Spider-Man on PS4 has an almost therapeutic quality to it. Swinging around its amazing recreation of New York City, diving straight off a building and catching yourself on a well-timed web swing to catapult into the air can bring a smile to even the most jaded of college students. Along with that is some of the most lovable writing and fluid combat seen in a game this year. Thankfully, it also contains the soul of something created out of passion and a genuine love for the Spider-Man brand.
Insomniacs Games’ version of New York City is filled with things to do, be it web-swinging challenges, collectables, challenge missions or combat arenas. All of these are incredibly fun and integral to leveling up Spider-Man, as the game incorporates all of its side-objectives into its upgrade system. This means that it takes more than beating up goons to make Spidey stronger.
The combat flows very well with the web-slinging, as most combat encounters are free-flowing, allowing one to quickly swing into combat, beat down henchmen and grapple out of the arena. This is also helped by a very large set of attacks Spider-Man has at his disposal, like swing kicks, webbing enemies to walls and environmental objects to throw.
The only thing holding back the combat is its gadgets, most of which revolve around stunning goons. It starts with an ability to stun, then a power to stun and knock back, followed by a web-bomb that stuns and culminating in the penultimate gadget, which simply creates a field that stuns goons inside it. That is a shame, knowing that Insomniac Games’ products such as “Ratchet and Clank” and “Sunset Overdrive,” are known for their great weapon design.
Thankfully, this gap in Spider-Man’s arsenal is filled by the massive list of suits at his disposal. Each one is a callback to the massive canon Spider-Man comes from, not just that each suit comes with a unique special ability tied to it, allowing one to do amazing things like web up the surrounding area, lower gravity and even deliver irritating quips to annoy enemies.
Speaking of quips, without that specific late-game ability, Spider-Man is written much better this time around. He now keeps the jests mostly to himself throughout combat, saving the jokes for the many cut scenes throughout the game. It is definitely worth commending the writing team for not only finding a way to make Spider-Man funny instead of annoying, but also making every character in the game as in-depth as Peter Parker, who is voiced spectacularly by Yuri Lowenthal (“Ben 10: Omniverse”). Classic Spider-Man characters like Mary Jane Watson (Laura Bailey), Miles Morales (Nadji Jeter), Aunt May (Nancy Linari) and J. Jonah Jameson (Darin De Paul) also making returns to the cast, and each one of them is written just as lovingly as the NYC Wall Crawler.
All of these elements come together to create one of the best Spider-Man games out there. Not only delivering epic combat and a great story, it also is completely welcoming to newcomers by keeping its themes about growing up and being a good person central to its core instead of playing with the extended canon of the comics. This is a game any PS4 owner or Super Hero fan should not miss out on.
Image from Smosh Games via YouTube.com
