The original 2018 game release was already substantial for a Spider-Man game. It allowed you to smoothly web-sling across a small part of New York and fight iconic villains with an easy but challenging combat system. Its story was fun and emotional and felt like a true Spider-Man story. But can the same thing be said for its sequel? The answer is yes, and it goes beyond the original game in almost every way.
Starting with the gameplay, the game instantly reveals its large cityscape, with New York feeling two times bigger than the first game. Traversing throughout the city now has many more options for getting points A to B, including the usual fast travel option, now instant with the power of the PS5.
There are now more options on how you want your web-slinging to act. If you want it to be easy and feel like Spider-Man, or have a challenge and improve throughout the time you play, you can, as there are more accessibility options to make it more comfortable for the player to enjoy the game their way. The game’s combat has both been simplified and built upon from the first game, which makes the combat intuitive while also leaving a lot of room for the player to increase their skills to become the best Spider-Man they could be.
The biggest thing with the new release of the game is the full use of the PS5 controller. The game takes full advantage of the controller’s speakers, haptic feedback, and adaptive triggers to give a more immersive experience that wasn’t possible in the previous two Spider-Man games. Spider-Man 2 introduces the idea of two playable spider-men in the game, which means that you play as both Peter Parker and Miles Morales. While their stories are connected, there are differences between their side quests and goals, which makes them feel unique from each other, rather than Spider-Man just being copied and pasted.
The Mary Jane missions have also improved from the first Spider-Man game. In the first game, there were many complaints about the shallowness of her gameplay, where the room for error was non-existent, which made her small moments of gameplay unfun in the 2018 release. Thankfully, Spider-Man 2 took the basic idea of Mary Jane’s missions and made it one of the most fun parts of the game. Mary Jane can defend herself from the beginning, unlike the original game where she was just moving from point A to point B. Not only can she stand her ground more, but being caught is no longer the same death sentence as in the original game.
While she does have a very limited amount of health compared to the Spider-Men, she still has enough that it makes her stealth sections less of a hassle while still keeping a small challenge in the game.
When it comes to the story, there is never a dull moment. Once the story goes, it doesn’t stop until the end, especially with its first villain for the first half of the game being Kraven. Kraven is different from most of Spider-Man’s gallery as he isn’t hunting him down, but rather hunting down Spider-Man’s past villains that we’ve fought in the previous two games, which causes some new dynamics where we are trying to save the same people that were trying to kill us. The game also shows previous villains trying to redeem themselves, and it’s something that isn’t seen in much superhero media, so it’s a nice breath of fresh air. But Kraven isn’t the main villain.
About into the game, we are reintroduced to Harry Osborn, who was previously out of consciousness in the last two games. He immediately becomes a likable character who interacts well with Peter and Mary Jane Watson. We learn that his father, Norman Osborn, essentially has an alien symbiote connected to him to help fight against his illness, the same one that had killed his mother.
Over time, however, this symbiote starts to take over. At first, it was like a normal suit with some cool superpowers. Still, after Kraven stabs Peter and essentially dies for a bit, the symbiote moves from Harry to Peter, causing Peter’s suit to become the iconic all-black suit. After this point, Kraven becomes the biggest focus for Peter, and the symbiote proceeds to change him as a person, not only isolating Peter from those whom he cares about but also causing him to become a more rude person.
After his fight with Kraven, Miles has to break the symbiote out of Peter to stop Peter from killing Kraven. After sep aration, Peter apologizes to the people he hurt and attempts to destroy the symbiote. Instead, Harry takes back control of the symbiote and transforms into the terrifyingly iconic Venom.
Venom introduces a new small segment where you get to play the villain for the first time in the series, and there is so much more to this story that needs to be experienced firsthand. Venom makes his presence known.
Something I also wanted to talk about was the overall improvement of the graphics in the game. From both predecessors, the lighting is the biggest improvement seen, with improved shadows and improved interaction with the game’s shaders. Every character model has seen a substantial improvement and, in some cases, changes in their character’s design. The game looks incredible in many diverse destinations that make every mission that you complete a different experience from the other. That’s all with the default fidelity mode the game puts most players in, but it is locked to 30 frames per second. There is a performance mode that, when enabled, does lower the graphics a tiny bit, but the boost to the game’s framerate is truly something to consider as the game runs butter smooth. When in this mode, it made me consider what mode I should use to complete the game.
There is no question that Spider-Man 2 lives up to and beyond the original 2018 release. The gameplay has seen improvements in every sense. The story is more emotional, packed, and an amazing experience that everyone has to see on their own. Spider-Man 2 did the impossible job of trying to live up to the original game, but the developers Insomniac Games, know what they’re doing.
This sequel is a masterpiece that I can fully recommend 5/5.
