Marvel's Spider-Man is worse than the Batman games in practically everything...

How did Insomniac even pull this off? They copy/pasted the Batman Arkham formula but somehow only managed to improve upon the traversal. Worse combat, worse art style, worse missions, worse writing. This game feels like it should have been released in 2013. They had like 4 games to study and build on but failed spectacularly.

And somehow, Arkham Knight also manages to be far more aesthetically pleasing despite being 3 years older.

I have not played it as I don't own the game. Is it really that much worse than the Batman Arkham games?

of course I always knew this is copy and paste from Batman arkham.

people also bash Arkham knight which was actually great but praise marvels spiderman.

It's not much worse. It just doesn't do anything better besides traversal. This game was released in 2018 but mechanically is more dated than Arkham City from 2011.

It's a solidly put-together game. Just very meh and not much better than inFAMOUS or any other open-world superhero game.

I agree with champ.

Movement is fantastic but the game is pretty mediocre.

Surprise people keep bringing this up.

Totally. Swinging around the city is great, minus the silly music that always played; I had to shut that off. But the combat is not as satisfying, and the missions are boring. I watched my roommate play Miles Morales, hoping it would be more than a palette swap, and that they would expand on the gameplay, seeing how the city and mechanics were already in place. They didn't.

I have several ideas that would vastly improve it. First, they should add a time mechanic. Make it so the player has to choose between (for example) stopping the Shocker from robbing a bank, disarming a hostage situation for the police, rescuing citizens from a highrise fire, taking MJ on a date, picking up groceries for Aunt Mae, etc; as many possibilities as you can think of. That way you could actually FEEL what it's like to be Spiderman. Not stopping the Shocker would increase his area of power, causing him to attack the city more frequently, his minions (if it's a villain with minions) would grow in numbers and brazenness, the main villain would gain new attacks to use in your next encounter, etc. Not helping with the city services (fire and police) would have them be more aggressive towards you, and the populace would verbally ridicule you, as well as putting up anti-Spiderman signage throughout the city; so you can visually gauge their delight/disdain. Mary Jane would only allow herself to be stood up so many times before moving on. All of these struggles would serve to show how hard it would actually be to live as Peter Parker/Spiderman. If you are fast enough, and skilled enough, you can complete them all, but this should be ultimate perfection. Of course lower difficulties would soften the challenge.

And for the love of Christ... If you see a pigeon, set up your swing to perfectly intercept said pigeon before it can react, don't force me into some predetermined/forced chase to pad out the activity.

@davillain: Why? Plenty of games use a very similar formula. Batman was just by far the best at it.

Hmm, not sure I see too many similarities with Arkham so far. I do love the Arkham games FAR FAR more though. Even Arkham Knight.

So far, the music is annoying. The city and swinging are good, but nothing I haven't seen before, just a bit better. Also, I've just started, but what the older Spider-Man games got right was a much bigger jump and I think a charged jump. Spider-Man is supposed to be able to jump 15 feet in the air. :-S

So I think the combat is a bit... It feels unfocused, could just be me this early on. It's also a bit annoying. Spider-Man's punch is supposed to be able to knock over a rhino, how long do I have to beat on these guys with guns. The evade button is interesting, but it breaks the flow.

I like the graphics, but I'm not fond of some of the art style for the characters faces.

My first impressions of Spider-Man are, I'm glad I didn't buy a PS4 just for this game.

I do appreciate the range of options available for this game though, for example, the accessibility options etc. It's very thoughtful.

I got a Dualsense for this. I haven't got to anywhere where I can feel the resistance triggers, but so far the haptic feed back is a little unimpressive. It feels different, but it doesn't feel any better imo. It's a comfortable controller, but side by side with the Dualshock 4, I prefer the shape of the Dualshock 4. I think the DS4 is a tiny bit smaller, and it has a perfect shape for a PS controller. I can reach everything easily and the first fingers I use for L2/R2 also easily touch L1/R1 on the DS4, where as the Dualsense, it's not comfortable for me to move my fingers from L2/R2 to L1/R1. I think they should have kept the features of the Dualsense, but retained the shape of the DS4. So far I'm more impressed with the DS4 as a controller, I've found it very comfortable as both a PC controller and for playing PSNow games.

