Spider-Man 2 is another fantastic game in Insomniac's Spider-Man franchise, delivering more of the same. Spider-Man 1 and the Miles Morales sequel brought us two well-written and engaging stories of two different Spider-Mans in the same city with mostly the same mechanics. So naturally Spider-Man 2 gives us a well-written and engaging story of two different Spider-Mans in the same city with mostly all of the same mechanics.
If you've played the first two, you've played this one. Nothing is all that new or different here no matter what they try to provide. The city is much larger, which is fantastic, so they've added the 'web wings' to traverse the map more quickly. They're welcome and the bigger map is very cool. But it's still mostly the same game. There's not much to say here, I've reviewed the previous two, so I'll keep my remarks brief.
The good: interesting new villains, a fun story with interplay between two Spider-Mans, a first for this franchise and really a rarity in the superhero gaming genre, still the absolute best traversal mechanics in all of video games, a gorgeous city and playground, competent Akrham/Assassin's Creed style combat, tons of collectibles and side missions and new suits.
The bad: an uneven story, baffling character model changes, a thin rogue's gallery, some annoying accoutrement.
The story with Kraven is fun, though I wish we had a little more time with him. The Venom story is delivered fantastically and I'm looking forward to the Green Goblin/HobGoblin follow-ups. Slinging through New York City is still some of the most fun movement and engaging map design of any video game in history. You also have a set of enjoyable side quests and collectibles that are expected in super hero games like this.
But it's not all roses and puppies. Some of the story writing and dialogue is very mediocre, or even downright bad. In particular Miles suffers from some really bad writing while the game doesn't handle Pete's personality change while infected by the symbiote with any subtlety or rewarding storytelling. I have no idea why they decided to change MJ's appearance nor why they decided to make her look significantly less attractive and meaningfully older. I also still disagree with the change to Peter's model that came in the last game. We also see the fewest villain interactions of any Spider-Man game so far with only brief forays against Mr. Negative and Mysterio (and the opening mission versus Sandman) to flesh out the main story villains, Venom and Kraven. I also hated the throwaway of Scream and the saving of Carnage for another game instead of giving him a showdown in this one. The symbiote storyline feels like it already well run its course at this point that I don't want to revisit it in the future. Also the game would be meaningfully better without Danika Hart.
I'm usually critical of sequels that fail to innovate. But the Spider-Man formula has been so damn good, I don't need many innovations. I just need new stories and more content. Spider-Man 2 has the least engaging stories to this point and the thinnest content. But the previous two were so damn good that it's unfair to treat SM2 as if it's not a good game still. It is. It's very good. Some unbalanced writing is the game's biggest sin but I'll keep coming back for more and more Insomniac Spider-Man
If you've played the first two, you've played this one. Nothing is all that new or different here no matter what they try to provide. The city is much larger, which is fantastic, so they've added the 'web wings' to traverse the map more quickly. They're welcome and the bigger map is very cool. But it's still mostly the same game. There's not much to say here, I've reviewed the previous two, so I'll keep my remarks brief.
The good: interesting new villains, a fun story with interplay between two Spider-Mans, a first for this franchise and really a rarity in the superhero gaming genre, still the absolute best traversal mechanics in all of video games, a gorgeous city and playground, competent Akrham/Assassin's Creed style combat, tons of collectibles and side missions and new suits.
The bad: an uneven story, baffling character model changes, a thin rogue's gallery, some annoying accoutrement.
The story with Kraven is fun, though I wish we had a little more time with him. The Venom story is delivered fantastically and I'm looking forward to the Green Goblin/HobGoblin follow-ups. Slinging through New York City is still some of the most fun movement and engaging map design of any video game in history. You also have a set of enjoyable side quests and collectibles that are expected in super hero games like this.
But it's not all roses and puppies. Some of the story writing and dialogue is very mediocre, or even downright bad. In particular Miles suffers from some really bad writing while the game doesn't handle Pete's personality change while infected by the symbiote with any subtlety or rewarding storytelling. I have no idea why they decided to change MJ's appearance nor why they decided to make her look significantly less attractive and meaningfully older. I also still disagree with the change to Peter's model that came in the last game. We also see the fewest villain interactions of any Spider-Man game so far with only brief forays against Mr. Negative and Mysterio (and the opening mission versus Sandman) to flesh out the main story villains, Venom and Kraven. I also hated the throwaway of Scream and the saving of Carnage for another game instead of giving him a showdown in this one. The symbiote storyline feels like it already well run its course at this point that I don't want to revisit it in the future. Also the game would be meaningfully better without Danika Hart.
I'm usually critical of sequels that fail to innovate. But the Spider-Man formula has been so damn good, I don't need many innovations. I just need new stories and more content. Spider-Man 2 has the least engaging stories to this point and the thinnest content. But the previous two were so damn good that it's unfair to treat SM2 as if it's not a good game still. It is. It's very good. Some unbalanced writing is the game's biggest sin but I'll keep coming back for more and more Insomniac Spider-Man