Marvel's Spider-Man 2 is another solid entry in Insomniac's web-slinging series that provides ample fun while also starting to show the wear and tear of a formula running a bit dry.
Peter Parker and Miles Morales are back, this time both as playable characters you can switch between while swinging around an expanded map of New York that now includes Queens and Brooklyn. As Kraven the Hunter invades the city looking for the ultimate prey and Harry Osborne returns cured of his illness by a mysterious black suit, the two Spider-Men must confront their own demons and insecurities as they strive to once again save the city.
It's overall a very compelling tale that really dives deep into both our protagonists and all the supporting cast, and while the main villain this time around is far more well-known than the first game's Mr. Negative and Miles Morales' Phin, the plot does a good job hitting the expected beats for these stories from the comics while also subverting your expectations when needed to keep things fresh. Aside from some pacing issues and a couple contrivances (Miles, how did you get that Oscorp container???) it overall lands most of its ideas with a particularly satisfying conclusion. I'm looking forward to the almost guaranteed Spider-Man 3 to see where the threads left hanging go.
What I'm not looking forward to in another sequel is a continuation of the formula as it stands, because in my opinion at least, it's starting to get stale. You'll once again swing around, completing story missions in between the various side tasks the large map gives you. Nothing here is bad necessarily, it's just that it's not so different from before. You'll have little errands and minigames, that while neat on their own, rarely contain much depth and repeat maybe a couple times too many before you finish them and get the satisfying little easter egg or new suit or battle with a side villain. They're all at least new activities, though some will feel very familiar like the Hunter Blinds basically being this entry's Construction Sites or the Mysteriums being similar challenges to Taskmaster's questline in the first game. All that to say, this was still a fun time, and some of the side quests that had more dedicated stories like the FNSM requests, the Harlem Museum quest, or The Flame questline told some really interesting stories separate from the main plot. However, nothing here truly evolves the formula. It's all a fresh coat of paint slapped on the same car we've been driving since 2018, and I think after 3 games (or 2.5 whatever), I'm getting a bit tired of it. I'd love to see Insomniac truly evolve the structure of their next Spider-Man game or God forbid otherwise, show us something new and exciting with their Wolverine game. For now though, as the novelty starts to wear off, I find the repetition and homogeneity starting to grate more and more.
The same can largely be said of the combat. It's still very good, but it's also still very similar. We have a parry now which as always is satisfying to pull off, and some new powers that I won't spoil coming from specific plot elements change things up a bit. But only a bit. Otherwise it's the same animation-based, counter and hit system we've seen in these games, the Batman Arkham games, the old Assassin's Creed games, and more. It works, but it also doesn't add much in terms of enemy types to make things more interesting or even mechanics beyond the couple I already mentioned. Bosses can be very fun and provide a good challenge, but they largely mix and match different ways to use your skillset with the odd gimmick thrown in. If you're already a fan of this type of combat, you're not going to find much to complain about here, but detractors also won't be convinced otherwise.
The game also has an issue with bugs. I don't think the other Spider-Man games were perfect per se, but they definitely weren't as buggy as Spider-Man 2 is even this long after launch. I had numerous visual glitches such as characters walking on thin air, buildings disappearing but their objects and enemies still staying there floating, etc. It was particularly bad when I got to a late game state of the game world I won't spoil right before the final mission where things really got bad. I was cleaning up side stuff and buying the remaining upgrades and suits only for the game to freak out and glitch so half the suits turned Spider-Man into a small, white box. Thankfully, this went away when I quit out and went back in, though it wasn't encouraging that the Title Screen when I backed out had a glitched out Peter Parker head jutting out from the side of a bridge. These don't stop at visual either unfortunately. A couple times my Web Zip (done by pressing X while swinging) would fritz out and not launch me as fast as normal. It not only was obvious from just game feel, but you could see a little hitch in the animation too as the character doesn't zip forward as fast as usual. My game crashed twice, once when I died in a Mysterium (oops) and once during a cutscene after beating a boss (thankfully there was a checkpoint right when I beat the boss, so I didn't have to redo anything). I also got softlocked in a story mission when I decided to have Peter sit on a bench only for it to not let me get up from said bench, even when all the dialogue was exhausted. It's not anything horrible like Assassin's Creed Unity, but the frequency of things like this is just well below what I expect from a first-party Sony title or even just an Insomniac game. It worries me, especially with the news that Sony is laying off hundreds of employess, including a decent chunk from Insomniac.
That being said, I still did have fun, and I still Platinumed the game just like I did the first one. It's not broken (aside from the couple times it quite literally is as described above), but I'd be lying if I didn't say I felt disappointed by this game. It's the third sequel from Sony now, like the new Horizon and God of War games, that doesn't really try to push for anything new like we saw from Sony games in the PS3 and 4 eras. While Horizon and God of War maybe get a bit of a pass as their first games were a bit more unique from the outset, even the first Spider-Man from Insomniac was already pretty close to tried and true open world ideas. As we go on and things remain the same, it starts to show a bit more. I think we need a refresh of sorts, not just with this series but a number of them, but for the time being, it's not like this game will be a waste of your time. If you liked the other Spider-Man games, you will like this. It is still unparalleled in its ability to make you feel like Spider-Man (cue the groans) with its excellent swinging system and cool takes on the characters and villains everyone knows from the comics and movies. I just hope next time we can get back to making that feeling of being Spider-Man feel fresh again.
