While playing Insomniac's Spider-Man 2 and searching for a way to verbalize my overall impressions, I kept coming back to the phrase "more of the same" but in this case it's important to clarify that "more of the same'' means more of one of the most accomplished, thrilling, and authentic superhero experiences of all time. It means more of a game that allows us to live out the fantasy of being a friendly neighborhood Spider-Man better than any other medium. For my money, Insomniac's games are the only place where longtime web-heads can think about that iconic phrase "with great power must come great responsibility," feel the full weight of what it means, and have personal involvement in making sure Spider-Man lives up to Uncle Ben's guiding principle.
The weight of that responsibility has never been more apparent or felt as heavy as it does in Marvel's Spider-Man 2, which presents a much larger neighborhood for Spidey to do his friendly adventuring in. With the addition of Queens and Brooklyn, the sequel's open-world is double the size of the original and, by leveraging the power of the PlayStation 5, Insonmanic is able to ensure that players are always keenly attuned to just how much of New York is relying on them.
Standing atop the Avengers Tower as Miles Morales, I couldn't help but be overwhelmed by the city stretching out far into the horizon. Expansive video game worlds aren't exactly new and exciting these days, but there's something different about the world of Insomniac's Spider-Man titles. There's a realistic familiarity to it, even more so now that the PS5 is able to render buildings as far as the eye can see and introduce small but subtle details that, while undoubtedly mundane, also make the world feel more alive: a plane passing overhead, boats cruising across the Hudson river, flocks of birds weaving between buildings, and people shuffling around the streets, to name just a few.
But for as overwhelming as it is, it makes that moment where you step out into it all the more exciting. And when it comes to moving through open-worlds, very few games make it as exciting as Marvel's Spider-Man did, and its sequel does. That much became apparent the moment I stepped off the Avenger's tower as Miles, falling at breakneck speed, the iconic silhouette of Spider-Man cutting through a golden blanket of sunlight as the final minutes of daylight tick away.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but in this moment I was so glad to have "more of the same." As Miles pullmeted towards street level, the wind rushing past his ears, the anticipation of firing a web that would latch onto a nearby anchor point built up until I hit the button as the thumping base and bouncing snare of a trap beat shattered the silence and and I was instantaneously swung back up into the sky, spinning wildly but still with the kind of controlled grace that only Spider-Man can have. It immediately put a smile on my face and, within seconds, the muscle memory of being Spider-Man in Insomniac's last two games kicked in with exhilarating familiarity. Before I knew it I was catapulting myself across rooftops; falling low enough to the ground before firing off a web that Miles's feet would graze the pavement on the upswing; zipping around and across buildings, arms brushing windows as I sprinted along windows and through fire escapes.
Within moments I was back into the swing of things, but this time around Insomniac has made some additions to traversal to both account for the larger landmass available in the sequel, as well as to give players more options. Some of these are small--but nevertheless cool--additions like a slingshot launch that has Spider-Man use fire webs onto two surfaces on either side of him, then fire himself up and into the air to quickly gain speed and distance. Others, like the Web Wings, are much more significant. At any time, Spider-Man, either Peter or Miles, can deploy web-based wings under their arms that let them glide for long distance but, in practice, effectively enable them to fly. It's a surprising new addition that ostensibly means that those moments from the last game where you suddenly found yourself careening over a large park or body of water with nothing to latch onto and swing from are a thing of the past. Now you can pop out your wings and majestically glide back to more densely constructed areas to continue swinging.
It's an excellent addition to Spider-Man's traversal skills, but it did make me question the impact it would have on swinging. After all, why swing when you can fly? As it turns out, Insomniac asked itself the same question and ensure that gliding/flying didn't rob the swinging of its function and, more importantly, thrills.
"We took a lot of the same approach with the Web Wings that we do with all of our traversal," explained senior programing director Doug Shehan. "Which is to make sure that we've always said that we look at traversal as a cohesive whole. As Spider-man you have a huge pallet of moves that you can do in traversal. Swinging is obviously a huge part of it, but there's also wall-running, and web-zipping, and point-launching. So when we approached the web wings we were trying to solve a couple problems. One of which was what are we doing in the new boroughs where everything is lower. Another of which was how we were going to cross the river--it solves those problems. So we really set out to make something that was really engaging, really fun, but balanced with the rest of traversal.
"It was really, really important that we made sure that effective use of the web wings was getting it so that people were more integrating them into the rest of their traversal and using them opportunistically, as opposed to using them exclusively. People can [use them exclusively], but the side effect of that is if you just use them and try to glide for a long way you're going to slow down a lot. The only way to get there fast is to dive and to shed height, and then we're getting you into integrating everything else and you use swinging to really build that speed back up, fling yourself up in the air, glide a little further, go around a building, engage with point launch, fire off of that swing again, use the web wings again. And so what we found pretty early was that it integrated really well if we found that right balance."
