally install and play one game that’s been on my list for months — “Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite & Beyond.”

“MVCIB,” as it’s affectionately known, is a fan mod spearheaded by YouTuber Maximillian, developer WistfulHope, and others that gives “Infinite” the coat of polish and love it so desperately needed. The mod adds a striking new cell-shaded art style, UI and UX changes, new music, additional offline game modes, and slight gameplay modifications to make the game a bit more balanced.

I was thrilled to finally get my hands on the mod after many months of watching it grow over time — and it did not disappoint. Right off the bat, you’re treated to a new start screen and a new menu. The new menu music is infinitely (pun sort of intended) addicting and catchy. It’s clear from the get-go that this mod is full of love and dedication — something the base game lacked in spades.

Character models have been updated to feature a new cell-shaded look that masks the drab and sometimes outright ugly models from the base game. Character colors and costumes have also been updated with homages to past Marvel games (see Orange Venom) and other properties.

The “MVCIB” team even updated certain alternate costumes, like Zero’s, who now has a Vergil-styled cloak, harkening back to the “Zero May Cry” team that has dominated “Marvel vs. Capcom 3” throughout its lifecycle.

There are some key changes to the gameplay that reign in some stronger mechanics while strengthening ones that were seen as weaker. For starters, all throws remove recoverable red health — yes, even command throws. This means characters like Haggar have increased viability because they can remove recoverable health. I’m reminded of the same change made to “Street Fighter X Tekken” during its major content update that was designed to speed up matches.

Other changes include changes to the tag mechanics, combo scaling, hitboxes, and to the Infinity Stones, strengthening some of the underwhelming stones while balancing the stronger and more popular stones.

Tournaments featuring the new patch have been an absolute blast to watch and I’m excited to get online and play ranked matches once I finally settle on a team. The patch works with other players online granted they have the patch installed as well.

The only downsides I’ve found are slowdowns caused by the game itself being less than optimized. Certain stages, especially the “new” stage (no spoilers!) slow the game down tremendously, but I was having those issues with the base game too. And to be transparent, I haven’t played the game online yet but all footage I’ve seen shows it playing smoothly.

In closing, “Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite & Beyond” is a stellar ode to a game that was close to being lost to time, the lone forgotten entry in a series beloved the world over. Rather than fall by the wayside, this dedicated team of developers revived a dead game that was being held together by a few dozen loyal players and turned it into something worth playing once more. My only hope is that this is the beginning for “MVCIB” and other fighting games that were in danger of being lost to time (I’m looking at you, “Street Fighter X Tekken.”)

If you’re interested in trying out “Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite & Beyond, you can download the mod today at https://www.mvcib.com/ and follow the instructions on the site to install it. Note that you need the base copy of “Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite” to play the mod — it isn’t standalone. See you online!