This review contains spoilers
𝗜𝗡𝗦𝗢𝗠𝗡𝗜𝗔𝗖 𝗣𝗥𝗘𝗦𝗘𝗡𝗧𝗦…𝗛𝗢𝗪 𝗧𝗢 𝗨𝗧𝗜𝗟𝗜𝗦𝗘 $𝟯𝟭𝟱 𝗠𝗜𝗟𝗟𝗜𝗢𝗡 𝗜𝗡𝗘𝗙𝗙𝗘𝗖𝗧𝗜𝗩𝗘𝗟𝗬!
In the latter half of 2023, a year that’s been described as “one of the best years for gaming”, Sony Entertainment decided to publish “Marvel’s Spider-Man 2”. Their biggest, most wallcrawling, most AAA, and Spider-Maniest game ever.
Any praise I can give to this game is justified and deserved, while underneath my criticisms there’s still an enjoyable game to be found I can’t help but feel a little alienated when I see people on my twitter feed every day saying this is one of the best video games they’ve ever played.
When it comes to adapting superhero comics into any media, I can’t say there’s still not an influx of those, especially when it comes to Spider-Man. I'm nowhere close to being a huge Marvel guy, and I haven’t read a main Spidey book since 2018’s Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man (that was 5 years ago) but the wallcrawler himself holds a special place in my heart, which is why seeing this game fall down the usual pitfalls when it comes to adapting the medium hurts. It’s more earnest and heartfelt than something like the MCU, but when it comes to a lot of what this game adapts I can’t help but feel you’d be better off reading the comics this game is “inspired by” if you wanna see those concepts explored better.
One thing I’ll commend this game for is that they actually do try to make Miles stand on his own and apart from Peter as a character and as Spider-Man. This is reflected not only in the side content but the narrative as well…only problem is that in a game that’s as big as this there’s still very little given to their relationship. It’s hard to believe at times these two are on good terms with each other with how little they interact before Peter receives the symbiote, 2020’s Miles Morales had a chance to fill in that hole but that game itself was a run of the mill generic “filling in the shoes” story where Peter was only there for the first 30 minutes. I’ve intentionally avoided making comparisons to Spider-Verse but after that movie I feel this game does sorely lack the relationship Peter and Miles have in that movie, yet this game’s third act is still written as if the depth of their relationship has been effectively displayed to the audience. Just makes the final scene at Peter’s house feel more hollow than it should.
Also another thing Spider-Verse did better was Miles himself. For a game that has quite a bit of Miles’ side quests being respectful to POC, especially black culture, and interacting with other students his age, it is astounding how little Miles’ personality is a product of his surroundings. My friend put it best when they said that every young person in this game acts like they live in 2014 Oklahoma. Spider-Verse showed that you could have a dorky Miles whose personality fits with his age because unlike Peter, Miles doesn’t fit in with his peers due to his upbringing and his class, he isn’t able to relate to a lot of the attitudes exhibited by them. Meanwhile every kid in Brooklyn Visions including Miles act like they’re the nerd stereotype from a movie in the 2000s, which leads to scenes like this.
Of course I don’t think Miles Morales is a character is someone who should be removed from the game, as his character arc is definitely one of the best things about but but I don’t know man, despite being a game that’s long yet well-paced I still feel like large chunks are missing, especially in regards to the eventual “I forgive you.”. It’s a well written scene…but it doesn’t strike as it should due to how underdeveloped their relationship was and how much of his arc took a backseat to everything else.
When it comes to the new characters, I think Harry Osborne is very enjoyable early on due to how well he works off of Peter and his descent into becoming a villain is certainly understandable and engaging it’s just everything after that’s just putting a sour taste in my mouth. I’m no adaptation purist by any means and the decision to make Harry into Venom is a unique one, but I’d be praising it more if there was more to it than just Harry’s bitterness. For the general audience, Venom is a character who is tied to Spider-Man despite decades of comics proving how he’s able to be independent. It’s because of that desire to cater to the general audience that Venom in this game isn’t given his own identity, instead of becoming an extension of Harry and the symbiote character he’s written as a product of Peter which really doesn’t do Harry any favors due to how the game is written.
