Marvel’s Spider-Man Review

Marvel’s Spider-Man
Developer: Insomniac Games
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Reviewed On: PlayStation 4
Available On: PlayStation 4

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For the most part the new Spider-Man on the PS4 is a resounding success. Insomniac Games has created a brilliantly-detailed MCU version of New York City with plenty of character and charm. Combat is flashy and flamboyant as Spider-Man should be, and the story is foreboding and longer than expected. If not for a few minor inconveniences and issues with traversal that could have been ironed out, this is a solid game with plenty of replay-ability and post-game content. With the promise of the first of three story based DLC packs releasing in October, you can rest assured you’ll get enough bang for your buck.

The hallmark of any good Spider-Man game is how it feels to move around. Fans of Spider-Man 2 for the PS2 were understandably cautious about how this new adventure would feel, and I am pleased to report that Insomniac got it resoundingly right. The devs clearly made it a priority from the beginning of production that web slinging and traversing the city were of utmost importance. They even went as far as making an entire skill tree based around movement and faster, easier ways to get around the city. This lends a strange sense of non-urgency to the whole experience. When simply moving around is almost as fun as the action-packed missions themselves, then something is going right.

Simply swinging from web to web wouldn’t be nearly enough, however. That is why Spidey has many different abilities at his disposal that allow him to move around quickly and easily. You can web to a high point like the top of a lamppost of the roof of a building and then, pressing the ‘X’ button on contact, Spider-man will launch forwards and into the air to gain momentum. This is a great way to maintain or increase speed easily when travelling. Another option is ‘web zipping’. By pressing the ‘X’ button while in the air, Spider-Man will slingshot himself in whatever direction the left stick is pointing. This is mainly used to quickly change direction at speed and also gain a quick burst of speed while moving. There are, of course, even more ways to maneuver in the air as Spider-Man, but even this offers a wide variety of options. It’s almost akin to learning to drive a car at the beginning, as you grapple with avoiding buildings and other obstacles like cars and railway bridges.

It’s these obstacles that represent the slight issue with web slinging. Swinging around New York feels fantastic. There is a great sense of momentum and weight in the swings and the traversal options are complicated enough to feel like a feature, but not so hard to master that it’s not satisfying to do. It is only when you come into contact with a building that you will run into problems.

It seems so odd to me that they would fine-tune the web slinging to such an extent but leave climbing up walls and jumping onto and off of things so clunky and un-intuitive. When latched onto the side of a building the best course of action is usually to mash ‘X’ and ‘O’ repeatedly while holding ‘R2’ to web sling until detached. There is no easy or graceful way to remove Spider-Man from a building once attached. As well as this, attaching yourself to a building when you want to wall run/climb can be even harder.

To run up a building the required input is ‘R2’ and a direction on the left stick; to wall climb only the direction is required. However, when you are finished wall running up a building and want to come to a stop on the side of said building, Spider-Man will sometimes detach himself and begin plummeting to the ground. Needless to say this halted my forward momentum and flow more than once and even caused me to fail missions while I struggle to scale the structure once more.

Post-game has all of the usual open-world-tropes. Inconsequential collectibles and side objectives are readily available and really don’t hold a candle to simply swinging around in terms of fun after the story is over.

Spider-Man has three major fighting moves- kicking, punching and webbing people up. It would have been pretty difficult to mess this system up in a game that, more or less, follows the Arkham games in its combat style and fighting scenarios. However, there are still enemies that require a different approach. These include ‘brutes’ who must be webbed up before damage can be done or armed adversaries with weapons who have to be disarmed so they can’t block your attacks. Gadget attacks (aka web attacks) come in different forms for different uses.

My personal favourite is the ‘concussive blast’. This is incredibly useful as it acts as a sort of force push that causes enemies to fly away from you when used. This gadget is uncontested in the many rooftop fights as one shot from this ends most fights instantly by blasting the enemies off the building on to the streets below. The impact web is also a favourite as it will take most enemies out of the fight with a single shot at ground level and leave them there.

The speed and constant inputs the combat excels with make it incredibly addictive. Random fights and encounters are fun and engaging, and side mission content is almost secondary to the opportunity to web sling around and punch the bad guys. Boss fights are interesting enough without being hugely engaging or varied and the slight slow-time effect upon defeating an enemy is a satisfying addition. The only major gripe I have with this is the frequent QTE that plagues most of the game. Especially combat missions. Used sparingly, QTE can be used to good effect, but Spider-Man has just edged over the line from sparingly used to annoyingly used. Every car that needs to be stopped, person to be rescued and boss to be finished off is done with a QTE. This is a shame, but in no way a deal breaker.