Peter Parker and Miles Morales are back, this time both as playable characters you can switch between while swinging around an expanded map of New York that now includes Queens and Brooklyn. As Kraven the Hunter invades the city looking for the ultimate prey and Harry Osborne returns cured of his illness by a mysterious black suit, the two Spider-Men must confront their own demons and insecurities as they strive to once again save the city.
It's overall a very compelling tale that really dives deep into both our protagonists and all the supporting cast, and while the main villain this time around is far more well-known than the first game's Mr. Negative and Miles Morales' Phin, the plot does a good job hitting the expected beats for these stories from the comics while also subverting your expectations when needed to keep things fresh. Aside from some pacing issues and a couple contrivances (Miles, how did you get that Oscorp container???) it overall lands most of its ideas with a particularly satisfying conclusion. I'm looking forward to the almost guaranteed Spider-Man 3 to see where the threads left hanging go.
What I'm not looking forward to in another sequel is a continuation of the formula as it stands, because in my opinion at least, it's starting to get stale. You'll once again swing around, completing story missions in between the various side tasks the large map gives you. Nothing here is bad necessarily, it's just that it's not so different from before. You'll have little errands and minigames, that while neat on their own, rarely contain much depth and repeat maybe a couple times too many before you finish them and get the satisfying little easter egg or new suit or battle with a side villain. They're all at least new activities, though some will feel very familiar like the Hunter Blinds basically being this entry's Construction Sites or the Mysteriums being similar challenges to Taskmaster's questline in the first game. All that to say, this was still a fun time, and some of the side quests that had more dedicated stories like the FNSM requests, the Harlem Museum quest, or The Flame questline told some really interesting stories separate from the main plot. However, nothing here truly evolves the formula. It's all a fresh coat of paint slapped on the same car we've been driving since 2018, and I think after 3 games (or 2.5 whatever), I'm getting a bit tired of it. I'd love to see Insomniac truly evolve the structure of their next Spider-Man game or God forbid otherwise, show us something new and exciting with their Wolverine game. For now though, as the novelty starts to wear off, I find the repetition and homogeneity starting to grate more and more.
The same can largely be said of the combat. It's still very good, but it's also still very similar. We have a parry now which as always is satisfying to pull off, and some new powers that I won't spoil coming from specific plot elements change things up a bit. But only a bit. Otherwise it's the same animation-based, counter and hit system we've seen in these games, the Batman Arkham games, the old Assassin's Creed games, and more. It works, but it also doesn't add much in terms of enemy types to make things more interesting or even mechanics beyond the couple I already mentioned. Bosses can be very fun and provide a good challenge, but they largely mix and match different ways to use your skillset with the odd gimmick thrown in. If you're already a fan of this type of combat, you're not going to find much to complain about here, but detractors also won't be convinced otherwise.
The game also has an issue with bugs. I don't think the other Spider-Man games were perfect per se, but they definitely weren't as buggy as Spider-Man 2 is even this long after launch. I had numerous visual glitches such as characters walking on thin air, buildings disappearing but their objects and enemies still staying there floating, etc. It was particularly bad when I got to a late game state of the game world I won't spoil right before the final mission where things really got bad. I was cleaning up side stuff and buying the remaining upgrades and suits only for the game to freak out and glitch so half the suits turned Spider-Man into a small, white box. Thankfully, this went away when I quit out and went back in, though it wasn't encouraging that the Title Screen when I backed out had a glitched out Peter Parker head jutting out from the side of a bridge. These don't stop at visual either unfortunately. A couple times my Web Zip (done by pressing X while swinging) would fritz out and not launch me as fast as normal. It not only was obvious from just game feel, but you could see a little hitch in the animation too as the character doesn't zip forward as fast as usual. My game crashed twice, once when I died in a Mysterium (oops) and once during a cutscene after beating a boss (thankfully there was a checkpoint right when I beat the boss, so I didn't have to redo anything). I also got softlocked in a story mission when I decided to have Peter sit on a bench only for it to not let me get up from said bench, even when all the dialogue was exhausted. It's not anything horrible like Assassin's Creed Unity, but the frequency of things like this is just well below what I expect from a first-party Sony title or even just an Insomniac game. It worries me, especially with the news that Sony is laying off hundreds of employess, including a decent chunk from Insomniac.
That being said, I still did have fun, and I still Platinumed the game just like I did the first one. It's not broken (aside from the couple times it quite literally is as described above), but I'd be lying if I didn't say I felt disappointed by this game. It's the third sequel from Sony now, like the new Horizon and God of War games, that doesn't really try to push for anything new like we saw from Sony games in the PS3 and 4 eras. While Horizon and God of War maybe get a bit of a pass as their first games were a bit more unique from the outset, even the first Spider-Man from Insomniac was already pretty close to tried and true open world ideas. As we go on and things remain the same, it starts to show a bit more. I think we need a refresh of sorts, not just with this series but a number of them, but for the time being, it's not like this game will be a waste of your time. If you liked the other Spider-Man games, you will like this. It is still unparalleled in its ability to make you feel like Spider-Man (cue the groans) with its excellent swinging system and cool takes on the characters and villains everyone knows from the comics and movies. I just hope next time we can get back to making that feeling of being Spider-Man feel fresh again.