Up until now, every character confirmed to appear in Invincible Vs–the 3v3 tag fighter starring characters from Skybound’s Invincible series–has been a souped-up superhero. Today, at New York Comic Con, Skybound and developer Quarter Up changed that, as Global Defense Agency head Cecil Stedman has officially been added to the playable roster.
Designing a human character to fight against superhuman opponents on the level of Omni-Man and Invincible requires a change of approach. GameSpot sat down with Robert Kirkman, creator of Invincible, and multiple members of the dev team at Quarter Up to speak about the process of bringing Cecil and his unique abilities to the game.
“Only” human
As a “normal” human among superheroes, Cecil relies less on superior strength and speed, and more on the vast resources of his government agency to provide extra firepower. This idea was key to Cecil’s appearance in Invincible Vs, as it’s those resources that make him a very formidable foe.
“I’m not saying he has endless funds, but he’s using a lot of taxpayer money to get around,” executive producer Mike Willette said. “He can jump around and teleport because, while he’s just a regular guy and doesn’t have the mobility of double jumps and flight like other characters, with government funds, he can get around just fine.”
That movement allows Cecil to manipulate the arena to his advantage, which Willette says plays into the character’s role as a master manipulator. “He has projectiles with ranged arcs, he has a sonic mine that will hover before it detonates, he has a lot of ranged utility,” Willette said. “He can fill the screen, almost like a bullet hell, and as soon as he confirms a hit, he flows right back into our combo system.”
It’s not just the moveset that proves challenging when adding a human like Cecil to a roster of superhumans; he has to look like he can hold his own against the rest of the roster. Skybound art director Dan Eder explained how the team found different ways to truly bring out Cecil’s power.
“We asked ourselves, how do we still make him someone imposing without all the muscle mass of a huge bulky dude like Omni-Man?” Eder said. “We do lean more towards the show, but we go through so many iterations with every new character that I think the artistic process here is very challenging but also extremely satisfying. Ultimately, I think it feels very authentic to the character, and he’s going to feel cohesive within the rest of the roster, even though they are visually pretty different.”
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Fitting into the canon
The addition of Cecil also came with the news of an original story arc that will be told within Invincible VS. Though the team didn’t give specifics on where exactly the game fits into the overall timeline, Robert Kirkman said that the teams at Skybound and Quarter Up closely collaborated to make sure this story felt natural to the series as a whole.
“[Narrative director] Mike [Rogers] has been working really closely with Helen Leigh, who’s one of the key writers on the Invincible series, and co-wrote the Atom Eve game with me,” Kirkman confirmed. “There’s logic to where the story mode for this game would fit in the narrative of the Invincible show, and while we’re not talking specifics here today, fans of The Invincible television show are going to get a very cool experience that’s tailored to fit within that narrative.”
Rogers himself likens the Invincible Vs story as a “standalone special” to the overarching Invincible storyline. “It’s been a real treat going to work with Helen and Robert,” Rogers said, “and really make this feel authentic to the Invincible universe.”
Where Atom Eve was a narrative adventure game focused on Atom Eve, the Invincible Vs story gave the narrative team a lot more to play with in terms of available characters. For Kirkman, the ability to use these characters in new ways is a big part of what makes a project like this so enticing.
“I think it’s cool because it’s a bigger playground for them to play in,” Kirkman said. “The interaction of these characters is, at times, somewhat unique to the universe. There are characters in this game’s story, who interact with one another, that haven’t really interacted very much before in other forms of Invincible.”
Invincible Vs is set to launch in 2026 for Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, and PC. Cecil joins a cast of playable characters that also includes Omni-Man, Invincible, Atom Eve, Rex Splode, Bulletproof, Thula, and Battle Beast.
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