The world itself in Spider-Man 2 has changed to encourage players to consider what traversal opportunities it presents and how Spider-Man's skillset can leverage them. One of the major new additions for the wings is wind tunnels and the updrafts, which give the web-slinger a boost in speed while carrying him across the city. Naturally, they factor into the activities you can do in the open-world too--namely chasing down drones belonging to Kraven the Hunter, the main antagonist of the sequel. However, one of the most interesting changes for the game is the way these opportunities, as well as other mission and activities, become visible to the player. Taking a page of of Rocksteady's Batman: Arkham Knight, Insomniac has place a greater emphasis on trying to keep the player out of menus and in the world. It has done this by placing visual tells in the world that indicate opportunities to the player. Crimes in progress return, so you can expect to be pulled in different directions to help the citizens of New York as you go about your own super heroics, but now other side-missions will also pop up and be marked in the world. Most importantly, they're only visible when you engage the augmented reality vision the Spider-Men have, which means that you can see what's available to you at the tap of a button, but also the world doesn't feel cluttered with distracting beams of light.
For someone like me, who revels in just moving around the world of Spider-Man as the character, the sequel is already shaping up to be a more thrilling prospect. Even today, I load up the previous two games and just swing about for the thrill of it, and with the various new abilities at Peter and Miles's disposal, zipping around New York feels quicker-paced and more engaging.
The changes to traversal are just one part of a broader group of tweaks and additions made for Spider-Man 2. While many of these will feel like natural progression from the previous games, others are more significantly different. In particular the new combat options that are enabled by the presence of the symbiote, which has bonded itself to Peter, for better or for worse. The new abilities make the two Spider-Men feel more distinct as the symbiote-powered combat style feels more aggressive and destructive, resulting in a Peter that feels powerful in a way that is reckless and create a sense of unease for people that are used to seeing him as a heroic, considerate, and good person. Miles, meanwhile, is precise and more classically Spider-Man-like in his ass-kicking, but this belies a real crisis of confidence and identity he is feeling in the game.
While the traversal served as the thing I most focused on in the gameplay session, I did spend a good chunk of time cracking heads while taking down goons and also advancing the story. Both the combat--including how each of the Spider-Men can be developed separately and together--and the story for Marvel's Spider-Man 2 are discussed at length in the preview video above and, given nature of it and how important I feel it is to go in fresh, I won't explain too much of what's going on in the game. For astute Spider-Man fans, the pieces of the puzzle were all presented in the previous two games and even with the little I saw it became clear that Insomniac is trying to put its own twist on the well-trodden symbiote Spider-Man story. There are characters being positioned in roles that feel like they could interpret those familiar narrative beats in new ways, just like it did with Doc Ock previously. At the same time lesser known and used characters like Kraven the Hunter look like they're going to be used in effective ways to push the overall narrative while also having their own smaller arcs--the same can be said of Martin Li, who returns from the first game and is a key focus for Miles in his current turmoil.
Most importantly, however, my time with Marvel's Spider-Man 2 hinted at the exploration of themes that are core to both Spider-Man as a whole and the symbiote stories: both Peter and Miles are underground changes and dealing with challenges that are calling into question their own sense of self, who they are, and what they believe is right. One of them has found family, while the other has lost it, and the impact of that is something that the game looks keen to explore, through the lens of superhero fiction. It's an exciting prospect, especially as the performances already look to be worthy of such heavy subject matter. Peter's new gravely voice and aggressive demeanour is suitably unsettling, Miles's vulnerability is heartbreaking, and supporting characters like Genki, MJ, and Rio Morales delivered memorable performances in the short time I spent with them.
For those that want to know more, I encourage watching the preview video in which Lucy James and I talk at length about our time with the game. But those that just want the broad strokes so they can go in with just the basics should feel confident knowing that, at this stage, Spider-Man 2 looks to be doing all the right things to build on what made the previous two games some of the best superhero gaming ever. As the follow-up to the critically acclaimed and beloved Marvel's Spider-Man and its Miles Morales-focused pseudo-sequel, Marvel's Spider-Man 2--a full numbered sequel--looks to be taking everything developer Insomniac created for those two games and bringing it all together in a new experience that also layers on some new ideas atop the strong foundation.
And on top of that, Insomniac's ability to tell impactful stories in this world and with this character has been honed even further, and if they can pull it off this will be another Spider-Man story for the ages.
