"HORSEMEN OF APOCALYPSE"
Earth-205117

Membership: Shadow of Death, Specter of Pestilence, Waraxe

Purpose: To wipe out Homo sapiens

Affiliations: Cyborg Apocalypse clone, Mystique (Raven Darkholme), Sabretooth (Victor Creed)

Enemies: Apocalypse (En Sabah Nur), Magneto (Erik Lehnsherr), X-Men (Cyclops/Scott Summers, Gambit/Remy LeBeau, Iceman/Bobby Drake, Professor X/Charles Xavier, Storm/Ororo Munroe, Wolverine/Logan)

Aliases: None

Base of Operations: An unspecified graveyard in Canada and its associated catacombs and underground fortress

First Appearance: X-Men: Mutant Wars video game (November 10, 2000)

History:
(X-Men: Mutant Wars video game (fb) - BTS) - A rogue cyborg clone of Apocalypse seized control of one of the real Apocalypse's bases. He hired Mystique to steal unspecified robotics technology from Magneto and used it to produce a vast army of robots and cyborgs, including his own team of "Horsemen." He then sent them out, along with another one of his hirelings, Sabretooth, to destroy humanity, starting with Canada. The X-Men detected this activity and set out to stop it, mistakenly believing that Magneto himself was behind the attack.

(X-Men: Mutant Wars video game) - After the X-Men fought their way through the vanguard of the Apocalypse clone's army in the wilds of Canada, fighting Sabretooth along the way, Professor X directed them to a nearby graveyard, in which the X-Men's supercomputer Cerebro had detected more of Magneto's technology. There among the tombstones, the X-Men encountered the "Horseman" Waraxe. Though Waraxe declared Wolverine would be its first victim, the mutant destroyed it, finding to his surprise that it was a robot. Continuing into the catacombs beneath the graveyard and battling more cyborg troopers, the X-Men were confronted by the Specter of Pestilence. It was also defeated despite its great physical strength. After the battle, Storm located the hidden entrance to an underground fortress. Entering, the X-Men fought still more cyborgs and robots. Eventually, the last of the "Horsemen," the Shadow of Death, challenged them and like its brethren, proved no match for the X-Men. The X-Men eventually learned, first that the "Horsemen" and the rest of the army were created by Apocalypse using Magneto's technology, and second, that it wasn't Apocalypse at all but a cyborg clone made by Apocalypse who had rebelled against his creator.

Comments: Created by Daniel Greenberg and one or more of Touru Tsuboya, Tetsuya Wahira, Yoshiki Nishijo, Tetsuya Yusa and Tsuguhiro Yamazaki.

    X-Men: Mutant Wars was a game developed by Hal Corp and AVIT and released by Activision for the Game Boy Color in 2000. It had a sequel called X-Men: Wolverine's Rage. The "Horsemen" do not make a second appearance.

    First things first: did this story take place on Earth-616? I mean, probably not. It would actually fit really well into the period of Apocalypse's "death" between his seeming destruction by Cyclops on the moon and his resurrection in "X-Cutioner's Song," except that the real Apocalypse makes an appearance on a video screen at the end to explain the plot, thank the X-Men for killing his clone, and then immediately threaten them for wrecking his stolen base. Because this game is clearly based on the Adjectiveless-era Blue-and-Gold-Team setup (well, and the cartoon), there isn't an obvious time for it to occur when Apocalypse isn't in some form of regenerative hibernation. Maybe he came out of hibernation briefly just to make that angry video call to the X-Men?
    Well, the video game was later ruled to have occurred on Earth-205117 per the Appendix's list of Earth designations so I guess that answers whether it was -616 or not... --Proto-Man

    Nominally, you can play as any of the five non-Xavier X-Men listed under "Enemies" but Wolverine is the only one with an actual set of moves instead of a single feeble projectile, and all of the cutscenes feature Wolverine, so Wolverine really seemed to be taking point on this mission.

    The sizes of the "Horsemen" are extremely difficult to determine because, although it's easy to see them right next to the X-Men, the X-Men's sprites are all basically the exact same size so they look bigger next to Cyclops than next to Wolverine. The two humanoids are more or less the size of large humans, though the Shadow of Death is much smaller.

    There is no sign of a Famine for this iteration of the Horsemen, by the way. Maybe the Apocalypse clone never got around to it or maybe the X-Men somehow missed running into Famine. As for the rest of his army, it's a lot of generic-looking techno-soldiers and abstractly-shaped floating robots...and also some zombies and werewolves, for some reason. I guess cyborg zombies and werewolves.

