Marvel's Spider-Man (PS4)
Published By : Sony Interactive Entertainment
Released : Sep 7, 2018
It's here, it's finally here! After the amazing announcement and reveal last year of gameplay from Insomniac's Spider-Man, the beast is finally upon us! I, like so many others, was instantly sucked into the things this game promised, and after waiting so, so long, I finally have my hands on it, and it's everything I hoped it would be from that intial gameplay reveal. Yes, I'm saying it right off the bat in a review, this game is perfect, amazing, and if you own a PS4, this needs to be in your collection. So now, let's spend some time and talk about why.
Story
Spending his time split between being Peter Parker and Spider-Man, things are getting crazy in both worlds. For Peter, financial issues abound as his internship with Dr. Octavius comes into question thanks to funding being pulled by the city. As Spider-Man, things get stirred up even more hectically. A new threat is rising in New York City, the Demon Gang. After mounting a joint assault on The Kingpin, Wilson Fisk, Fisk hints that something much bigger is about to come to Spidey's doorstep, and he'll be wishing The Kingpin was still around.
With Fisk tucked away in jail, our friendly, neighborhood superhero begins to investigate, trying to discover if there was any truth to the threat. An auction is going on at the Fisk estate, when a group of gang members wearing demon masks breaks into the place, taking one of the workers hostage while they search for important documents that had been tucked away in the collection. Documents that would confirm or deny Fisk's earlier threat.
Getting a peek at what's about to go down, Spider-Man has a lot to handle. Who are these new threats walking around his city like they own the place? What are they going to do? And, most importantly, can he stop them in time?
So Much To Do
Naturally, you'll get to experience the story through he main missions that spawn across the map. These pop up one at a time, and lead from one into the next, sometimes sending you inside a location, or keeping you outside slinging webs between buildings. However, this is far from being the only thing to do, since New York City is fully open and explorable as soon as you start the game, and the city offers up more than enough to do.
The most important side activity is going to be the communication towers that you'll have to sync up with. They're important for two reasons. One, the map itself ends up being "fogged" over, and syncing up with the towers opens the map up. These also open up the ability to see more of the rest of the games activities which will occupy your time.
Crime fills the city, so you'll get plenty of opportunities to stop these when they come up on your scanner. This can be anything from simple "thug" crimes of gangs trying to rob banks or local stores, to special Demon crimes later in the game that are much bigger and usually involve swinging into a shootout on the streets between the Demons and the cops.
Backpacks are scattered all over, and are fun little easter eggs because they usually contain little easter eggs into Spidey. Child drawings of the superhero, old gadgets from fights with old villains, each one containing something nifty inside it. But, it's not the item inside you want to concern yourself with, it's the token you get for finding the backpack itself.
All of these activities, the towers, crimes, backpacks, research labs, landmark photos (remember Pete is a photographer), net you tokens. These tokens are absolutely key to being able to build yourself additional Spider-Man suits, gadgets and suit powers. So if you're an in-game completionist that likes to do everything, you'll have plenty at your fingertips in this one. Let me put it this way, as of my last play session on stream, I'm at about 50% completion of everything (story + collectibles), and I still don't have the full list of side activities available to me. About four or five of them are still listed as "locked".
Not All About Spidey
Throughout the story, it only makes sense that a heavy part of the spotlight falls onto Spider-Man and Peter. He's not the only one soaking it up though, as there are at least a handful of sections where you'll be in control of someone else. No, don't worry I'm not going to spoil who you play as, but I will point out one thing. These sections of the game, by comparison, are a lot slower. That can be either a good thing, or a bad thing, depending on what you're looking to get out of the game as a whole.
The person/people you play as (I'm not even going to spoil if it's just one other character or more) don't come with Spidey's abilities. So you won't be slinging webs, you can't get into hefty combat situations. Instead you'll be forced into some minor stealth elements which will either be amazing or horrible. Again, this is completely dependent on you though and what you want.
If you're playing Spider-Man looking for a gameplay experience only, then you'll probably dread these chunks. They are extremely slow and could be perceived as boring when stood up next to everything you do as Spider-Man himself. However, if you enjoy a good story and are looking to pull that away from this game, these sections do an amazing job narratively, pushing forward the story in a way that makes sense instead of forcing an angle from Spidey's perspective. If you've caught anything off this blog in the last couple of years, it's that I love story experiences in games, so these areas of the game were a ton of fun for me.
Overall Feel
Probably my biggest worry while waiting for this game, was how amazing it looked. Would it still be that great when it got released? Or were things amped up for the display model? Well, it most definitely lives up. Webbing through the city as Spidey is extremely smooth and fluid. So much so, that the first handful of hours I spent playing, there were many times I thought I'd messed up and was going to slap right into the side of a building. Instead, he transitions beautiful into skimming and running along the side of the building until he's clear. There's also no webbing onto "nothing". If you're up to high, you'll freefall down until you're low enough to sling onto another structure, which can make swinging through Central Park a tiny bit nerve wracking.
You get three skill trees in the game as well, that can expand your move sets, letting you perform swing kicks, swinging thugs around after they've been webbed up. One of the most fun ones is unlocking the ability to perform tricks between web-swings. It even comes with a small EXP boost (literally 2 points per trick performed) so if you're constantly doing it you'll hit through the levels quicker.
Combat is fluid as well, very reminiscent of a Batman Arkham style. You can perform punch/kick combos, utilize your web with some maneuvers, and even bust out some gadgets to up the ante. If an enemy is about to attack, the Spidey Sense will tingle by flashing over Spidey's head. Also, certain enemies can only be attacked in a specific manner. For instance, brute-types need to be webbed up before you can get close enough or they'll waylay you instantly.
By far, my favorite thing about the game though is the opening three hours. In this time, you don't really experience much of the story, save for the run in with Kingpin. Here, the game takes it's time introducing you to everything that is about to be splayed out before you. It's my favorite part because it gives you just about everything you'll need for the experience ahead, and it does it in a way that's not tedious and boring. Most games do it in a very cheesy, guided-tour sort of display. Here, Spider-Man gets a dedicated mission that at the end is when you learn "Oh by the way this is a thing you can do for the rest of the game if you liked it."
Final Verdict
We already know where this ends. I said at the start that I thought this game turned out perfect and amazing. There's not many instances where I can say I've waited over a year for a game and been completely satisfied with the result. Almost always, some flaw poked out. Some mechanic felt clunky, things felt recycled from a previous game in the franchise or dev's history. None of that happened with Spider-Man though, and I'm still blown away by the fact that this comes from the developers and Spyro and Ratchet & Clank. Although I'm still hopeful for an easter egg in the city, much like how Sucker Punch had Sly Cooper logo's in Seattle for Infamous Second Son.
I'd have to say that the only downside about this game is the fact that it's exclusive to the Playstation 4, so it can't be experienced by everyone in the gaming community. So, unfortunately I have to limit it by saying if you have a PS4 or access to one, definitely get this game. Again I'm only about halfway through completion of this game (which, for the record, I'm going for that platinum trophy in this one), but I've loved every second I've spent in it and I'm sure I'll love all the rest.
Insomniac did an amazing thing here, and I sure hope to see this become a series from then. The last really good Spider-Man game we got was back in the PS2/Xbox days so this more than makes up for that long gap. Let's just hope we don't experience another one.