Insomniac’s Venom is his own beast when compared to the comics, and I can appreciate that. But what bugs me about him is that the writers intentionally take elements from Donny Cates’ run on Venom released in 2018, but here they replace the central characters from that comic into Peter himself and other people from the Spider-Man mythos; this is all done without any credit to Cates as well. Despite being so radically different in that regard, the narrative still tries to utilize the same talking points from other Venom media but it’s done so haphazardly that you’re ended up with a Venom that feels like a mishmash of multiple characters, none of whom are Harry.
Unfortunately, Venom isn’t the only villain to undergo this fate. Even to the average person who enjoys superhero media and doesn’t read comics, chances are that they’ve more likely than not at least heard about Kraven the Hunter. That’s the effect a comic like Kraven’s Last Hunt has, it’s able to send shockwaves across the character of Spider-Man’s entire legacy, which only makes the way he’s used here more baffling. Translating how threatening Kraven is into a video game is a challenge in of itself but there’s also the element of his relationship with Peter. Here he doesn’t make me feel strongly, and he takes a backseat for a lot of the game, only appearing more as the game progresses. Everything about him just feels undercooked, like he was mandated by the higher-ups to be put into the game, just like Venom, as he’s easily recognizable as a formidable Spidey foe.
It’s really just stuff like this which makes me realise that a lot of this game should’ve been reserved for the next one. The glaring flaw of this game is that it tries to do way too much than it can, which leads to events like Kraven’s death and Miles’ forgiveness being lackluster as the game already had a lot to fit in, something had to take a hit. There is a lot of praise I can offer this game as well but I’m only focusing on the negatives here to highlight the importance of AAA games restraining their scope.
I keep turning over the development cost of $315 million in my head. No matter how hard I try I don’t understand what exactly here could cost that much, to the point where they had to exceed their initial massive budget of $275 million. Hell, even the Spider-Man (2018) remaster cost a whopping $40 million to make, and now the recent leaks have shown that Insomniac still hasn’t broken even on Spider-Man 2. I’m more partial to AAA games than most of my peers, and overall I enjoy this one, but even I have to agree that this industry is not feasible, not like this.
In the latter half of 2023, a year that’s been described as “one of the best years for gaming”, Sony Entertainment decided to publish “Marvel’s Spider-Man 2”. Their biggest, most wallcrawling, most AAA, and Spider-Maniest game ever.
Any praise I can give to this game is justified and deserved, while underneath my criticisms there’s still an enjoyable game to be found I can’t help but feel a little alienated when I see people on my twitter feed every day saying this is one of the best video games they’ve ever played.
When it comes to adapting superhero comics into any media, I can’t say there’s still not an influx of those, especially when it comes to Spider-Man. I'm nowhere close to being a huge Marvel guy, and I haven’t read a main Spidey book since 2018’s Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man (that was 5 years ago) but the wallcrawler himself holds a special place in my heart, which is why seeing this game fall down the usual pitfalls when it comes to adapting the medium hurts. It’s more earnest and heartfelt than something like the MCU, but when it comes to a lot of what this game adapts I can’t help but feel you’d be better off reading the comics this game is “inspired by” if you wanna see those concepts explored better.
One thing I’ll commend this game for is that they actually do try to make Miles stand on his own and apart from Peter as a character and as Spider-Man. This is reflected not only in the side content but the narrative as well…only problem is that in a game that’s as big as this there’s still very little given to their relationship. It’s hard to believe at times these two are on good terms with each other with how little they interact before Peter receives the symbiote, 2020’s Miles Morales had a chance to fill in that hole but that game itself was a run of the mill generic “filling in the shoes” story where Peter was only there for the first 30 minutes. I’ve intentionally avoided making comparisons to Spider-Verse but after that movie I feel this game does sorely lack the relationship Peter and Miles have in that movie, yet this game’s third act is still written as if the depth of their relationship has been effectively displayed to the audience. Just makes the final scene at Peter’s house feel more hollow than it should.
