Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 Review – Sticks To Its Roots But Flies Beyond Expectations

Five years after the release of the original, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 builds upon the previous instalments to deliver an improved experience.

Be Greater, Together

Set 9 months after the events of Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Spider-Man 2 follows Peter Parker and Miles Morales as they try to balance their duties as New York’s protectors while starting a new chapter in their lives, with each finding ways to cope with the challenges presented to them in life.

After moving to Aunt May’s place, Peter continues to mourn her death by stopping by the house between missions. Mary Jane continues to be Peter’s friend and support system, but Harry Osborn, Peter’s best friend since high school, has returned to play a major role in the story.

It was also nice to finally see Harry after only hearing about him in the first game, though he is not in the best condition due to a terminal illness that he contracted prior to the events of this game.

As the name of the game suggests, Spider-Man 2 allows you to play as not one, but two Spider-Men, with Miles Morales joining Peter Parker in this new adventure.

With the exception of major plot points that require the player to play as one or the other, Miles and Peter receive equal amounts of attention in the game, with the player being able to freely and quickly switch between them. There are also small, but amusing moments when you shift perspectives, such as Peter performing sit-ups on the side of a building. Moreover, Miles or Peter could also unexpected appear in front of one another during combat, similarly to the three playable characters being able to cross paths during free roam in Grand Theft Auto V.

Despite having different storylines, missions, and skills to unlock, they share a lot of side activities, Spider gadgets, and base upgrade paths. Furthermore, you are never forced to relearn moves when switching characters because of the identical button layouts.

New Chapter, New Challenges

[Spoilers Will Be Discussed Below]

Spider-Man 2 places a heavy emphasis on the struggles our heroes face, and how they plan on overcoming these challenges.

As Miles and his friends, Ganke and Daily are about to graduate from high school, he is struggling with deciding on his future. The stress is further worsened with the burden of being Spider-Man on his shoulders, and the newly developed obsession with finding Martin Li, a.k.a Mr Negative, the person responsible for his father’s death. Miles finds himseling being stuck between choosing to be a hero or fight for vengeance.

Peter Parker also begins to experience unintended effects from wearing the symbiote suit, being in control of the suit for the first half of the game. Typically, the topic of the Symbiote suit is quickly glanced over in other forms of Spider-Man media, so its refreshing to see the game taking its time fleshing out the story for the Symbiote suit for the first half of the game.

Along with the struggles they’re facing personally, Peter and Miles are also dealing with other issues that could push them over the edge. To make things worse, a Symbiote appears to threaten them, the city, and those close to them, which puts the bond between our heroes is to the test.

Overall, I really enjoyed how Insomniac Games handled the story, emphasising on the humanity of these characters just as much as telling an epic story. Not only does the story show the strengths of these characters, but they also show the weaknesses and fragility of our heroes. Moreover, there wasn’t even a single story beat that overstayed its welcomed, and everything smooths out nicely.

[END OF SPOILERS]

Old Spider-Men, New Tricks

The combat doesn’t deviate too far from the previous instalments, but instead adds onto it to provide a more comprehensive experience. Miles feels more slick and acrobatic when compared to the previous instalment. Peter, with his simpler play-style, gains the ability to eliminate enemies with brute strength thanks to the addition of Spider-Arm.

Although the foundation of Miles’s combat style was always going to be more advanced than Peter’s due to the combo variations from Miles’s outing as Spider-Man being more complex than that of Peter’s, Insomniac Games did an excellent job at balancing Peter and Miles to make them equally as enticing to play.

Additionally, a new element of combat, parrying, has been introduced to the game. Just before an enemy attack is launched, pressing L1 blocks and stuns the target, giving you an opportunity to counter-attack. It’s especially useful for fighting larger enemies and defending against new parry-focused attacks, in which the enemies glow yellow when they begin to attack, and turning red just before contact. The colour-coded warning system gives a visual cue as to when to get ready to parry, with these attacks dealing significant damage.

Parrying might take some time to get used to, but is a welcome perk as a new layer of strategy is added, forcing the player to determine whether to dodge or parry depending on the circumstances.

Changes in combat go even further, as Peter Parker now dons an advanced mechanised suit that serves as a permanent part of his fighting style, giving him many new skills and abilities.