    This is a bad game with a silly story and ridiculous dialogue (when the Specter of Pestilence says he'll "shrivel Wolverine's bones," Wolverine retorts that his bones are "fortified with calcium and Adamantium, strongest substance in the world!" and I genuinely don't know if it's intended to be funny).

    Greenberg is listed in the credits as "Story;" the other five people listed above are "Graphic" (sic).

    Sadly, the "Horsemen" just show up one at a time in three consecutive levels.
    ...and therefore, there isn't a shot of the team together as a group. --Proto-Man

    This profile was completed on 09/24/2026 but its publication was delayed, as it was intended for the Appendix's 25th anniversary celebratory event.

    Profile by LV!

CLARIFICATIONS:
The clone's "Horsemen of Apocalypse" are conceptually related to, but much lamer than:

The Shadow of Death should be distinguished from:

The Specter of Pestilence should be distinguished from:

Waraxe should be distinguished from:

Shadow of DeathShadow of Death (full body)


The Shadow of Death was a robot built by the cyborg Apocalypse clone using technology stolen from Magneto. The Shadow of Death patrolled the depths of Apocalypse's secret underground fortress (which mostly resembled a sewer), going so far as to scrawl "SHADOW" on one of the walls. After its compatriots had already tried and failed to defeat the X-Men, it expressed a great overconfidence to Wolverine but soon found itself on the scrapheap with the others.

The Shadow of Death was the most robotic-looking of the "Horsemen," being little more than a cylinder covered in weapons with delta trike wheels. It could fly, and fired rockets from its side-mounted launchers and grenades from the aperture in its head. Wolverine, of all people, referred to it as "half-pint," so it must have been pretty small.

--X-Men: Mutant Wars video game
Specter of Pestilence (full body)Specter of Pestilence


The Specter of Pestilence was one of the robot "Horsemen" built by the cyborg Apocalypse clone using technology stolen from Magneto. The Specter of Pestilence lurked in the catacombs beneath an unspecified rural Canadian graveyard. The X-Men entered the catacombs looking for a "blue mutant" seen by Iceman. The Specter of Pestilence threatened first to shrivel Wolverine's bones and then to grind him to jelly but it was ultimately destroyed, revealed to be another robot rather than a mutant. Iceman then said the mutant he saw had been darker blue anyway.

The Specter of Pestilence was, a little unintuitively, a hulking blue humanoid with massively oversized fists. It fought as a brawler, though it also told Wolverine it would "shrivel [his] bones," suggesting it may had some form of degenerative power common to versions of Pestilence. If so, it did not get an opportunity to demonstrate it.
--X-Men: Mutant Wars video game
WaraxeWaraxe (full body)

After having Mystique steal Magneto's robotics technology, the cyborg Apocalypse clone used it to build Waraxe and the other "Horsemen." Waraxe seemingly led the Apocalypse clone's attack on humankind; while the other two "Horsemen" remained underground, Waraxe was on the surface with the first wave of cyborg soldiers. Nevertheless, it apparently did not take part in the violence itself. When the X-Men arrived, it told Wolverine he would be its first casualty. In the end, Waraxe itself ended up merely the latest in a long list of Wolverine's victories.

 Waraxe was an extremely '90s-looking human by appearance, so it is actually somewhat surprising when Wolverine discovers it was a robot. It had a massive axe that it could throw; when thrown, the axe would return to its hand via means unrevealed.

--X-Men: Mutant Wars video game
images:
X-Men: Mutant Wars video game (all images in this profile)

Appearances:
X-Men: Mutant Wars video game (November 10, 2000) - Mika Hayashi (executive producer), T. Colin Mack (producer), Daniel Greenberg (story), Joe Favazza (QA manager), Adam Hartsfield (QA lead), Melissa Chapman, Nita Patel (brand management), Kenji Konno (production assistant), Hiroyuki Sekimoto (game design), Touro Tsuboya, Tetsuya Wahira, Yoshiki Nishijo, Tetsuya Yusa, Tsuguhiro Yamazaki (graphics), Akira Kito, Takeya Igarashi, Masakazu Yoshida (programming), Kazuo Sawa (sound)

First posted: 09/27/2026
Last updated: 09/24/2026

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

Non-Marvel Copyright info
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