Spider-Man 2
Spider-Man 2 is the perfect successor to Spider-Man and Spider-Man: Miles Morales in everything. The game revolves around both Peter Parker and Miles Morales and the player alternates between the two. The story pits the Spider-Men against Kraven the Hunter, who appears to be targeting the powers of all kinds of supervillains. The gameplay mainly relies on web swinging through New York and fighting. Both are well put together, and swinging is especially fun to do, especially because the speed is higher than in the previous games. Graphically, Spider-Man 2 also represents a step up, with a much higher level of detail than in the previous games, better ray-traced reflections, more different moments of a day with different types of light and changing weather conditions. All in all, Spider-Man 2 is another hell of a game for the PlayStation 5 and therefore the next in an already long list of must-haves from Sony’s studios.
I’ve never worried about what my favorite superhero would be. I certainly won’t suddenly claim that it is Spider-Man, but there is a case to be made for the helpful superhero. His content, whether comics, films or games, is often laced with humor. In addition, it is a lot easier to empathize with a nerdy student who gets superpowers from a spider bite, than with an Asgardian God, an alien superhuman or a scientist who turns into a green monster, to name a few. When he’s not wearing his signature suit, Peter Parker often faces the same problems that normal people have to deal with. He’s more down-to-earth in every sense of the word than many of his superhero colleagues.
This is also clearly evident in Spider-Man 2. The story covers topics such as self-doubt and dealing with pressure, but also shows how Peter struggles to keep his deceased aunt’s house, because the bills are piling up and wrapping crooks in cobwebs is unfortunately not a paid job. Fortunately, at the beginning of the game, Peter is assured of a safe job as a teacher at a school. However, that changes when Sandman turns New York into chaos and Peter has to rush towards one of his well-known enemies. A blessing in disguise: Miles Morales, also Spider-Man since the previous game, is in his class and immediately joins the original Spider-Man.
This immediately mentions the most striking part of the setting, because in Spider-Man 2 Peter Parker and Miles Morales share the leading role. The player switches between both characters. Sometimes this happens automatically, when the story continues with a mission that specifically belongs to one of the two gentlemen, but you can often switch yourself. Of course, the fact that you have not one, but two Spider-Men plays an important role in the story.
That story is fine, but not high-quality. That’s actually exactly what we would expect from a superhero game, or rather: within that context, the plot of Spider-Man 2 exceeds expectations. Central to the game is the battle that Peter and Miles wage against Kraven the Hunter, a villain who hunts all kinds of people with special gifts. He initially focuses on supervillains that Peter and Miles have previously defeated, but becomes particularly intrigued by a set of new powers that Peter acquires during the game. Anyone who has already seen some footage of the game may already know where this is going: Peter gains the special superpowers of Venom and that turns out to be a nice game changer, and something that Kraven is very interested in.
As that story unfolds, there are all kinds of other things going on in Peter and Miles’ lives. As mentioned, Peter struggles with the bills that Aunt May’s house entails and he and MJ discuss living together. Meanwhile, Miles tries to get into a prestigious music school and also helps his mother with all kinds of things. ‘Helping people’ remains an important part for Spider-Man. Peter and Miles receive all kinds of small and large extra missions via a special app. The randomly popping up alerts get repetitive quite quickly, but are quite fun to grab every now and then. The larger side missions have a story behind them and are therefore a lot more worthwhile.
2023-10-28 04:00:00
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