Some of Peter’s new moves includes Spider Shock, which uses Peter’s mechanical Spider-Arms to stab forward aggressively with a barrage of swipes. Then you have the ground-shattering Wall Smash, a strong rising kick that launches opponents in the air.

There is also a Symbiote suit that offers a different play-style, being more aggressive and violent than normal. Just like his mechanical arms, the Symbiote suit has its own skill tree, and is pre-mapped for four different attacks.

The Symbiote suit overrides your existing suit, and gives you several new abilities, such as allowing him to shoot two enormous tendrils at two enemies, instantly incapacitating them. Furthermore, Peter can also transform into a spiked symbiote ball, dash into a group of foes, and launch them into the air. Peter also has the ability to use the symbiote defensively, automatically blocking and parrying an approaching attack. Peter’s final and most potent symbiote ability involves grabbing several foes with tendrils and slamming them to the ground.

Previous Spider-Man games typically don’t have much variation when it comes to the Symbiote suit, often just being slightly different from the regular suit, so its refreshing to see the Symbiote suit having a completely unique moveset from the regular moveset.

Attacks that are successful also fill a meter that, when activated by simultaneously pressing the L3 and R3 analog sticks, puts the player in a powered-up state. In Peter’s case, this state is known as Symbiote Surge, which increases his damage output and abilities until the meter drains, allowing players to unleash hell until it does.

It only makes sense that Miles receives the same treatment as Peter, learning many new tricks since his first outing as your friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man, now possessing two new bioelectric Venom powers, yellow and blue, which gives him a massive boost in power.

He now possesses the ability to fire blue biovenom from his hands, which causes a charge to be fired directly into one enemy, knocking them back and causing chain lightning to affect those nearby. Miles can also use this ability to teleport himself into the air, where he will instantly land on top of his enemies, dealing bioelectric damage to them all.

Additionally, when using the surge ability, he releases a gigantic burst of blue bio venom that strikes down all nearby enemies.

I really enjoyed the difference in play-styles between the two characters, along with the additional depth that the combat now have thanks to these extra skills, evolving past the button mashing from previous instalments.

In terms of combat, this is definitely the most experimental Spider-Man game. Although some of the mechanics may not be faithful to the comics, we’re thankful it doesn’t follow the same fate of limiting itself for the sake of authenticity like other comic book games.

With Great Power, Comes Great Skill Trees, Gadgets, And Suits

The skill tree was designed in a way that allows both Peter and Miles to advance at the same rate, thus the other Spider-Man wouldn’t be left behind even if you just stick with one Spider-Man outside of the required story sequences. When levelling up with one character, both gain experience the experience necessary to open their respective skill trees, and share a tree of fundamental upgrades that include numerous suit upgrades that boost stats like Health, Damage, Focus, and Traversal perks, with the latter option focusing on things like speed with your web wings. You can also unlock new gadgets after meeting certain criteria.

You can equip more skills in one of four slots on the wheel as you progress through the adventure. As a result, Peter will be capable of using a combination of his symbiote and Iron Spider abilities. However, you will need to be strategic when using these powers as they do have a cooldown.

You’re also equipped with a variety of tools, such as the iconic webshooters, which are capable of webbing up a single foe with a quick tap of R1, which experienced an upgrade, now holding twice as many slots so they recharge quickly. Aside from the web shooters, there are also tools such as an upshot, which sends out a drone that fires a barrage of web shots at the enemies in the area, launching them into the air. There’s a gadget that can shoot out a sound blast. The clear favourite, however, was Web Grabber, which shoots out webbing from all directions before quickly pulling anything attached back in, ready for an AOE strike takedown.

It’s nice that they added so many new features to the arsenals of these characters, as diversity in the combat was greatly improved from the previous instalments thanks to these new additions. Despite being able to get away with only using your main attacks in the prequels, in Spider-Man 2, we almost always had to utilise our gadgets or abilities. There was also so much experimentation done with their abilities, which pushes the boundaries of what Spider-Man can do.

New suits were also added, adding on to the already impressive variety of alternate suits for both Peter and Miles were available in the first two Marvel’s Spider-Man video games. There’s also a new customisation option that allows the player to alter the suit’s colour variant for those who want a more distinctive appearance.

Since Miles and Peter will each have their own distinctive wardrobes, the number of available suits easily doubles when compared to previous instalments. Moreover, players can craft their suits this time around, removing the specific requirement to get them, which was a much needed change.

