Spider-Man 2 - The Most Underrated -man Game Ever
Spider-Man has been featured in article games for pretty much forever. He started out in 1982, on the Atari. We've had tons of Spider-Man games throughout the years, enough that some of them are often honestly forgotten. There are the critically acclaimed games; the really rough, not really beloved ones; and then just some of the weirder ones, the ones that casual Spider-Man fans quickly forget about, but we're still talking about them here today.
We want to show some love to Spider-Man. The Web of Shadows A game with flaws, sure, but a game that made some bold moves and was just a ton of fun. We think it's underrated, so let's dive in. In 2008, The Spider-Man: Web of Shadows was released for the PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Wii. There were other versions for the other smaller platforms, but they were completely different games.
Now, believe it or not, this Spider-Man: Web of Shadows wasn't received too well by critics, a bit middle of the road with review scores ranging anywhere from six out of tens to eight out of tens, with it generally considered. It's cool but a bit messy, but looking past some of the warts and the flaws, man, there is some really cool stuff in the web of shadows for like comic book fans and specifically Spider-Man.
For article game fans, the web of shadows opens in a really iconic way when it's in the heat of the action. New York City is seemingly being torn to shreds and Spider-Man looks somber as he walks through the chaos as shield helicarriers are in the sky and shield soldiers are fighting off symbiote monsters.
Explosions are everywhere. It's kind of badass though, and it has been memed like a million times by now, but as the prelude plays out and then the game itself sets up, it starts off pretty straightforward. Spider-man fights venom. He gets some of the symbiote. He can control it and the venom flees.
Spider-man goes about his spider-man business, fighting the kingpin. Luke Cage and Moon Knight eventually show up too. Wolverine shows up too. Now Wolverine, along with Spider-Man, is investigating symbiotes. As all of the typical Marvel stuff is going down here. Spidey dealing with Black Cat, all that type of stuff, it turns out venom is capturing and infecting random civilians, essentially turning them into symbiote zombies.
As you play, the city falls more and more into chaos and is eventually quarantined by shield and turned into a war zone, and Spider-Man must make decisions and team up and fight to save the city and defeat Venom. The game actually takes the open world web swinging and crime fighting established by the excellent Spider-Man 2, the great Ultimate Spider-Man, and the you know, okay.
Spider-Man 3 movie game and adds a level of apocalyptic chaos to the city and some dual-sided elements to the story and the combat, so Peter Parker has the symbiote suit here and you can actually swap between the two in real time, even in mid-air. What seems like just a color swap actually affects combat styles quite a bit.
The good old red and blue Spidey is pretty much the classic Spidey fighting style, with quick hits, jumps, flips, and dodges, while the black suit is a bit more deliberate, with harder, slightly slower attacks, and some really cool symbiote style moves and just chaos causing stuff like he even has a move that is basically just a big angry power stomp, but the combat switching is a nice change up to the at that point familiar open world Spider-man formula.
You gain experience, and you can unlock different moves and combos for each of the two suits in a skill tree that was fairly satisfying to progress through, especially because the combat was so much fun. I mean, full disclosure, it did get a little repetitive after a while, and that was unfortunate, but it had some really satisfying moments on the ground.
You're punching and kicking and dodging and flipping and throwing, of course, but the newer The web striking mechanic was just so awesome to pull off with proper timing. It allowed you to web zip your way towards an enemy to hit them at high speed. You can then expand upon that move, and it makes for some really cool scenarios.
As Spider-Man combos his way around, yanking his way towards an enemy, then hitting them or slamming them down, practically riding on some enemies, it can get wild and cool, but where it really excels is in the air. This game really stepped it up for aerial combos thanks to that web stripe mechanic.
You can get high up in the air quickly as long as your web can attach to an enemy, and then you can just go nuts. It gets even more chaotic when you can call in allies. This becomes really apparent once you get into a boss battle with a vulture. It's not a cutscene, but you are desperately trying to tug your way towards him to get a hit on him, and man, you really go high above the New York skyline here, like no buildings to attach to, it's dangerous.
Although I will say another side note: as fun and spicy as the combat can be, the camera can absolutely be god-awful sometimes. And really, that's the problem. The game was in rough technical shape. You know, at times it didn't look great, and it was littered with bugs and frame rate issues. Along with some repetition, it kind of held it back from greatness.
But the big boss moments were a lot of fun throughout because we got fun new stuff like Black Cat but infected with the symbiote, a symbiote wolverine, i mean come on, it's pretty awesome, and the game is just jam-packed with fan-fun moments like that, just cool stuff to appreciate. From fighting on the streets with Luke Cage to the big end boss battle, there was some cool stuff here, and this was, of course, a time when these characters weren't the massive mega things they are today.
They were still a big deal, but people who had licenses to make the games for these things could really do whatever they wanted, and it showed the game also had a morality system where at certain points of the game you were presented with choices. The good old spidey heroic choice or the darker, more do whatever it takes symbiote spidey side, they make for some pretty nuts moments like choosing to essentially kill Wolverine like what or embracing Black Cat over Mary Jane like it's crazy man.
All of this results in a reputation bar that affects the city. The NPC civilians will either love you or fear you. And basically, your allies in battle are either heroes or villains. There are like four different endings too, so you have all of this packed into a game that is just the open world spidey treyarch formula that they cracked with the movie game Spider-Man 2.
