Spider-Man 2.0
While there have been a vast array of superhero games over the past few decades, It’s safe to say that Spider-Man and Batman have had that market cornered in terms of sheer playability and overall quality. Marvel’s Spider-Man, the 2018 title by developer, Insomniac Games, was a tremendous achievement for both the studio and superhero games at large. While I personally had some issues with its open-world activities, I still found the game to be vastly enjoyable and one of the best games released in 2018. Now, Insomniac is back with its follow-up, a game that is to be set before their anticipated Spider-Man sequel, a story focused solely on Miles Morales, and frankly, a game that I found to be just a tad bit superior.
Much of what I felt was lacking in 2018’s Spider-Man was that while New York was a blast to explore, the side quests, activities, and collectibles were a bit uninspired and often felt at odds with what I personally wanted from a Spider-Man game. Many of the side quests just lacked that personal touch for the wallcrawler, and much of the map just felt padded with mediocre things to do, not to mention a few pacing issues and stealth missions that hurt the overall experience. While some of the open-world issues do exist here, they have vastly improved the side quests, making them far more personal in several respects. The icon-filled map of New York, taking place during a very snowy Christmas season, is also loaded with objectives that are more deeply connected to Miles as a person, making their discovery to be enriching to the character and the progress they are making as a fresh new superhero and their desire to protect Harlem.
Miles Morales started his existence as an alternative universe Spider-Man, taking over the web-swinging mantle when the Spider-Man of that world was killed during a battle with the Green Goblin. While there is vastly more to that story, Marvel eventually collapsed the Ultimate universe and brought Miles into 616 proper, making him a fully-fledged Spider-Man in the process. Since then, he’s appeared in cartoons, numerous games as a supporting character, an incredibly successful and award-winning animated film, and now, his own personal video game, one set in the same world as 2018’s Spider-Man. In fact, there is even a post-credits sequence that aids in telling a bit more of what we can expect from the next game in the series, one I hope sees both Miles and Peter as playable protagonists.
One question going into Spider-Man: Miles Morales was where was Peter going to be during this adventure. Thankfully, Insomniac gives Peter a break from New York and places him on the other side of the world while Miles is put in charge of protecting New York. It’s been some time since the end of the previous game, with Peter being both a mentor and teacher to the new hero. In fact, even with Peter gone, he has set up training simulations around the map to continue that teaching, granting a cool new suit for a reward should you tackle them all. Miles can also learn new abilities and upgrades from these training events as well, making them extremely worthwhile to do. In fact, every activity is worth completing as you’ll use the resources from those events to craft gadgets, mods, and earning the currency to unlock new suits as you level up. And while there is a decent number of suits to unlock, I did only find a few to really stand out, especially the suit from Into the Spider-Verse movie, complete with the same framerate stutter present in the film.
While some of the origin story is skipped over in favor of pushing the story forward, Miles is still learning about his powers, discovering new abilities as he gets in deep over his head. While the animated film touched upon his venom sting capabilities with the wildly humorous ‘shoulder touch’, the game goes even further with them, making him a bio-electrical god in some ways, electrocuting his foes, and using the ability to solve various electrical puzzles or even just powering generators or siphoning their power. Thankfully, the game doesn’t feature any of those poorly implemented mini-games from the prior game and instead focuses more on environmental puzzles instead, such as moving pulleys, webbing them, and trying to connect wires across the environment. Many of them are nothing terribly special but feel more akin to what Spider-Man would actually be doing as opposed to those trivial mini-games.
The better part of the story is Miles trying to find his own way as Spider-Man, coming to grips with his powers and how he can protect those he cares about. With a New York that is largely obsessed with the original, Miles looks to find his own way to stand out, even chatting up a street painter early on as to when the mural he’s currently working will be updated to feature “that other one.” This desire to prove himself then leads him into investigating the Underground, a high-end tech-equipped group that is hell-bent on stopping Roxxon from releasing a new form of questionable clean energy, one that seems to have gained the interest of The Tinkerer, a character that Miles will be tasked with shutting down. Miles will also have to deal with a few people from his past showing up, his long time friend in Phin, and his Uncle Arron, the Prowler. These relationships are important, and drive home a lot of the narrative, even if several parts of each of their stories are vastly predictable., Now, that predictability aside, their resolutions are fantastic, touching, and even brutally emotional by the game’s end, a finale that feels earned in ways that I feel is executed better than the previous game. This is simply just Insomniac becoming better storytellers as a result and makes me super excited for the future of this franchise.