Also another thing Spider-Verse did better was Miles himself. For a game that has quite a bit of Miles’ side quests being respectful to POC, especially black culture, and interacting with other students his age, it is astounding how little Miles’ personality is a product of his surroundings. My friend put it best when they said that every young person in this game acts like they live in 2014 Oklahoma. Spider-Verse showed that you could have a dorky Miles whose personality fits with his age because unlike Peter, Miles doesn’t fit in with his peers due to his upbringing and his class, he isn’t able to relate to a lot of the attitudes exhibited by them. Meanwhile every kid in Brooklyn Visions including Miles act like they’re the nerd stereotype from a movie in the 2000s, which leads to scenes like this.
Of course I don’t think Miles Morales is a character is someone who should be removed from the game, as his character arc is definitely one of the best things about but but I don’t know man, despite being a game that’s long yet well-paced I still feel like large chunks are missing, especially in regards to the eventual “I forgive you.”. It’s a well written scene…but it doesn’t strike as it should due to how underdeveloped their relationship was and how much of his arc took a backseat to everything else.
When it comes to the new characters, I think Harry Osborne is very enjoyable early on due to how well he works off of Peter and his descent into becoming a villain is certainly understandable and engaging it’s just everything after that’s just putting a sour taste in my mouth. I’m no adaptation purist by any means and the decision to make Harry into Venom is a unique one, but I’d be praising it more if there was more to it than just Harry’s bitterness. For the general audience, Venom is a character who is tied to Spider-Man despite decades of comics proving how he’s able to be independent. It’s because of that desire to cater to the general audience that Venom in this game isn’t given his own identity, instead of becoming an extension of Harry and the symbiote character he’s written as a product of Peter which really doesn’t do Harry any favors due to how the game is written.
Insomniac’s Venom is his own beast when compared to the comics, and I can appreciate that. But what bugs me about him is that the writers intentionally take elements from Donny Cates’ run on Venom released in 2018, but here they replace the central characters from that comic into Peter himself and other people from the Spider-Man mythos; this is all done without any credit to Cates as well. Despite being so radically different in that regard, the narrative still tries to utilize the same talking points from other Venom media but it’s done so haphazardly that you’re ended up with a Venom that feels like a mishmash of multiple characters, none of whom are Harry.
Unfortunately, Venom isn’t the only villain to undergo this fate. Even to the average person who enjoys superhero media and doesn’t read comics, chances are that they’ve more likely than not at least heard about Kraven the Hunter. That’s the effect a comic like Kraven’s Last Hunt has, it’s able to send shockwaves across the character of Spider-Man’s entire legacy, which only makes the way he’s used here more baffling. Translating how threatening Kraven is into a video game is a challenge in of itself but there’s also the element of his relationship with Peter. Here he doesn’t make me feel strongly, and he takes a backseat for a lot of the game, only appearing more as the game progresses. Everything about him just feels undercooked, like he was mandated by the higher-ups to be put into the game, just like Venom, as he’s easily recognizable as a formidable Spidey foe.
It’s really just stuff like this which makes me realise that a lot of this game should’ve been reserved for the next one. The glaring flaw of this game is that it tries to do way too much than it can, which leads to events like Kraven’s death and Miles’ forgiveness being lackluster as the game already had a lot to fit in, something had to take a hit. There is a lot of praise I can offer this game as well but I’m only focusing on the negatives here to highlight the importance of AAA games restraining their scope.
I keep turning over the development cost of $315 million in my head. No matter how hard I try I don’t understand what exactly here could cost that much, to the point where they had to exceed their initial massive budget of $275 million. Hell, even the Spider-Man (2018) remaster cost a whopping $40 million to make, and now the recent leaks have shown that Insomniac still hasn’t broken even on Spider-Man 2. I’m more partial to AAA games than most of my peers, and overall I enjoy this one, but even I have to agree that this industry is not feasible, not like this.