Review: Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 – The Friendly Spiders Are Back

Spider-Man is the most famous comic book hero in the world. He has three film series and over seventy video games to his credit, created by legendary studios such as Neversoft and Treyarch. The Californian company Insomniac Games is currently working on the brand, and it should be noted that they managed to take Spider-Man stories to a new level. In 2018, we saw Marvel’s Spider-Man get the most out of the slowly aging PlayStation 4 console, and two years later, another Spidey debuted in a PlayStation 5 exclusive called Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales. Now a full-fledged sequel has been released. Is this a hit or is the spider caught in the web?

• Platform: PS5
• Publication date: October 20, 2023
• Manufacturer: Insomnia Games (USA)
• Genre: open city action adventure
• Czech localization: subtitles
• Multiplayer: No
• Data to download: 85 GB
• Game time: 25-30 hours
• Price: 1799 CZK

Flying spiders

Refreshing the history of previous games with a handy recap, you’ll easily be transported from cutscenes straight into the action, in the spirit of the first game. And the action is truly impressive. During the opening megalomaniac battle with a giant villain destroying all of New York, you’ll brush up on the basic moves, combat system of both main characters, and their special abilities. While Peter Parker relies on robotic spider arms, Miles Morales is literally charged with electricity. As part of the introduction, the most important new ability will also be introduced – flight with expandable wings.

You’ll love this new ability right away. Combined with web swinging, this will allow you to easily cover vast distances in the never-sleeping city, which, with the addition of Brooklyn and Queens, is now roughly twice the size of last time. To make navigation easier, you can use air tunnels, which are mainly located above roads and on bridges over the Hudson River. You can easily travel from the southernmost part of the Financial District to the northern part of Astoria without touching the ground (you will also receive a trophy for this trip). The amazing feeling of movement is even better with new abilities.

You’ll love this new ability right away.

Let’s take a moment to look at the abilities of both Spider-Men. The entire system has been redesigned and significantly simplified compared to previous parts. During battles, you won’t have to slow down the game by opening radial menus and selecting the appropriate equipment. Everything is tied to the L1 (abilities) and R1 (gadgets) buttons. During skirmishes, just like in the previous game, your concentration bar will charge, which you can use to activate a combo or heal a hero. Each Spider-Man has his own sets of abilities, and the spider toys and suit upgrades are the same for both (as is the third, universal ability tree). However, you don’t have to worry about making the wrong choice by mistake. If you reach the maximum level of 60, you will be able to unlock everything. A large degree of character customization is represented by alternative costumes, of which there are dozens in the game for both heroes. However, in this case these are only cosmetic improvements.

With great power come… great enemies

The plot of the game repeats the events of the previous parts. Let’s remember that at the end of Marvel’s Spider-Man, Miles Morales discovered his spider abilities and became Peter Parker’s new assistant. Both previous games also hinted at the appearance of Venom, who, as a symbiote, helped cure Peter’s terminally ill friend Harry Osborn. However, what the previous games didn’t hint at was the introduction of a new villain, Kraven. This killer is determined to hunt down the most dangerous beasts New York has to offer—Spider-Man’s local gallery of foes, and perhaps Spider-Man himself.

Thus, the first half of the game follows the classic spirit of the previous parts, both Spider-Man will have to join forces to defeat the most difficult enemy at the moment, while each of them will separately struggle with their own problems. Peter tries to escape the monotonous life of Spider-Man, find a job and settle down with his girlfriend MJ. Miles struggles to juggle his newfound abilities with school, his roots, and his desire to avenge his father’s death.

The first half of the game is in the classic spirit of the previous parts.

