Marvel's Spider-Man 2

[Ryannumber1gamer]

Guess I'll be the first one to talk about it lol. I might get further into story later, but I'll just drop quick thoughts for now.

So, I finished the main campaign last night. I'm still debated on if I like the first game or second game's story more. I do think the second game has a lot of higher highs and does manage to avoid some of the issues the first game had with jumping around a bit, as the plot condenses itself mostly to Kraven's Last Hunt, and the Alien Suit Saga. 

I do think a lot of the themes and stuff it goes into is a really needed fresh breath of air for anyone following Spidey's comic run lately. Where for the entirety of Zeb Wells' run has been non-stop misery for Peter, the game kind of takes that and makes a point of it. A lot of it is about the themes of Peter not entirely resolving matters and problems in his personal life, storing and bottling up his insecurities until the black suit eventually makes them explode. It's a lot more focused on it's themes of second chances, dark sides, and personal grief and insecurity, with the same exact balance of snapping writing and even arguably better humour than the first game.

I do have some issues with the narrative, mainly how by the time you get to the third act:

Spoiler

I'd say the game focuses a bit too far on making it rag on Peter. Miles has a fantastic plot about Martin Li, and his fury towards him, but it ultimately ends up resolved around the closing point of Act 2, and Miles feels like a weird addition to Act 3 where he both takes a back seat to Peter's story, but is also too perfect for a story that's meant to be clarifying Peter's insecurity about being a worse Spider-Man is not true.

When the symbioite starts taking the city over Web of Shadows style, all of the personal ramifications only hit Peter. It's MJ who gets a symbioite. It's Peter who is almost retaken by it. It's Peter's personal connections taking hits. You'd think at some point, they'd try to throw those same kind of consequences at Miles, either via having Rio, Ganke, or Hailey personally affected by the symbioite invasion (Especially since there is a lot of hints of Miles shutting down his life to Spider-Man, so that could've been a chance for them to explore that, as MJ does for Peter). You'd think they'd even have Miles end up with a symbioite and Peter needing to save him at one point, considering Miles saves him at least 2-3 times. But nope. Never happens, beyond a close call.

I get part of it is it's because Miles is meant to be capable enough of saving the entire city by the semi-retirement of Peter at the end, but it feels a bit wrong to have Miles basically face no personal adversity or call outs for his problems in balancing life/hero work while the entire third act is all about calling Peter out for how shitty he is at doing so. 

I'd also say most aspects of the game is improved. Traversal is a lot better, much faster and quicker, with a lot more options. The side missions are shorter and not as annoying (MJ gets a gigantic upgrade, and there's a fantastic surprise later on with a new playable character), the new city portions are pretty interesting to explore. Collectibles and the crime system also got reworked, so there's no annoying shit like multiple faction crimes to do to finish off portions of the city.

I'd say ironically, it's fights and boss design that takes the worse hit. It's not bad, especially with combat. But I do feel the gadgets were a lot more lacking this time compared to the first game's better and diverse selection. But the boss design, I don't know what it is this month and bad drawn out fights. Every boss is incredibly tanky, has multiple phases, the parry system is too fast with timings for what amounts to providing openings, and by the late stage of the game, it feels like every single enemy does ridiculous amounts of damage in one go, especially with certain new enemies at the end who are incredibly tanky and only become vulnerable via two very specific methods. I don't know what it is at this point with boss design making bosses uber-tanky and specifically only vulnerable at very particular points, while also dishing out high levels of damage at the same time, but I sincerely hope they stop it.

Still, all and all, I enjoyed it. I don't wanna go much more into thoughts because I do wanna wait and give the game time to digest (and also maybe pin down if I ultimately enjoyed this or the first game more). It's probably my current GOTY, with Resi 4 Remake as a close second, problems and all. Insomniac continues to carry the PS5 on it's back and I can't wait to see what they got in store for Wolverine.

[Jango]

Yeah, finished the main missions yesterday night (around 85% total) gotta say a few isolated sequences of the story / campaign are better than the first game, but as a whole, I prefer the original, especially the ending*... Its pretty much the exactly feeling I had with The Last of Part 2 and to some extended, Ragnarok. Mostly everything else is better in the sequel: the visuals, the action, the gameplay, mechanics, speed... it's the story that doesn't fully hit.

The things that bothered me at first are personal taste stuff like Pete's new, a little too Iron Man-ish, set of gadgets. They're not bad or unfun to use by any means, I just prefer the ones in the first game for variety and because they're more... Spidey.

Also, the bosses are a little on the lame part, especially the 2 final ones. The first three are pretty epic, tho'. 

 

But, huh...

Spoiler

Spoiler

Harry really ended up being Venom, hm? Talk about a plot twist of the plot twist. The most obvious choice ended up being correct. I really was expecting something crazy like Kraven becoming Venom, but eh... Also, Scream? Gotta say they went a little too niche by the end. Oh well.

*Oh and, Green Goblin pretty much confirmed, but I really felt like they dropped the ball hard on Norman's reaction. It totally be like:

Norman: -Save my boy!

