After swinging over New York City for more than 30 hours, I tried to find the shortcomings of “Marvel Spider-Man 2” to balance my praise for it, but after thinking for a long time, I found that this game is not only perfectly combined with the PS5 function, but its excellent quality can even touch the “ceiling” of superhero themes. It is difficult for me to judge what aspects of it are not good enough, but excellent points abound.
Yes, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 is an epic sequel. If the gameplay of the previous game and Miles is “somewhat interesting”, then the second generation has achieved a smooth and huge improvement in almost all aspects, reaching the ideal gaming state in my mind at least. I finally understand why Insomniac Studios is frantically expanding its development staff, because all this effort will eventually pay off.
Thanks to Sony for providing an early review opportunity, this game has a performance mode with simplified ray tracing at 60 frames per second, and a fidelity mode with high-definition full ray tracing at 30 frames per second. After playing, I learned that it takes about 22 hours to complete the main story of Marvel Spider-Man 2 at normal difficulty, and about 35 hours to complete the full content and collection (Platinum). Except for some clipping, there are almost no other problems.BugsTriggered, except for the game crash during the final boss battle that made me feel very resentful, the whole gaming experience was not affected by the common problems of the open world, which is one of its most inconspicuous advantages.
Plot and performance
The main and side quests of the game strongly continue the NPC characters and a lot of plots of the previous game, including the key plot content triggered after completing any collection element. So although there is a more official rhetoric of “you can get started easily even if you don’t play the previous game”, to be honest, the sense of plot substitution will definitely be reduced by half. So here it is recommended that players who have not played the previous game should catch up.
In the same way as the series, in order to show that Spider-Man can quickly “jump up and down” in the three-dimensional city space, the second-generation game uses a long and intense battle and various explosions and crashes from the beginning of the plot to stimulate the player’s adrenaline. In the entire plot of the game, at least 80% are such highly intense game scenes. The grand and outrageous sense of chaos in superhero movies is well reflected in this game, and it is seamless battle + QTE + long performances.
The previous games in the PS4 era are a thing of the past. The functions of the PS5 allow “Marvel’s Spider-Man 2” to achieve a good sense of connection of “no need to wait for anything”. This includes the direct switching between Peter and Miles, and the quick transmission of a map that is nearly twice the size of the previous game. This makes the self-operated gameplay feel like playing an interactive movie. Even the “Good Neighbor” series of tasks, which are equivalent to odd jobs, feel like watching “Spider-Man’s Daily Vlog”.
As for the follow-up of NPCs, Lizardman, Martin Lee, Norman Osborn and his son Harry, Catwoman, Scorpion, Sandman Mars, Tombstone, etc., as well as some characters suspected of major spoilers, all have their own part of the plot, some of which are integrated into the main line, and some are side lines accompanying the collection tasks. Everyone is caught in a new round of crisis because of the arrival of the hunter Kraven. Here we have to mention the expressions of the characters during the performance, and their excellent delicacy provides a stronger sense of immersion for the character’s personality and emotional changes.
Of course, the plot of Marvel’s Spider-Man mainly reflects the keywords “civilian heroes”, “the restlessness and anxiety of youth”, and “responsibility and growth”, interspersed with some childhood school memories and some old-fashioned scripts that the greater the ability, the greater the responsibility, but players who come for Spider-Man are probably just for this taste.
Fighting and growing
In the previous article, I never mentioned the word “fan-oriented” because “Marvel’s Spider-Man 2” was obviously developed for the general public. Although the Spider-Man IP and script are the concerns of Sony’s core fans and Spider-Man fans, the game itself represents the cutting-edge technology of first-line 3A games in many aspects, and transcends the population limitation of the Spider-Man IP, allowing a wider range of people to find fun in the game.
In terms of difficulty curve design, the game has set up detailed manual adjustments and auxiliary functions, such as enemy strength, stealth, swinging, puzzles, some mini-games and challenges, etc., as well as adjustments to accessibility functions. But these are not surprising.
More importantly, even when the game’s moving camera, scenes, and combat actions are shaking at high speed and switching suddenly, the game can still ensure the continuity of the operating experience. There is no situation where the combo will be suddenly interrupted because the enemy falls to the ground, or some enemies are too far away to be able to combo all the way. To put it more bluntly, the prompts of the enemy’s killing moves are very obvious. Players can counterattack, dodge, and even use a skill to pull the enemy far away. Moreover, each skill has “auto-capture”, which is equivalent to greatly improving the fault tolerance rate. Even if you press randomly during the battle, you may still be able to perform dazzling skill combos.
In fact, the first two games already had this idea, and “Marvel’s Spider-Man 2” makes this more varied. The game has designed three sets of skill growth trees, including Peter skills, Miles skills and public skills, with a total of more than 60 skill enhancements and changes, as well as 5 upgradeable spider silk gadgets, plus 4 similar attributes of combat suit technology upgrades. This variety also ensures the freshness of the combat experience in the second half.
It should be mentioned that in addition to the individual kill shots, Peter and Miles can trigger a combined killing performance when fighting together. In addition, a certain Spider-Man and certain NPCs will also trigger a special combined killing effect. Some are placed in side quests and collection missions, so the side quests and collection missions in this game are also very important, otherwise you will miss a lot of things.
Explore, collect and puzzle
If an open world game can make exploration and collection interesting, it is considered a success. Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 does not have spaces inside ordinary buildings, so most of the scenes are on the surface of the city, in the air, and on the roofs of high-rise buildings. All the mission triggering locations are marked on the map, with a total of more than 10 major branches and 4 types of collection elements, and the number of each area is also indicated.
It can be seen that this is not a super canned product. The amount of content is somewhat different from the games in the past two years that are often hundreds of hours long. The reason is that each trigger point is strongly related to the side story or skills. The longer the side story is, the longer the collection process will be.
At the same time, some air channels are set up in the city to provide spider wings with fast flight, as well as catapults and slingshots, as well as a fast transmission function unlocked after improving the prestige of the region, so the collection speed will become faster and faster as the game progresses. I personally think this is a good thing. It is not just for collecting trophies, but no matter how good the additional content is, it cannot defeat the players’ gradually lost patience.
As for some puzzles and mini-games, they are equivalent to a branch line that provides a continuous advancement of the gameplay, but the difficulty is not high.
For example, the gameplay of the small spider robot infiltrating, the aerial racing gameplay of chasing UFOs, etc., except for the “Mirror Hall” challenge level, there is no challenge difficulty design for the others. This is probably because the acceptance level of different players needs to be maximized.
Other bonus points and deduction points
Some of the more memorable places, such as Hailey’s side quest, let me feel what the daily life of people with hearing impairment is like. There is also a detailed amusement park and a scene of riding bicycles through the park. Although these things are unnecessary, they add a lot of life to the city of civilian heroes.
As for the points deducted, they are actually the side effects of being too humane. For example, in a combo, the player will try to pull the second enemy to continue the attack, even if the character has unreasonable displacement. This unreasonableness also appears in the stealth design. Even if the partner next to the enemy is killed loudly, as long as it doesn’t happen in front of you, it’s the same as if it didn’t happen. It can be understood that this is a trade-off made for the smoothness of the game, but it still makes people want to complain.
Summarize
Generally speaking, it is difficult for a sequel to reproduce the glory of the first generation, but “Marvel’s Spider-Man 2” far surpasses its predecessor in terms of plot and gameplay. Not only is it a faster and more refreshing seamless battle, and a large number of shocking cutscenes, but also all the side quests and collection tasks that are closely centered around the characters and plot. It has become a superhero masterpiece that all popular players can find excitement in, and its greater possibilities are yet to come.