A while back, I promised you all that for the sake of the gaming community, I would stop getting excited about video games with the exception of Spider-Man 2. This was mostly due to the fact that I loved the first entry, and knowing full well that Venom (my favorite MCU character next to Deadpool) was included, this was going to be a win. But my reason for not hyping up games is because usually when I get excited about a game, it turns out to be complete shit. So, unfortunately, this one might have missed some marks because of me, but before you come at me with pitchforks and torches, hear me out. I am fully aware that this is racking up high if not perfect scores across the board, and I will likely be one of the lowest reviews out there. There will be some mild spoilers here, and to really dive into why I disliked this story so much, I am going to have to go waist-deep into a full-on spoiler section that I will submit as a separate articleseparate article, so be warned if you venture into either part of this review if you haven’t played or beat the game just yet.

The story focuses on New York having not one but two super powered Spider-like men, Miles and Peter, whom you switch between throughout the game, sometimes at will based on your preference and other times based upon the point of the story you are in. Each character has their own side missions, special attacks, and separate narratives that add some variety if you don’t have a favorite Spider-Man. I personally lean towards Peter because he was the one and only Spider-Man when I was growing up, but if you prefer Miles, that’s cool too.

The story is by far one of Sony’s most ambitious ventures that I have played in terms of scope, shoehorning in a ton of classic Spider-Man villains that in my opinion feels kind of bloated, much like Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 3, which is easily the worst film in the hero’s silver screen history, and for good reason. It was excessively busy and tried to do too much. This is easier to accomplish in a long-form video game, but again, there is a lot of filler here and not all of it is worth the time invested.

Much like the previously mentioned film, Venom doesn’t get nearly enough screen time despite being heavily showcased in the initial announcement, promo materials, and the 19-inch statue that came along with the collector’s edition. Instead, we get smaller bits of Sandman, The Lizard, Mysterio, Mr. Negative, and a few surprise ones that I’ll discuss in the spoilers, and then what I’d call the main antagonist, Kraven the Hunter. The narrative is loosely based upon a few key story arcs, namely Kraven’s Last Hunt, Planet of the Symbiotes (I think), and Back in Black. With the former two being some of my favorites from the era when I was really into comic books, collecting every single issue, I was excited and then downright disappointed with the outcome.

By far the biggest issue outside of the lack of Venom screentime is the depiction of Kraven. Historically, Kraven is a bit of a badass. He’ll fight off anything and anyone with his bare-freaking hands to prove he’s the biggest and baddest mother-f’er on the block, but here he’s kind of a little bitch. The kind who would go to one of those big game hunting reserves where he pays people to hold down his kill while he walks up from a safe distance and lands the kill shot. It’s sickening to see him portrayed in this manner, and he’s not even one of my favorites. Kraven not only uses a bunch of high-tech gadgetry for cheap shots against his prey, he has an army of goons that I get are mostly there to give someone for Spider-Man to punch, but I feel like this could’ve been done a lot differently.

There are plenty of other changes as well, which we will dig into more in part two, but I can talk about another big change that annoyed me: MJ. I wasn’t a fan of her in the first one, and I disliked her even more here. She’s got some offensive tactics now, explained by training with Silver Sable after the events of the last 1.5 games, which is fine, but her overall personality and appearance turned me off from the character. Now I have my own MJ at home, so I don’t need to fantasize over a fictional one, but I would like her to somewhat remain true to her character, which she isn’t even remotely here. She’s a reporter for the Bugle, which is fine, whatever, but she is kind of ugly and deeply contrasting from her comic counterpart. We went from her being a supermodel in the comics (seriously, look it up if you don’t believe me), to being an Ohio four at best. She legit looks like the decapitated child from Hereditary. She also rides a Harley for some reason now too. And then… well, catch me in the spoilers for more.

You don’t just occasionally take control of MJ now, there’s also the deaf artist girl whom I didn’t care enough about to remember her name, Miles and Peter outside of their suits, and then an entirely too short time as Venom. I would honestly at least consider selling my firstborn child to play in free-roam as Venom outside of the glitch that I am not entirely sure if I just failed at initiating or was patched out before I got there. I can’t attest to this because I was busy playing this segment, but my wife compared my smile during this chapter of the story to being a kid on Christmas. He’s just as powerful and vicious as you’d expect, and they mostly do the character justice, even if it was short-lived. My only complaint other than screen time for Venom is his lack of being able to swing by webs, which in the other mediums was something the symbiote suit gained from its time attached to Parker.