With Miles being new to his powers and abilities, this translates into his fighting style and web-swinging capabilities as well. There is a rawness and an awkwardness to it all, showing us every indication that he still has a lot to learn. While Miles shares in some basic combat fundamentals to what was present in Marvel’s Spider-Man, his overall style is quite different from Peter’s, making him equally different to control. A lot of his combat is based around using his venom sting abilities or turning invisible to make a hasty retreat or getting in a few quick stealth attacks. You’ll still web-zip to enemies, tag objects to spin around, or web-pull weapons from enemies, disarming them for a quick follow up. As you level up and push through the story, Miles will learn more venom sting attacks, evolving his combat offerings in the process. While the skill tree is somewhat limited due to the game’s shorter length, you can upgrade how his venom attacks and his invisibility works, making each more efficient in the long run. You’ll also craft and equip suit mods that will aid in making you stronger, hold more gadget ammo, or toughening up your webbing. It’s very similar to what we had in the previous game and still functions in a way to carve your own path into making a Spider-Man that’s all your own.
Exploring around New York does tend to feel less impressive simply due to it being largely the same map as the last game. While there seems to be more variety in the crimes, many of them do feel largely recycled, but as we are tackling them as Miles, the approach of them can feel a tad different, but not in a substantial way. To aid in how you navigate the city, and what there is to do, Miles will rely on an app via his phone, created by his friend Ganke, to give him things to do. This app allows the citizens of New York to request things as simple as wanting a picture with him, to helping them find their missing cat. Many of these quests dive into the heart of Miles protecting Harlem, and for as silly as some can be, there is actual heart to a few that stick with you till the end. The app does have one narrative flaw that doesn’t make sense when you actually sit and think about it. Ganke mentions to Miles that the app is on fire, that it is setting records as one of the most used apps in the city; but we never see more missions being added, or that popularity translating into content. It’s a nice concept and one I hope returns, but as it stands right now, it doesn’t fulfill its story purpose in its design.
Coming just two years after the release of 2018’s Spider-Man, I wasn’t expecting the game to be a technological jump in visuals, even despite it being part of the PlayStation 5 launch. That said, this game does shine and is a very impressive looking game on the new hardware, complete with a 30fps ray tracing mode that applies reflections to every building, car, and puddle. You can even see the reflections of buildings in the puddles and frankly, as tempting as the 60 fps mode was, I just couldn’t part with how gorgeous and breathtaking those reflections made New York out to be. Now, It’s likely that once Insomniac has had more time with the hardware that we may end up seeing the next game run at 60fps in 4K with ray tracing included, but for now, it’s something we will likely need to choose between. What is impressive, despite the variable visual modes is that there are literally no loading screens at any point. Fast traveling and starting the game up all load within 2 seconds, and it’s damn impressive to see. The haptic feedback to the triggers is barely used here; however, offering just a slight resistance to web-swinging that feels like something they added in at the last second than any sort of planned feature.
The game also suffers from a few control issues I had with the previous game. It’s still too easy to accidentally web-zip or fire off a web to the wrong target, often web-zipping right into a group of enemies instead of what you had planned to do. It’s also still awkward to sometimes attach to a wall or jump through an opening. Sure, there are shortcuts that make several of those things easier, I just wish there was a bit more refinement here to many of those things that I assume is being worked on for the next in the series. Still, I can’t fault the controls when it comes to combat or web-swinging as it is still an absolute blast here in nearly every conceivable way. The saying “if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it.” is aptly applied here as the game literally plays and feels like the prior game in all the right ways.
Miles Morales is often the better game between the two; it’s more focused in its gameplay and storytelling and Miles trying to resonate in the city as another Spider-Man is something that is addressed here to great lengths. The personal struggle of being Spider-Man is also something that Insomniac gets right with Miles, having his life as a superhero often clash with that of being there for his family and friends. Both games offer up a unique story that does have some common threads, but each goes about itself in totally different ways, allowing both games to stand apart. Miles is a very important character to a massive community, as it does a great job at showing that anyone, should they stand up for what they believe in, can wear the mask and become, Spider-Man.
Developer - Insomniac Games Publisher - Sony Interactive Entertainment Released - November 12th, 2020. Available On - PS4, PS5. Rated - (T) Blood, Drug Reference, Language, Violence. Platform Reviewed - PS5 Review Access - Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales was purchased by the reviewer.