Insomniac’s new game Spider-Man Two (2023) for the Playstation Five is the third iteration of the game, and takes place ten months after its predecessor, Spider-Man Miles Morales (2021). The problem that Insomniac faced with this game is, what do they do to compete with their last two hits? Answer, they make it bigger.
They made everything bigger and better. The map is two times bigger than the original and even bigger and badder villains are present, such as sandman, the lizard, and the fan favorite, venom. The game feels fresh and new even with it being the third game, thanks to the new features that Insomniac has added. New features include the wing suit to travel around with in New York and new powers/abilities for both spider-men, Peter and Miles. That’s not the only thing Insomniac added, as you can find 70 costumes for players to enjoy and most of them also have different variations of colors. Players will have a wide variety of costumes to choose from and I can tell you right now that some of your beloved skins are in there.
The game takes you through New York City and two other boroughs, Queens and Brooklyn. When you start up the game you will get a rundown of what has happened in the previous games and all the storyline elements in a short cinematic that is a few minutes long. After that you get straight into the action as Pete, who’s first day of teaching doesn’t go as planned, as the sandman is attacking New York. As you’re swinging, you can feel the movement be quicker than the last two, and it definitely feels faster and smoother when you swing, even though the past two iterations still had good swinging mechanics. Spider-Man 2 adds to all the swinging with stuff like the glide suit, which is very handy when you are trying to get from point A to point B as quick as possible.
There are new swinging mechanics as well, such as the slingshot and the loop de loop, which are both convenient to use when you want to gain speed at a fast rate without having to swing for a couple of seconds. The game feels like a love letter to Spider-Man fans, beyond all the action and adventure there is a story, but it isn’t as gut wrenching as the previous games. There are moments though where diehard fans could drop a tear or two. The story follows a similar line to the comics but doesn’t completely rip from it, which I like. I like for games to be original and have an original story, and this is what this game has. It has an original story involving Venom, but also gives fans some nostalgia with elements of the comic book storyline also present.
The gameplay on other hand can feel bland and repetitive doing the side missions. Don’t get me wrong, it is fun swinging around as Spider-Man, but the crimes the game has you doing feel similar to the ones in the first two without changing much of the scenes. It feels sort of like a loop, you do a crime, you’re done, you swing around until another crime pops up, you go do that one and repeat. The graphics on the other hand look fantastic while you’re swinging; it just looks like you are in the actual New York City, you can also see the diversity in the city. With the lighting and shadowing, you can see the city pop even in the day. At night, it is a different story as the city lights pop out at you and as you swing, it just looks beautiful, especially if you are wearing the symbiote suit- man, that suit is amazing.
At the end of the day, this game is fantastic and it definitely delivers. It just feels like a spiderman story and feels like you are watching a movie or reading the comics. There are bugs that could be fixed and glitches that could be resolved, and of course, after a while, it could feel repetitive. Other than that, this game is “Game of the Year” worthy and I would give it a score of 9.7/10. It still has very minor issues that are easily resolvable. If you are a Spidey fan, and have some money laying around, I would highly recommend buying the game and playing it for yourself. Within the first couple of minutes you will be sold and play for hours. This game was made for Spidey fans, but anyone would love to play this game; it’s unbelievable, incredible and will have your jaw dropping at points. It is definitely the best of the three- having new areas to explore and new mechanicals everyone will enjoy. It does take about 20-25 hours to finish the story and 35 hours to complete it. If you have the time, enjoy it, this game is perfect for everyone.