@ghosts4ever: Because Arkham Knight sucked. Top to bottom. Arkham City was my favorite game that generation and Knight was awful.

For starters the story was not only a rethread of the first game (emptying the asylum/city) but you see the "twist" coming from a mile away with the remixed Red Hood storyline being "borrowed" to create the Arkham Knight. To cap that off pretty much everyone phones it in except Mark Hamill but at the same time much of his role in the game is unneeded but they killed Joker in the last game so gotta find a way to include that icon of a villain. Go back and watch Oracle's fake death scene and tell me anything about the aftermath made you think it was real. Was it Conroy's simple utterance of "no" before moving on like nothing happened?

Gameplay wise the whole thing revolves around the Bat-Tank which feels more akin to something out of Armored Core than Batman and really starts throwing things into question as to how the **** Batman isn't killing anyone despite running them down doing over 100 mph in an armored tank with a jet engine strapped to it and discharging high voltages of electricity to render victims unconscious upon contact.

This stupid thing took over the game so much not only is it used to solve nearly every puzzle like Gotham civil engineers figured everyone would have a Bat-Tank of their own to power elevators and doors but motherfucking Riddler builds entire race tracks for you under Gotham and kidnaps Catwoman who gets to stand on a square for the entire game until you do all the Riddler challenges which used to be inventive puzzles to earn trophies but are now just races and time trials because Bat-Tank.

And the damn thing isn't even fun to drive but it does really show you how much of the world map was designed to let you fly around in that with no regard to actual city layout leaving Gotham to feel like it was made to house Batman instead of Batman being made to work within Gotham.

Arkham City was superior in every possible way to Knight.

As for Spider-Man sure it takes inspiration from what Rocksteady but that's what the industry is all about. Not only is this an extremely solid outing for the start of a new franchise but it's one that gets me excited for what comes next. Arkham Knight pretty much killed my desire to see more games in that series. It wasn't supposed to reinvent the wheel, it was supposed to deliver a great Spider-Man experience after two generations of Activision missing the mark repeatedly.

Oh and the boss fights in Spider-Man are actually fun, engaging, and test your skills. The Arkham series always struggled with boss fights outside of Mr. Freeze and Arkham Knight was no different.

It's only hyped because it's a sony exclusive. Same with god of war. Really overrated, but I still think GOW is good, not just a masterpiece like what cows claim.

was more like assassin's creed to me. assassin's creed in very shiny and polished super hero clothing. derivative and lacking in creativity. disappointing. preferred miles morales. short, to the point and less of an emphasis on side content busy work

I've played the shit out of all the Arkham games and honestly, in my opinion, it goes Arkham Origins > Arkham Knight > Arkham City >>>>>>> Arkham Asylum.

My opinion used to be the same as yours on Arkham Knight sucking, but the more I re-played it, the more I liked it. It's different, it's almost a different Batman game, it's less Gothic for sure. The boss fights are ass though in Arkham Knight.

I like Arkham Origins the most, because to me it's an expanded version of Arkham City. It's a slog at the beginning until you can unlock critical hits in the Sheeva side mission and the 5x combo change for grabs. But once you do, it's better game imo. That's why City goes to third place, because it's not quite as needed in second place.

The combat in AK is improved with small touches. I'm happy to play both Origins and Knight the most. I love the extra DLC content in Arkham Knight as well. The extra costumes and Batmobiles.

Arkham Asylum was ruined for me by how powerful "Detective Vision" was. Arkham Asylum could have been a game I'd spend hours on collecting secrets, but DV just showed you everything. So as enjoyable as it was the first time, there's nothing to make you go back to it once you're finished.

I agree they needlessly spelt out the Arkham Knights twist by explaining who Jason was, but I think the dilemma was that to most people, they'd reveal it and the average casual Batman fan might go "who the **** is Jason and what does he mean to Batman?". So I kind of understand why they did that. I'd prefer they didn't, but hey. It would have been one of the biggest twists in gaming for some time.

