MARVEL’S SPIDER-MAN 2 – PS5 Launch Edition

I am still exploring all the game has to offer me. But this is an improvement on the first game on many levels.This time around we get to play and switch between 2 heroes: Miles Morales and Peter Parker.Each of them has unique abilities. Miles has abilities that revolve around his venom abilities, and Peter relies on his gadgets which can change gameplay and keep things fresh.You also have the return of side activities and pop-up crime that help you gain exp and resources to upgrade your gear and suits.One new thing for traversal is gliding, you gain access to this right in the beginning which makes exploring the city so much more fun.Story wise it is a classic spiderman tale. I haven't played through it all but I can see a very promising setup that is bound to be a whole rollercoaster.Do you need to play the previous games?I recommend that you at least play the first insomniac spiderman game. The game offers a recap but a lot of call backs and nuance will be lost if you hop right into this game. On the other hand, you can completely skip the Miles Morales game and play this one. The Miles Morales game is only about 8 hrs of story which this game gives you a good recap of. Plus maybe skipping it will offer some more "freshness" to playing Miles in this game.Cons:This game at its core retained a lot of what made the first game great. But it can feel repetitive. Combat as usual is not so much challenging but a mashing of buttons against enemies that soak up damage to different degrees depending on how "tough" they are. When the game tries to challenge you, it does so by throwing enemies that block you or try to overwhelm you with numbers which after a few fights can get cumbersome. The fights are definitely more enjoyable as Miles. At least for me.There is some grind to this game, but only if you want to unlock everything and get every activity done. And I recommend at least unlocking skills because otherwise, combat will get even more stale.Pros:The graphics are beautifulThe swinging and traversal of the city is fun and so spot on.Story is intriguing and the character switching is fun and freshens up the gameplayNow, is the game worth $69.99? Sadly, not to me.Don't get me wrong, it is a fun game and if you liked the previous games and you enjoy Spiderman/Marvel you will like this game. You have a lot of gameplay and a lot of content to find and explore but when I looked it up the campaign averages 18-20 hrs without the side activities. When you include the side stuff you are looking at 30 hrs of gameplay. Unless you pursue a completionist gameplay then you are looking at 40 hrs (estimated)But the content is not enough to warrant the not-so-new price increase of video games. If you are really excited about the game, you can buy it at full price. But honestly, I would wait for a sale if you can. Holidays are right around the corner afterall.

This is easily the best Spiderman game ever made. The story is the best Insomniac has ever written, and the characters each have an arch that develop them over the course of the story. Every character is developed and by the end of the game they are different.The traversal is 2-3x faster than the first Spiderman on PS4 and Miles Morales, momentum plays a much larger role in web swinging causing you to traverse much farther and faster when it’s built up.The new powers for Peter bring him up to the level of Miles with powers, and the Spider legs are also a nice addition adding new special moves that can clear out enemies in droves. The new web line lets you take out multiple enemies at once in stealth and is a perfect addition to the game. There are a substantial amount of enemies thrown at you in each fight and this makes the combat even more challenging. Enemies have new attacks that can knock you out of the air, forcing you to adapt.The boss battles are revamped and boss battles require much more attention. Bosses also have health bars now which makes them feel more traditional. The new parry mechanic forces you to block attacks that you cannot dodge, adding a layer of depth to them that will challenge you more. Some attacks can only be dodged, while others can only be parried. The boss fights are also much grander in scale while also more of them are thrown at you than in the previous 2 titles.The side mission in SM2 are also much better than the previous 2 games (Howard the pigeon collector mission stands out at one of the best in the game and it is a side mission). Certain crime activities feel stale, such as stopping cars and fighting arsonists, but only a limited amount of these need to be done to 100% the game. More variety in this area would be nice, but this is not that important in the grand scheme of what the game offers.Overall, this game is the first true “next generation” game all around with graphics, performance, fast travel, and super fast traversal. It is a showcase for what the PS5 Was designed for, and nothing on the market quite touches the stellar 60fps with ray tracing in an open world that loads as fast as this. This is a generation defining game that will be revered for years to come.