A huge improvement on both Spider-Man and Spider-Man: Miles Morales, making them pale in comparison in pretty much every way from gameplay to narrative, becoming THE definitive Spider-Man video game experience.
When it comes to the gameplay, many people playing this one will tell you that they don't think that they could ever go back to the previous games and I couldn't agree with a fanbase more. Spider-Man 2 is such an innovative step in a better direction, I remember having huge issues with repetitiveness and bloated traversal that got really old after awhile, but here's that's like... barely an issue. The open world and it's crime activities (that gave me fatigue in the first) are such an improvement, there's a lot more variety and it's super satisfying, too. I really liked the approach to bosses, it feels a lot more like how video game bosses should do. I always had a slight issue with the older bosses, they felt way too easy and cinematically scripted for my liking so I was very pleased to actually face a challenge on spectacular difficulty for once and be able to sandbox a little with the bosses, which were some of the best I've ever seen in a video game and the best in the superhero genre (so far.) The little combat moments are super good, too. Combos are way more satisfying with the additions of power skills as well as some extra little tidbits like kicking the absolute shit out of an enemy against a wall which scratched a little bit of a Yakuza itch for some reason. The level design overall was really well done, the first didn't disappoint there but they went and topped it without even much of an effort.
A very emotional and heartbreaking story, it starts a little slow but with some awesome moments already, the pacing is absolutely perfect. Not sure why this game gets a lot of hate for it's narrative in certain corners of the internet, because it was perfectly fine. It's still not the best narrative games have to offer, and by no means do I think it's at "best PlayStation exclusive" status just yet, but compared to the first game? The stakes are so, so much more higher and the story does not nearly feel as generic as the first. There was maybe some rough dialogue here and there, but given Spider-Man is also catered towards a younger audience, that's totally acceptable, there were still some really well written moments regardless and I think a lot of the excess hate for this narrative just comes from weird ass bigotry towards Miles and Mary Jane (typical for the community, though)
I really liked how ominous the narrative started to feel and seeing how far certain characters would go to get what they want. There was a perfect blend of wholesomeness with stakes so high even the player starts to become hopeless if there really is a good turning point for any of the characters involved. It really pushed the boundaries for the superhero genre in games I think and could be pretty hard to top for the upcoming Marvel releases. I was also surprised by some of the side missions, specifically the one concerning Howard. A lot of effort were put into some of those that really gave the open world a sense of character the first didn't achieve on the same level. It made things much more personal and down to earth and I would have liked to have seen more of that, I really hope Spider-Man 3 goes absolutely balls out with the world building and smaller things.
It's a really solid sequel in a year of very solid games, definitely a step in the right direction for Insomniac's Spider-Man and I'm really eager to see how they'll improve on the franchise next.
When it comes to the gameplay, many people playing this one will tell you that they don't think that they could ever go back to the previous games and I couldn't agree with a fanbase more. Spider-Man 2 is such an innovative step in a better direction, I remember having huge issues with repetitiveness and bloated traversal that got really old after awhile, but here's that's like... barely an issue. The open world and it's crime activities (that gave me fatigue in the first) are such an improvement, there's a lot more variety and it's super satisfying, too. I really liked the approach to bosses, it feels a lot more like how video game bosses should do. I always had a slight issue with the older bosses, they felt way too easy and cinematically scripted for my liking so I was very pleased to actually face a challenge on spectacular difficulty for once and be able to sandbox a little with the bosses, which were some of the best I've ever seen in a video game and the best in the superhero genre (so far.) The little combat moments are super good, too. Combos are way more satisfying with the additions of power skills as well as some extra little tidbits like kicking the absolute shit out of an enemy against a wall which scratched a little bit of a Yakuza itch for some reason. The level design overall was really well done, the first didn't disappoint there but they went and topped it without even much of an effort.
A very emotional and heartbreaking story, it starts a little slow but with some awesome moments already, the pacing is absolutely perfect. Not sure why this game gets a lot of hate for it's narrative in certain corners of the internet, because it was perfectly fine. It's still not the best narrative games have to offer, and by no means do I think it's at "best PlayStation exclusive" status just yet, but compared to the first game? The stakes are so, so much more higher and the story does not nearly feel as generic as the first. There was maybe some rough dialogue here and there, but given Spider-Man is also catered towards a younger audience, that's totally acceptable, there were still some really well written moments regardless and I think a lot of the excess hate for this narrative just comes from weird ass bigotry towards Miles and Mary Jane (typical for the community, though)
I really liked how ominous the narrative started to feel and seeing how far certain characters would go to get what they want. There was a perfect blend of wholesomeness with stakes so high even the player starts to become hopeless if there really is a good turning point for any of the characters involved. It really pushed the boundaries for the superhero genre in games I think and could be pretty hard to top for the upcoming Marvel releases. I was also surprised by some of the side missions, specifically the one concerning Howard. A lot of effort were put into some of those that really gave the open world a sense of character the first didn't achieve on the same level. It made things much more personal and down to earth and I would have liked to have seen more of that, I really hope Spider-Man 3 goes absolutely balls out with the world building and smaller things.
It's a really solid sequel in a year of very solid games, definitely a step in the right direction for Insomniac's Spider-Man and I'm really eager to see how they'll improve on the franchise next.