High-performance playtime.
Ol’ web-head is back and full of surprises.
“A richly-populated world offers countless things to do.”
While there’s been no shortage of games starring everyone’s favorite web-slinging spider-guy over the last decade and a half, very few have come close to matching the vertigoinducing heights of 2002’s Spider-Man2 — the first game to absolutely nail the sensation of swinging through an open-world New York setting. In the trusted hands of Ratchetand
Clank- developer Insomniac Games, Spider-Man has finally received a game that’s as polished and cinematic as the beloved character deserves.
When we meet up with Peter Parker in Spider
Man, he’s no longer the green teenager we’ve come to expect from traditional portrayals of the character. Aside from holding down a real job as a scientist (you might be surprised by who his boss is), he also works closely with NYPD captain Yuri Watanabe, who regularly calls Spidey for help.
Mary Jane Watson, no longer Peter’s girlfriend, has also grown-up significantly, and is now working as an investigative reporter for the Daily Bugle — you’ll even get to do your fair share of snooping through a number of playable stealth and puzzle-based sequences.
Unfortunately, a new villain named Mister Negative has kicked off a deadly epidemic across the city, and only Spider-Man can stop it. This won’t be easy, as a number of his most famous villains are also standing in his way.
If you had any concerns about Insomniac’s ability to tackle Spidey’s graceful swinging, you can rest assured — the Californiabased developer has absolutely succeeded in recreating that glorious feeling of swooping between skyscrapers with reckless abandon.
Generally considered one of the weaker aspects of previous Spider-Man games, combat feels quite satisfying here, with the game expectedly using the character’s “spider sense” to help you counter and dodge attacks from the rear like Batman in the
Arkham series of games, albeit in a more acrobatic fashion.
In true Insomniac fashion, you’ll also have access to gadgets which allow you to change up the game’s combat in a number of delightful ways. For instance, Impact Webs will send enemies flying into the nearest wall and Spider-Drones will web-up baddies for you.
Though its graphical
style is not quite aiming for the photorealism of Horizon:ZeroDawn or God ofWar, Spider-Man is a sensational looking game. The real star of the show, however, is the island of Manhattan, which looks absolutely glorious in Spider-Man.
The game’s emotional roller-coaster of a story provides plenty of drama for longtime Spider-Man fans (this really is a rogue’s gallery of familiar faces) and its richlypopulated world offers countless things to do once the campaign has reached its conclusion. One to tickle your spider senses.
Stephen Lambrechts