With the Batmobile, I think you're trying to add too much logic to it. Sure, they added a whole lot of plot armour but it's not that bad, and the Riddler races can be fun. If you use this logic for Origin's and City, has Batman ever really glided around the whole city before? He apparently built a grappling device out of nth metal that he can shoot it and use it to propel him 100,000 times while saving the whole city by his powerless lonesome self all in one night without even eating, drinking or resting once.

I 100% agree with this and it's actually not good. Because it's "over-hype". So I'll start playing a Playstation exclusive on PSNow for example on the PC, and the cows have told me the game I'm about to play is the best thing since sliced bread... And then it isn't. And then 30 or so minutes in, I've given up.

For example, cows told me Gear of War is shit, but then I'm playing the worst gunplay known to man in Uncharted 1 on the boat at the beginning. Now I'm getting bored quick, apart from the fact that for the most part, I'm not one for cutscenes. This is the problem with fanboys and what they do.

The interesting thing is, I started playing Red Dead Revolver 6th gen game, the other week and the 3rd person gunplay is actually really good, despite the age of the game. Way ahead of its time.

I take it you were never around the time Spider-Man 2 PS2/Xbox/Gamecube era kind of started it all? Granted, Marvel's Spider-Man game was more of an evolution from the Spider-Man 2 game but Rocksteady technically borrows the ideas of the Spider-Man 2 game first in a way. I played Arkham games and combat is more grounded for Batman while Spider-Man combat is more on the fluid/reflexes side.

All in all, I'm only saying if someone's gonna say Marvel's Spider-Man is too similar to Arkham games have never played Spider-Man 2 game is what I meant.

@HalcyonScarlet: The "trick" with playing Sony games is to completely ignore the hype and just enjoy the game for what it is. I say this because I know the feeling of getting something like Uncharted 5 expecting it to be a 10/10 "best game ever" and being so underwhelmed that I just couldn't enjoy it as much as if I had played it expecting nothing from it. Their games tend to be average to good, with some awesome exceptions.

@davillain: Didn’t play Spider-Man 2. I played the first one on the GC. I also played some on the GBA and SNES.

Wrong. It was discussed in the past before in depth. Spiderman copied everything from the Arkham games. The spidey sense in Spiderman 2 is pretty superficial in comparison to Arkham games entire combat system which Spiderman copied 1:1. Hell both Marvel and Insomniac is on record saying that Arkham games served as a blueprint for Spiderman.

@pc_rocks: This tells me you didn't play Marvel's Spider-Man game yet. Instead of reading from Gamer's perspective, I recommend you play it first before saying stuff it's too much Arkham-like.

And yes, we discuss this in-depth but I for one play games😉

I'll keep that in mind. Thanks. :-). I'll drop my expectations completely and try some of these games again.

When I don't have expectations, I can usually find something to enjoy. For example, I enjoyed the flying on Super Man Returns on the Xbox 360. But if someone is telling me a game is amazing, when it isn't, it really ruins it.

Yep called it several years ago… Spider-Man wouldn’t have received half the hype it got without being a PS exclusive! That being said, still a solid game that I enjoyed quite a lot!

Spider-shite🤣

Stealth and combat were both more enjoyable to me in the Arkham games. (Stealth especially felt pointless in SM)

Spiderman also had those crap MJ/Miles sections .

Knight was ruined by too much tank

Its a superhero game. Just like every movie, they're supposed to be bottom tier garbage.

Played some of the PS4 version but have been really enjoying it. I did very much enjoy the Batman Arkham games as well though.

They are both great and I would put city, knight and even origins above spiderman but its not worse in ever day the story of spiderman is better. City, knight and origins top 11 games of all time. Spiderman is like top 20.

I wasn't moved to play the game despite having the game.

I downloaded it but haven't started in yet.. Played a bit of the Batman games and liked what i saw there

@simple-facts: 9 out of 10 GameSpot

87 metacritic

Deal with it!

Haha, I had to 👍

It's a different game that plays similarly. It is not the same. Two different games and each have their own feel. Lots of open world games are similar as well in formula but all are different. Some do it better than others. I thought they did a good job capturing the Spiderman world, gameplay wise as well. I felt the same about the Batman Arkham asylum game as well.

