The first Amazing Spider-Man game was, while not the greatest, a really good game in its own rights that followed the events of the movie. Unfortunately, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is anything but amazing. Beenox had a golden opportunity to improve elements from the first game and instead decided to jam as many of Spider-Man's rouge gallery into it with very little explanation. The Kingpin, Black Cat, Green Goblin, Kraven and company are all there but to be honest, the story behind their appearances felt rushed.....and recycled. The Kingpin boss fight feels identical to the Rhino fight in the first game, Black Cat is a carbon copy as well. It's like Beenox did not put a lot of effort into the game.....at all.
Granted, once you're out in the Big Apple is where things get good for now. The web swinging from the first game has improved (for better or worse) giving Spider-Man a more authentic feel to the way he travels across New York City. Combat hasn't changed much with a few exceptions. Spider-Man can now counter more than one enemy at once and can also disarm them of their weapons (especially guns). Also changed is the HUD. Spider-Man obviously takes damage for every hit he takes but can manually heal himself instead of automatic healing (making the game a bit too easy even on Hard difficulty). A new feature added is the hero meter which has been executed poorly. Simply rescue citizens from danger such as car jacking, robberies, assist the police in shootouts, disarm bombs, etc. to keep your Hero meter to max. The problem is, they are so many stuff to do and they all have a time limit. Failing to perform the event or let the timer run out on any of them on the map causes the meter to go down. If it goes too far down, you will become a menance and have special task force on you each and every single turn. The meter goes down WAY too fast and it takes away the freedom of roaming such a giant area, which for someone like me who lovess freedom in sandbox games kills it for me. Added to the game are combat challenges to improve your skills as the game progresses but other than that, not much.
The one thing that was done right are the costumes. They are several costumes for Spider-Man and each one has special stats behind them that get stronger the more you level up. With 15 costumes to find ranging from the 2099 Spider-Man to the very first Amazing Spider-Man costume they're actually worth finding.
Gamers usually compare superhero games with the Batman Arkham titles. Personally I feel that it is unfair since both Marvel and DC's franchises are way different from one another as well as the games. But sometimes other games need to live up to rival ones to keep up with the time and this is what the Spider-Man games need. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 should've been better, but it came off as a major disappointment.