It is hard to imagine a game with greater hype at the moment since its announcement people have been waiting for a platform exclusive Marvel title from a top developer, in this case, Insomniac.
Like the most recent MCU movie, Spider-Man starts without any pretext, origin story or anything of the sort, you know who he is and that’s the part you pick up from. It’s interesting to play through and sort of piece the story together, it’s done in an almost non-linear way, is by what you do in-game and your progression reveals more about the backstory and not how he became Spider-Man, that’s pretty much common knowledge at this point, but rather how being Spider-Man has affected Peter Parker’s relationships thus far.
It is those relationships that drive the game forward, sometimes in a clunky and drawn out way, and at others they reveal themselves and it causes more questions than it answers, but I get the sense Insomniac are planning for the long haul, the controversial Season Pass was announced pre-launch but it is more than planning some add-on DLC, thought has gone into a continuing storyline through the main thread of the game.
However it is the storyline and its arc that is probably the main issue with the game, the focus is paid to certain villains way too much, others become an afterthought, you end up playing a very big portion of the game with one main villain, one that’s pretty obscure and the others feel like they are crammed in two at a time just to get them out of the way. The boss fights themselves are not really boss fights in the truest sense of the word and you will probably come away disappointed, they end up being more like action QTE’s which is a disappointment given everything Insomniac had to work with.
Once you move past certain portions of the game other unlockables on the map become available, but they are pretty cut-and-paste and are just based around a new villain’s characteristics. The pacing of the game feels off, there are some long stretches before things start to evolve a bit more, at some points you are thinking if they ever will and what you have seen thus far was just a tease.
Spider-Man could have done with a good portion of the beginning to middle cut away and the ending part stretched back some, giving the game more moments to shine in the areas that it’s so heavy on, with so much unused material that could easily have been fleshed out.
Insomniac made the game a very Ubisoft open world, it is almost like they didn’t know how to make an open-world game, so picked up a few Far Cry or Assassins Creed titles for reference. There are unlockable towers, multiple collectables, things to pick up and investigate. As you go through the game the map starts to get filled with an ever-growing collection of icons, which are all very samey in their execution.
There is a lot to do. The map is packed with busy work and side quests, none of it adds up to anything substantial, some introduce new characters, but mainly you gain points and XP which help you level up and there is a lot to level up. Things that help you in your travels and combat and because the majority of the time doing the above means traversing Manhattan or in combat.
Where the game shines is traversing that world, Spider-Man fluidly flings and glides up, around and across buildings with ease. As you progress you can unlock different abilities that make traversing a bit easier and slicker. Combat is just as good, less clunky than the Batman series and with a lot of combat options and gadgets you can easily and quickly use, it feels sharp, fluid and like you can easily manage a lot whilst pressing hardly any buttons and if timed correctly hardly any button mashing.
Spider-Man is an open world, within the confines of Manhatten Island, there are no excursions to any outer boroughs or Brooklyn for example which may seem like a slight to Insomniac considering how much time and effort must have been made to re-create such an amazing model of Manhatten, but after a while, all the buildings blur into one, at times you are snapped back by a landmark or two but there is not much diversity to the landscape as you would expect maybe from an open-world game and your expectations should not be that it is like every other game, but when the game does break up, you enter a building or a different sequence, after a while, they are also very much the same again and again.
The UI is sharp, very Iron Man, easy to navigate and upgrade, check out missions and even read the in-game Twitter timeline. Nothing is behind a paywall, there are a slew of suits to unlock but nothing that can not be done in-game, which in this climate with pre-order bonuses locking everything away gives you that little more incentive to complete those side missions you might not have before. Insomniac has done a great job with the feel of the game, having J. Jonah Jameson as a Radio DJ along the lines of Bill O’Reilly creates some great moments, Spider-Man interacts with friends and foe’s alike in his usual quippy way which was captured faithfully and will make you chuckle along.
Spider-Man is a long game, a big game, lots to do and see, it has massive re-playability. It is a shame about the storyline, the pacing and the unused potential, however, the combat is just so good and the way Insomniac have embodied Peter Parker and Spider-Man across all facets does make this a game to remember.