Since SPIDER-MAN by Insomniac was being so extremely hyped by everyone, i thought it´s just me again who is obviously "strange" or "weird" to the point of just not being able to "enjoy" the game as everyone else is obviously doing.

Now the game ain´t bad, it´s just...i don´t even know how to describe it...but there just ain´t "THAT" what kept me playing as for example the ARKHAM TRILOGY was. BTW ARKHAM KNIGHT was a great game and i have no clue why so many people did not enjoy it, but it probably was the vehicle?

I often see gamers "criticizing" the "Copy´n Paste Formula" but I don´t see how this would be something to criticize, since actually the first ever PONG, they in fact copy´n pasted every game, in every genre along with certain game-mechanics in each of the games out there.

It´s a logical thing that´s happening, or do people want to be stuck on one BATMAN ARKHAM game, one GTA game, one MORTAL KOMBAT game etc. while not wanting other games with the same or similiar meachnic?

It's not a problem that they took the formula. My problem is that they took it and didn't even improve upon it.

I enjoyed both didn't have any issues with the Spiderman combat that I can think of both IMO where satisfying in their own ways.

@HalcyonScarlet: I wish my opinion of Knight improved upon revisiting it but I just find myself crapping out quicker and quicker on it each time I pick it up for another go.

But my complaints are mostly about how it doesn't feel like a true blue natural sequel to City and is doing a bunch of stuff just to tick off the boxes people expect a sequel to fill. There's been clamoring for the Bat-mobile so find a way to force that in. People want the whole city so make that happen. Everyone loves the Joker so bring him back. Wouldn't it be cool to do the Jason Todd Red Hood reveal but with a twist?

That's my issue with the game being so lazy with how much of the "new" is handled and why it doesn't sit well with me. Feels like Jason Todd just became a spur of the moment idea in the writing room and never something organically planned out which is why we needed the heavy handed handling of his backstory so people knew who the **** he was when it was finally revealed. Might have been a touch cooler if Jason was the Robin in City and his death occurs between games.

The whole thing just felt like Rocksteady had to do a sequel and so Knight was them going through the motions. Where City felt like a proper evolution of Asylum by addressing certain issues like toning down Detective Vision, giving Batman more area to play in, expanding his arsenal of gadgets to fit the situation, and putting his rivalry with Joker looming over the story as there are still fallout from the first game.

Knight at the end of the day was more of the same when it was a chance to expand being Batman in a crisis situation to doing what Spider-Man does and putting you in the shoes of Batman before everything goes south and the entire city as stake. It's the same concept as City but without the gang related textures and trash all over the place. Just gangs controlling territory for big villains. Again.

And game concepts are fine when the feel natural to the game. Riddler going from testing Batman's cunning, physical prowess, and reflexes through a variety of challenges both great and small to do all the time trials to unlock Catwoman just feels weird and wrong for the characters involved. They had defined roles and they were thrown out for no reason other than they needed another area to show off a new game mechanic... and making a handful of race tracks with times to beat is way easier than dozens upon dozens upon dozens of micro challenges strewn across the map involving all manner of ideas to complete. In other words lazy.

@uninspiredcup: you had no guarantee I would post here!!!

I disagree with the premise, on the combat alone.

I understand what you're saying, but I disagree that they were going through the motions or being lazy. I think they were trying to move it a lot more forward. Whether it worked out or not is debatable.

My initial impression of Arkham Knight was that it was a bit soulless, and Gotham was bland due to them having to cater it to the Batmobile. But now I just see it as different, like Batman 1989 and Batman Begins.

I initially thought it was a bit silly bringing the Joker back.

But I do enjoy it these days. I like the challenge maps too. Using the other Bat family is kind of cool in them, not that you couldn't do that before.

True. The first 2 Batman games are way better than Spiderman, and Spiderman does copy a lot. Also, Batman is cool to listen to, where as Spiderman is often pretty annoying.

Batman : 9

Spiderman : 7

I have had access to both Spider Man games and never got around to trying them yet... maybe eventually, but super hero games aren't really my thing, but I might check out Wolverine just because I personally like the character a lot more.

Why must Games always being "improved" at all?

Can´t gamers enjoy "old" things so they must somehow be "improved" for them to enjoy them?

