The original Marvel vs. Capcom: Official Complete Works went out of print in 2012 and has been commanding collector prices ever since. UDON's Ultimate Complete Works is not just a reprint—it's a 336-page, hardcover expansion with over 140 pages of material that didn't exist in the first edition. At $59.99 for the standard, this is the kind of value proposition that makes artbook collectors stop calculating shelf space and start clearing it.
The contributing artist roster alone justifies the price: Akiman, Bengus, Kinu Nishimura, Shinkiro, Joe Madureira, Adi Granov, Yusuke Murata, and Arthur Adams. Capcom's A-team crossed with Marvel's finest.
Standard and Deluxe cover art — Capcom vs. Marvel roster by Bengus and Shinkiro
Marvel Super Heroes (1995) — promotional art and arcade cabinet art by Bengus
What's Inside
Ten titles spanning thirty years, from 1994's X-Men: Children of the Atom through MvC: Infinite. Character select screens, promo art, concept sketches, key visuals, box art—every stage of the visual pipeline.
The new 140 pages are the draw: never-before-seen sketches from the Capcom vault, plus MvC: Infinite coverage the 2012 edition couldn't have anticipated.
Character design sheets with alternate costumes
Never-before-seen rough sketches — Doctor Doom, Juggernaut, Shuma-Gorath
MvC Infinite concept art — Captain America, Dante, Chun-Li
The Art Itself
The collision of aesthetics is what makes this art electric. Capcom's designers—clean line art, dynamic poses, pixel-informed anatomy—meet Marvel's Western comic sensibility: heavier inks, aggressive foreshortening, different palettes.
Bengus deserves the career retrospective this book functions as. His MvC2 character art defined a visual era that fighting game art has been chasing ever since.
MvC Infinite key art + Capcom Fighting Collection roster piece
The Deluxe Question
The Deluxe ran $120: alternate cover by Panzer, six metal character cards, six enamel pins by Jeffrey “Chamba” Cruz. Pre-order window was tight and it's now manufactured-to-order. If you missed it, the standard loses nothing in content.
Deluxe Edition — six limited metal character cards
Deluxe Edition — enamel pins by Jeffrey 'Chamba' Cruz
Verdict
This is one of the best fighting game artbooks ever published. The crossover format means you're getting Capcom's best character designers working with external constraint — adapting their house style to accommodate Marvel's characters — and the creative friction produces work that neither company would make independently. At 336 pages and $59.99, the value is exceptional. If you've been waiting for the original to come back into print, this is better than what you were waiting for.
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