While playing this game I didn’t level up for the fun of it, not for the skill points or the gadget unlocks. No, I grinded each level for one simple reason: outfits.

All the different costumes are all beautiful in their own way and most of them poke fun or make reference to something familiar in Spider-Man’s MCU. For example, the ‘stark suit’ from Spider-Man: Homecoming and the latest Avengers movie is available fairly early on, as is the suit Toby Maguire’s  Spidey wore in his encounter with the wrestler Bonesaw in the 2002 Spider-Man film.

Along with each suit comes a specific ‘suit power’. These are individual and powerful ‘ultimate’ moves that vary from: webbing up everyone in a surrounding area to reducing gravity and playing an electric guitar to create a shockwave. While each suit power is unlocked alongside specific suits they are not locked to that one outfit. This is a great feature because it means the best powers are available to be used with your favourite suit. Insomniac knew that one person’s favourite suit would be another person’s least favourite and they planned accordingly to insure this would not affect gameplay.

New suits are usually unlocked every two or so levels, with twenty-eight total suits to unlock in the base game and more coming in the DLCs.

Like any Spider-Man game or movie there are certain predictable plot points. Aunt May dies, Peter gets with MJ and the placid Doctor Octavius becomes the evil Doctor Octopus. The main draw for this game’s story is the dark direction it takes later on. There are plenty of “great power/great responsibility” moments throughout, especially right at the end. Before the final credits Spidey has some tough choices to make and it creates an interesting juxtaposition between those dark moments and his usually witty persona. Spider-man is human, has real emotions and reacts appropriately to traumatic events. This goes a long way in helping the player to empathise with him, he just wants to help people and that shows.

In addition to playing as Spider-Man, there are also sections of gameplay where you take control of Mary-Jane Watson, often sneaking into secure areas in order to further her journalistic career. Miles Morales is also a playable character with a very similar sneaky play-style. These sections have appeared to be divisive in their merit and with good reason. When you buy a Spider-man game you expect to play as Spider-man and while these subsections are only part of the main story and not too frequent they still take you away from the fun of the game.

Everything that this game does really well is completely absent in these unfortunately dull ‘stealth’ sections. It’s sad that the most they could think of for these sections is “go from point A to point B, don’t get spotted” with little else interesting in between. Most of the time these ‘missions’ could be finished by simply walking through the area as quick as possible. I played the game on ‘amazing’ difficulty (normal) and had no issues just running through all stealth sections as MJ and Miles. If that’s possible on the most common difficulty setting then maybe a rework is required.

In short, the parts where you play as Spider-Man are refreshingly dark and touch on some topics I thought far beyond the emotional reach of any superhero game. Doc Ock suffers from a degenerative disease which will soon leave him with little to no use of his arms, hence the invention of the robotic ‘arms’. Even an off the cuff mention of something so real really makes your actions in trying to help someone so vulnerable all the more validated. We could have done without Miles and MJ but they at least tried to make the game varied and add another dimension which I have to commend them for all the same.

Something I absolutely have to at least mention is the uplifting and (for lack of a better word) proud soundtrack. Every time you leap into the air or start up the game you are greeted with this masterful, orchestral score which conveys so many emotions at once. While walking or doing otherwise unremarkable things the game is mostly silent, apart from the hustle and bustle of the streets. However as soon as you start swinging, that inspiring score creeps in and makes hurtling along through the streets of New York even more of a joy. It truly is a perfect accompaniment and John Paesano the composer should be commended on his work.

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Final Thoughts:

Marvel’s Spider-Man on PlayStation 4 is a fantastic game. While it isn’t perfect, a few solvable bugs and gameplay elements aside, it is pretty close. Story-wise, it beats most of Marvel’s movies so far. It mostly focuses on Spider-Man but not forgetting that Peter Parker is just as important to the overall character. Combat is satisfying and fun while not straying away from being challenging. Finally, the movement is the crowning jewel of any Spider-Man game and I am happy to say it is almost perfect in this one. Minor gripes aside, this is a very good game. I would happily recommend it to anyone, and I am confident that even a DC fan would have a blast with this title. Do yourself a favour, pick up this game, pop it in your PS4 and try to stop swinging around Queens for long enough to play the story. You won’t be disappointed.