Marvel is one of the most recognizable things in fiction. Where the Impossible becomes possible and the existence of superheroes. Many superheroes roam Marvel like Hulk, Daredevil, Wolverine, Iron Man, Captain America, Moon Knight, Scarlet Witch, Thor, Black Widow, and so on and so forth. However, there is one character recognized by millions, with a game named after him that was one of the best games of the year at the time. While it didn’t win Game of the Year, it is recognized for its well-written story and moments that truly make this game great. I’d love to introduce the poster boy of Marvel and one of the most recognizable faces in fiction, Spider-Man, and the game, famously known as “Spider-Man (2018)”
Background Details
Spider-Man first appeared in August 1962 in a comic book called “Amazing Fantasy #15”. He has been here for a long time and has appeared in a ton of comic book runs and comics that contain other characters. Spider-Man (2018) or Insomniac Spider-Man came out back on September 7, 2018. It was revealed back in 2016 and had a gameplay trailer in 2017. Because of how popular Spider-Man has been throughout Marvel and his overall character, he became the face of Marvel. Since then, there have been many movies and shows of the character, and it has been one of the most influential and recognizable characters.
Story
The story starts with our main character, Peter Parker, suiting up because there was a situation at Fisk Tower, and at this point in his life, he has been Spider-Man for years, and during this time got himself a Job with Doctor Octavius, or Otto for short. When he goes to Fisk Tower and it’s an entire shootout with the police, and in the middle of it rendezvous with Yuri Watanabe, in which she gives him the green light to go ahead and goes in and takes down Kingpin and gathers the evidence to send him to prison for good. After this, he goes on to help out Otto and help him with people who were going to be coming around, but had come in late. After this, he goes to make himself a new suit after the battle with Kingpin. Otto runs into him making the suit, and Peter plays it off as helping Spider-Man, but he isn’t able to fully repair it, and goes to sleep. Otto helps him out by giving him a new suit idea. In which we get our first suit that we will be using. Spider-Man has to find a way to stop Mr. Negative as well as all of his villains while also maintaining his regular life as Peter Parker in this action-packed and overall amazing story.
Combat/Transversal
Combat is one of the things that makes this game unique from others. The combat system is actually heavily inspired by the Arkham games, one of the most iconic versions of Batman. You use your regular day-to-day attack button to initiate a simple combo. Some of these things you can do are you can use your web zip to get over to an enemy really fast and continue the combat. Another thing that I would like to note is the dodge. What they applied to the game is when you are about to get hit with something, your spider-sense goes off, and you can avoid the attack, but if you dodge at the right time, you will initiate a perfect dodge where you can web an enemy and take them down, depending on the action you take after the perfect dodge. Transversal is the real main point of the game. Web swinging is the most satisfying thing that is part of the game. It makes you really feel like Spider-Man. Having that and being able to climb and run up walls as well as web-zip. All of this is then supported by the fact that you can also do tricks in the air, and furthers the point that they really took heavy inspiration from the people at Rocksteady.
Sidequests/Map
One of the things that makes this very memorable is the map itself and New York. They stay true to a lot of the things that you would see in New York in real life. It makes the city feel alive and makes it feel more immersive with the dialogue that can be heard from some of the New York citizens, and you can even interact with some by just walking around. They even have things that you would up and see in the comics as well, like the bar with no name, Oscorp, and even Avengers Tower. Another thing is that you can even visit Uncle Ben’s grave as well, and the words that Peter exchanges are really heartwarming. The Sidequests are what really keep you up at night if it’s not the actual story. These quests lead to characters that we know from Spider-Man comics in general. You will be surprised when you run into people like Tombstone and even someone like the taskmaster, a person who can copy and replicate someone’s fighting style just by seeing it one time in action. You also have little sidequests that make you go into the scientific things of the game, such as helping Harry figure some things out at some of the work stations at Oscorp while he is “away”. This game will have you up for hours if you are really that dedicated to completing everything, which, in my personal opinion, is the best part.
Suits/Gadgets
Suits are one of the most important things in this game. These suits come from all of the comics that you’ve seen. You’ll also come across the movie suits that you’ve seen, like the ones from Sam Raimi, Andrew Garfield, and Tom Holland. Comic ones consist of the Ghost-Spider, the Fear Itself suit, the Secret War suit, Ben Reilly suit, Spider-Punk, the Big Time suit, and much more. The thing that makes these suits unique is that they all have different powers that you can get from unlocking them throughout the game via side missions and crimes that give you tokens. A great point of reference is the velocity suit, which gives you the ability to move a lot faster, even while web swinging. This also has a comic where the velocity suit basically makes him a speedster. Gadgets are also something that can be useful in combat. One of the Gadgets that is really simple but really impactful is the impact web. This web, while being similar to your web shooter, gives you a bigger web capacity. Impact has a capacity of 4, but it gives your webs a knock back, and they web you instantly, and can be used to take down people that are next to walls. There are also things such as the web bomb that are also useful in combat, as well being of the radial gadget, getting anyone that’s in the radius of the explosion. I really like that these are in the game because it gives you the feeling of actually being like Spider-Man, and it gives players different combinations and combos that people can pull off.
DLC: The City That Never Sleeps
This is where it continues and gives us new opportunities and expand more on the story of this game. The city that never sleeps has three different stories to this, all of them being continuations of each other. The Heist has you mainly working with black cat for a little bit and figuring out what she is really up to. Turf war goes deeper into the story of Yuri and her fixation with wanting to take down Hammerhead. And lastly is Silver lining, where we work with an unlikely ally, Silver Sable, to take down Hammerhead once and for all. Each one one these stories doesn’t take place at once, and all of them have their own crimes and their own side missions. The recurring one is the one with Screwball, a streamer that gets Spider-Man into unlikely situations that involve criminals. This DLC also has its own set of skins that come along with it, but you can use it with the main game as well. Fun fact, the Iron Spider skin that you use for that is from the MCU can use Iron Spider legs. In one of the DLCs, they have the original Iron Spider suit, and if you were to use the ability with the original suit, it will appear Golden to match the design of the suit. I think that little things like that are what make this game such a success and why people love the suits in this game so much, because they all feel unique and feel like you pulled them out of the comic.
Opinion/Review
This is honestly up there with the Arkham games, while not as Iconic as them, it is definitely with them. This is genuinely one of the best superhero games that I’ve played. It figures out a way to really take you into the story with its emotional beats and twists. I love a lot of the suits in the game, and it really makes me feel like I’m in the game. I would give this game a 10/10; it’s genuinely amazing, and it’s the quality of video games we should get now. I think everyone should try it at least once, and if you do, you genuinely will not regret it and will see why Peter Parker is the Spider-Man.