This carries over to when Peter takes control of the symbiote, which is a notable change to the standard abilities he has prior to this point of the narrative. It was nice to see a substantial increase, which also applies to his attitude when dealing with the other characters which occasionally teeters on cringe, akin to the dance scene from Spider-Man 3, but is much more digestible. Miles also sees some upgrades to his powers since the last game, which is not quite as substantial, making him just as enjoyable to play. My issues with Miles… Once again mostly have to fall into the spoiler section of this, but I can say that I really wasn’t a huge fan of him essentially having some pretty heavy plot armor. You can’t tell me that a somewhat new hero is going to stand toe to toe with some of the same enemies Peter is, especially when he lacks the experience, is nowhere near as smart as Parker, and clearly is still fighting with pure emotion in many cases.

Overall the visuals, voice acting, combat, and traversal help make up for what the rest of the game lacks. As a video game, this is a really good one, and outside of some bugs, the story is where most of the faults for me lie. It’s still just as enjoyable to swing around, searching for collectibles, dealing with street-level crime, and completing the side missions that mostly differ from those found in the original game and its standalone DLC. Here, you’ll be using Miles to find stashes of The Prowler’s lost tech, fighting off some holograms in machines designed by Mysterio, Peter working on science projects for a spin-off of Oscorp, and either finding various collectibles, taking photos, and fighting or sneaking through some enemy bases. It was pleasant to be able to pick and choose who I wanted to play for most of these, even if Parker is still going to be my Spider-Man of choice. Stealth is still a viable route, but feels like it’s more of the same without any new mechanics that I noticed being offered that were not incorporated in the previous games.

Outside of the story changes and some of the bloat, I did notice a staggering amount of bugs. Nothing that rendered this unplayable for me, but the lack of polish concerned me. This is easily the buggiest first-party Playstation game I have played, I would even go as far as to say it’s worse than Days Gone was when I played it just after launch. I am still perplexed by how many people dragged that game at launch when this is getting some serious praise. Im some areas deserves it, but it’s nowhere near being in a perfect state at launch. I had a few missions where I lost a fair amount of progress on by getting stuck within a wall or static asset that I couldn’t escape by any means other than reloading a checkpoint. I’ve also been locked out of certain missions for extended periods of time, where I could see it was a thing, I could go to the waypoint, but I couldn’t nudge the game forward unless I reloaded, rebooted entirely, or just did something else for awhile. I’ve also had some audio issues where I switched between Peter and Miles at the wrong time, resulting in the same phone call between the deaf girl and Miles playing over and over again, overlapping the audio from what I was doing at the time.

Out of the three Insomniac Spider-Man releases, this is easily the least impressive. It doesn’t make me regret getting my PS5, because this was the primary reason I went through with the purchase, but it did not meet my admittedly high expectations. It’s buggy, they took some pretty extreme changes to the lore of the characters, and in many ways, reminded me of an extended or rebooted version Spider-Man Web of Shadows, which is generally regarded as one of the worst Spider-Man games in history. As far as gameplay goes, this is a solid game that will please most gamers, but as a Spider-Man fan, the story is likely going to disappoint, if not anger you. I cannot remember the last time I said, or in some cases, screamed no at a game in a long time. If this wasn’t clear enough and you really want my spoiler-y thoughts, I’ll see you in part two.

8 out of 10

Pros

• Amazing Visuals
• Traversal is Spectacular
• Playing as Venom is Outstanding
• The Ability to Switch Between Parker And Morales at Will, Each Feeling like a Unique Character

Cons

• MJ
• It’s Bloated
• A lot of the Lore Changes Don’t Work

Spider-Man 2 was developed by Insomniac Games and published Sony Interactive Entertainment. The game was not provided to us for review. If you’d like to see more of Spider-Man 2, check out the official site.

 

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