The World Is Your Playground

It wouldn’t be a Spider-Man game without being able to swing around the Big Apple. The map is now twice as large as the original, giving players access to Manhattan, Miles Morales’s Brooklyn, and the new Queens, adding some much needed variety to the exploration.

New York was a joy to explore. While trying to finish the main story, we found ourselves being constantly distracted by the environment around us, doing all the little things spread throughout the city.

There were no shortage of side missions, as there were several different mission types in store for the player. Some missions can only be completed by Miles or Peter, so even if you refuse to switch characters, you have to do it eventually to progress.

The “Friendly Neighbourhood Spider” app also makes its return, informing the player of any primary missions, side missions, or on-screen pop-ups that might notify the player of crimes reported by nearby residents to keep track of your progress. It also used to change between the Spideys.

Traversing through the world were some of the highlights from the previous instalments, and its hard to conceptualise a traversal method that would surpass web-slinging from previous games in terms of enjoyment.

The game sews webbed wings into the suits of our heroes, giving wings to our Spider-Men, adding another layer of depth to the movement. With these wings, you can fly through Central Park, rivers, and low-lying areas more quickly. The web wings will deploy when pressing Triangle in the air, allowing you to soar and dip with the left joystick. There will also be wind tunnels that are placed in strategic locations throughout the city, boosting your speed when flying through them.

Although effective, the web wings don’t outshine web-slinging, as players would have to find a perfect balance between the two to traverse the skyscrapers of New York. These web wings can work in tandem with web-swinging to add another layer of depth to traversal that when mastered, will not only allow the player to reach challenging spots gracefully, but will also allow you to chase targets down more efficiently.

This new method of traversal makes moving around New York all the more fun, but for players who don’t feel like feel travelling for whatever reason, the SSD of the PlayStation 5 is put to a good use, allowing players fast travel in an instant.

Haptics from the DualSense controller also provide a wealth of precise feedback and immersion, making stacking combos feel more rewarding thanks to the haptic feedback.

Accessibility 

A wide variety of people will want to play Spider-Man 2. Because of this, Insomniac Games also added audio accessibility features like accessible controllers and audio frequency controls, which let users turn off distracting sounds. The development team noted that while not all features will be accessible at launch, after-launch accessibility features will include in-game audio descriptions, a screen reader that can be used on menus, and captions for all significant gameplay moments.

Spider-Man 2 will also include “Challenge Level Modifiers”, where players can modify various aspects of the gameplay, such as the amount of damage that enemies deal, as well as their health, speed, parry timing, and more. Players can also enable features like Chase Assist or Enhanced Auto Aim, or even be able to make the game’s puzzles simpler. Another is the “Game Speed” setting, which aid players who might require longer reaction times during the experience’s most action-packed sections.

Verdict

Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 is awesome—the storytelling, the combat, the traversal—everything was excellent.

In a world filled with superhero games, not all are good. Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 burns bright, as Insomniac Games doesn’t coast on the Spider-Man IP, but uses the platform to add interesting gameplay ideas. They’ve also found the tricky balance between not straying too far from the source material, whilst adding unique twists to make the game fresh, resulting in a story that will keep players engaged.

Instead of starting from a blank slate, the game takes everything that made the first game successful and builds upon it, adding elements as if someone on the team was saying “Why wouldn’t Spider-Man be able to do this?”.

However, some of the decisions that are made can be a matter of taste, people may dislike the parts of the  plot for being too experimental, but considering how much the comic book genre has an issue with sticking too closely to the source material, trying something new is way more refreshing than watching Uncle Ben die for the 50th time.

As high as my expectations were for Spider-Man 2, Peter Parker and Miles Morales’ joint adventure definitely surpassed them, making this sequel worth the wait.

Game reviewed on PS5. Review code provided by Sony Interactive Entertainment.

Marvel's Spider-Man 2

Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment

Developer: Insomniac Games

Release Date TBC

PlayStation 5

Spider-Men, Peter Parker, and Miles Morales return for an exciting new adventure in the critically acclaimed Marvel’s Spider-Man franchise for PS5.

Swing, jump, and utilize the new Web Wings to travel across Marvel’s New York, quickly switching between Peter Parker and Miles Morales to experience different stories and epic new powers, as the iconic villain Venom threatens to destroy their lives, their city, and the ones they love.

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