In my personal opinion, games can be "improved" as well as making a "step backwards" at the same time, with GTA V being the best example for such a case while all the fan-boys (and there are BILLIONS of it!) are unwilling to see that sad fact.

GTA V improved on everything BUT the actual missions. I remember GTA III having missions being so much fun as well as GTA VICE CITY and SAN ANDREAS, but then again GTA IV and GTA V were such boring letdowns mission-wise, that i even stopped playing them somewhere in the middle.

It seems i have a similiar problem with SPIDER-MAN but that has nothing to do with less "improvement" and probably more with the fact they focused too much on graphics and game-play mechanics rather than making it a joyride when it comes to missions.

Don't have to. If someone says that Spiderman didn't copy Arkham but Spiderman 2 then they have already accepted that it plays like Arkham.

Started playing it. its Spiderman Arkham asylum. but still its pretty good.

definitely best sony exclusive to release on PC so far.

@HalcyonScarlet: For me most of it didn't work and just felt like sequel box ticking for the most part to appease fans and make it seem like the game was more of a natural progression than it was.

And the thing is there are certain aspects I did enjoy about the game. Like the Bat-Tank combat wasn't really all that bad focusing on area denial and a semi bullet hell situation where you've got to focus more on dodging incoming fire than you do attacking. However it just doesn't fit with a Batman game. You throw something like that into Armored Core and it feels more at home.

Joker was another one that I did enjoy being there even if it was just because Mark Hamill is the definitive Joker in my book. But it also felt like a reminder that the game's overarching villain simply isn't that great on their own and doesn't work all too well as a foil for Batman.

I mean just look at Barbara's supposed death. The only one putting anything into is Joker and that's because he's tearing Batman down as having yet another failure on his hands, that he should quit, and playing on all those self doubts. Scarecrow was the one who supposedly made her pull the trigger but Joker gets to gloat like it's his victory?

It's not the worst game in the world but in my book it is definitely the weakest of the Arkham series which brought the least to the table.

Also if you sit down and truly think about it this combat style makes much more sense for Spider-Man, who has Spider-Sense, thus giving him super human reaction speed and the ability to perceive threats he can't even see like someone getting ready to pull the trigger in the middle of a fist fight so he uses his web shooter to slide under someone tying them up and dodging out the way. Meanwhile Batman just glides backwards in a pseudo moonwalk to close the 16 foot distance between him and the attacker all while taking on three other people who just stand there casually watching him slide away like the world no longer has the laws of friction to applying to Batman's feet.

Edit: Also I dug having more of the Batman family to play with on Challenge Maps, I just wish they had actually paid attention to which Robin they were using, their history with Barbara, and all that which further adds that feeling that Jason Todd/Arkham Knight wasn't all that well thought out.

Looks like you're interested in the karma system of the inFAMOUS games being vastly expanded on.

Ignore this guy the game runs great like butter smooth on steam not like arkham knight which was refunded and trashed on.

Plus this game is way better than any batman game first off mechanics way better flying around with spider web way better, way better graphics brightness in it not all dark and a way better hero spiderman.

Definitely. The inFAMOUS system was too binary (good/bad), which wasn't my favorite, but it's also weird that they didn't continue work on their own efforts. If you watch a history of Naughty Dog, you can see how they continually iterated on their previous games. To the point that without playing LoU2, I knew there would be some rope mechanic, because it was in UC4. Maybe Spiderman 2 will, but I don't know.

But I also don't want them solely focus on karma, but rather emergent gameplay. Having the villains grow in aggression, power, scope of influence, etc, based on your commitment, sounds awesome to me. And it would add tons of replayability. Seeing the city transform with the will of the people sounds cool too. If the next one is just more of the same... what's the point? How many times can we do the same thing?

I don't understand why this is a surprise to anyone who's ever played an Insomniac game.

Outside of Spyro(which got old really quickly) all their games are pretty mid.

Not bad but the underlying game design isn't ever really inspired.

They're great for filling a release calendar and ensuring a nice time but you don’t go to them to be blown away by their game design.

They fit well within Sony's "press A for awesome" game design wheelhouse.

I did hear MM was better for traversal though, so there's that.

Sucker Punch made inFAMOUS, not Naughty Dog