The digital age is here and the comic book industry is following suit to accommodate. Knowing that some of their readers prefer reading digitally on their tablets, phones, or computers, publishers are coming up with new ways to get their comics to their readers. As part of their latest efforts to do this, Marvel has just unveiled their brand new digital comics subscription service called Marvel Unlimited.
According to Marvel.com, this new program will replace Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited and will include some new perks as well. For $10 per month or $60 per year, a member will have access to about 13,000 back issues right at their fingertips to read as much and as often as they’d like. You can also store up to six comics in your library in order to read while you’re offline and you will be able to sync the downloaded comics across all of your devices. Currently, the app is only available for iOS, but it will be coming to Android as well sometime in the future.
Gizmodo has a pretty in-depth look at this new service with a video that points out that the app itself is a bit slow and unresponsive at times, but “it’s mostly acceptable”. Since the service is still new, it’s not surprising that there are still some bugs to work out.
In addition to having access to the massive library of high resolution books sorted by by character, series, creator, or events, members will receive exclusive benefits such as deals on comics, merchandise, and a members-only newsletter with a curated list of books to check out.
Overall, this sounds like a Netflix for comics, which is a pretty cool thing to have. It’s a bummer that you can only have six comics in your library to read while you’re offline and that the books in the library are at least six months old, but things are likely to improve over time. Plus, if you want the most recent books, that’s really what the regular Marvel Comics app is for. If you’re looking for back issues to get into or to reacquaint yourself with, then this service seems perfect for that.
Are you going to sign up for Marvel Unlimited? Does this sound like the sort of thing you’d be into in between picking up your pull lists for the week? Or will you wait until improvements are made to the service before trying it out first? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