This “regular routine” is then disrupted by the return of an apparently cured Harry Osborn, who decides to join Spider-Man’s gang after discovering his best friend’s identity. His growing power and the symbiote’s appetite for a new host sets the stage for a much darker second part of the story. I won’t spoil it for you, but be prepared for a few twists, an Alien-esque atmosphere and a thrilling ride to the end. If you’ve seen the movie Spider-Man 3, you probably have an idea of ​​the impact the presence of the symbiote has on everyone involved. Compared to previous parts, a larger number of playthroughs have been added to the game, in which you can also play as civilian versions of the heroes. However, with a few exceptions (which are otherwise very good), these parts are weaker and extremely slow compared to the rest of the game. Particularly weak are the passages in which one of the main characters rides a bicycle.

The city that never sleeps

In addition to the classic story missions, there are, of course, plenty of open world activities to enjoy. Luckily, the game doesn’t throw everything at you at once, so they can be completed continuously between larger tasks. As in previous parts, you will enjoy secretly clearing out criminals’ lairs, various battle arenas, or looking for lost items. Often when solving crimes, a situation arises when a second Spider-Man will help you in battle, give you a pancake at the end and move on again. While the developers have tried to make all of these missions interesting, unfortunately, you can’t shake the impression that in some places they are just filler that could have been cut down even more (for example, in favor of other side stories).

Subjectively, the difficulty of the game seemed lower to me than in previous parts, but it can be set at several levels. To complete the game, if you decide to complete everything 100 percent, allocate about 30 hours. There’s not as much of it as in some giant open worlds, but at the same time it ensures that you always have something to do and the game doesn’t want you. In addition to the open world and story missions, you also get the opportunity to go through the side stories of both heroes, which the creators really succeeded in doing. Each of these storylines can only be completed with a pre-determined Spider-Man, and during them you will meet several acquaintances from previous parts.

In addition to the missions, of course, there are plenty of open world activities awaiting you.

Completing these side missions and open world activities will reward you with materials to improve your abilities, and completing a certain number of tasks in each area will also unlock fast travel. It’s when you’re quickly moving around the map that you’ll fully appreciate the developers’ ability to harness the potential of the PlayStation 5 console’s SSD drive. There are no loading screens when teleporting – you simply select any location on the map and immediately appear there at full speed. Changing heroes happens just as quickly, and with some exceptions, you can do this at any time. This is truly the SSD power that the developers promised us at the launch of the new generation of consoles.

Technological gem

The graphics are at a very high level, apart from minor flaws (MJ’s creepy unnatural blue eyes will haunt me in my dreams). The creators even managed to support ray tracing in all graphics modes. The graphics settings are very robust and you can see that the game was created and optimized for one platform. In the basic settings, you can choose between Fidelity and Performance modes. The first offers the game in full resolution, with maximum ray tracing enabled and high traffic and population density. However, the downside is that it locks at 30fps. On the other hand, performance will reduce the quality of some reflections and character models, as well as the aforementioned density, but will provide a much smoother experience at 60fps.

However, the real magic happens if your TV supports VRR and/or 120Hz. With these settings enabled, the game targets a very nice 40fps in Fidelity (which owners of 120Hz panels will appreciate). VRR then compensates for any frame rate fluctuations. Personally, I alternated between these two modes many times during the game, but in the end I preferred Fidelity 40fps. This mod offers the best of both worlds. The game also makes good use of the haptics and adaptive triggers of the DualSense controller. As with previous Sony games, players will also be pleased with the Czech localization.

The magic happens if your TV supports VRR and/or 120Hz.

Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 is not a revolution, but rather an evolution. Functional things from previous parts have been brought to perfection and unnecessary or overcomplicated systems have been removed. The story picks up momentum especially in the second part and doesn’t let up until the final credits. Interesting side stories will keep you coming back to the game even after those credits roll. A new way to move around the city will allow you to experience speed more than ever before. However, despite these improvements, the game still offers a somewhat tedious set of (optional) open-world activities required to fully upgrade your heroes’ abilities. Some of the slower “civilian” missions then disrupt the flow of the rest of the game and could have been summarized in an email (or at worst, cutscenes). Regardless, this is a very well-made and polished game that shouldn’t be overlooked by Marvel and action fans.