Spider-man: -Oh right. *Saves Harry without killing him, which Dr. Connors even said it was IMPOSSIBLE*.

Norman: YOU RUINED MY SON, I'LL DESTROY YOU SPIDER-MAN!

 

I swear to God, after Spidey handles Harry to the paramedics and Norman comes close to him I said to myself "he's gonna say thank you, Spider-man". But the dude simply wasn't happy at all. Some people can't be pleased.

 

Anyways... The Carnage reveal was cool, tho'! 

 

 

Edited October 30, 2023 by Jango

[Ryannumber1gamer]

On 10/30/2023 at 9:46 PM, Jango said:

Yeah, finished the main missions yesterday night (around 85% total) gotta say a few isolated sequences of the story / campaign are better than the first game, but as a whole, I prefer the original, especially the ending*... Its pretty much the exactly feeling I had with The Last of Part 2 and to some extended, Ragnarok. Mostly everything else is better in the sequel: the visuals, the action, the gameplay, mechanics, speed... it's the story that doesn't fully hit.

The things that bothered me at first are personal taste stuff like Pete's new, a little too Iron Man-ish, set of gadgets. They're not bad or unfun to use by any means, I just prefer the ones in the first game for variety and because they're more... Spidey.

Also, the bosses are a little on the lame part, especially the 2 final ones. The first three are pretty epic, tho'. 

 

But, huh...

  Hide contents

  Hide contents

Harry really ended up being Venom, hm? Talk about a plot twist of the plot twist. The most obvious choice ended up being correct. I really was expecting something crazy like Kraven becoming Venom, but eh... Also, Scream? Gotta say they went a little too niche by the end. Oh well.

*Oh and, Green Goblin pretty much confirmed, but I really felt like they dropped the ball hard on Norman's reaction. It totally be like:

Norman: -Save my boy!

Spider-man: -Oh right. *Saves Harry without killing him, which Dr. Connors even said it was IMPOSSIBLE*.

Norman: YOU RUINED MY SON, I'LL DESTROY YOU SPIDER-MAN!

 

I swear to God, after Spidey handles Harry to the paramedics and Norman comes close to him I said to myself "he's gonna say thank you, Spider-man". But the dude simply wasn't happy at all. Some people can't be pleased.

 

Anyways... The Carnage reveal was cool, tho'! 

 

 

tbf, I don't think

Spoiler

It's that out there for Norman to react like that. Norman is a man who has sympathetic moments in this universe, but he's also deeply in denial about Harry's health, and even when he's told point blank that he can't be saved, Norman refuses and begs Spider-Man to do so.

It's not really that out there that Norman would rather blame Spider-Man and find something to direct his failures and anger on, rather than accept his own responsibility in exposing Harry to the symbioite and the fact it got to the point where Dr. Conners told him that he was past the point of saving at this point.

 

[Jango]

17 hours ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

tbf, I don't think

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It's that out there for Norman to react like that. Norman is a man who has sympathetic moments in this universe, but he's also deeply in denial about Harry's health, and even when he's told point blank that he can't be saved, Norman refuses and begs Spider-Man to do so.

It's not really that out there that Norman would rather blame Spider-Man and find something to direct his failures and anger on, rather than accept his own responsibility in exposing Harry to the symbioite and the fact it got to the point where Dr. Conners told him that he was past the point of saving at this point.

 

Spoiler

Dunno, the results would've been the same, haven't the Spider-men interfered or not... They actually got the best case scenario in the end (for Harry and the world), which is why I think Norman's reaction was still a little out of place even for him. I think the fact that Spider-man essentially killed the "cure" to Harry's disease is a bit more believable for him to be mad at...

In the end, it's clear that Norman/Goblin was meant to be the main villain of the story, I mean, basically everything that goes wrong is because of him... He fucked with Otto, he fucked with Martin which resulted in Miles' dad death and Aunt May death, then he trusted a freaking alien goo parasite to save his kid which nearly fucked the whole planet... Really, I don't know how far he can go now XD

BTW, I 100%'d the game on Friday. Now we wait for the DLCs and NG+.

Currently playing the first game (the PS5 remaster) and yeah, out of the gate... Those wings make a diference, ho-ly shiiiiiiit. 

Edited November 6, 2023 by Jango

[Ryannumber1gamer]

14 minutes ago, Jango said:

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Dunno, the results would've been the same, haven't the Spider-men interfered or not... They actually got the best case scenario in the end (for Harry and the world), which is why I think Norman's reaction was still a little out of place even for him. I think the fact that Spider-man essentially killed the "cure" to Harry's disease is a bit more believable for him to be mad at...

In the end, it's clear that Norman/Goblin was meant to be the main villain of the story, I mean, basically everything that goes wrong is because of him... He fucked with Otto, he fucked with Martin which resulted in Miles' dad death and Aunt May death, then he trusted a freaking alien goo parasite to save his kid which nearly fucked the whole planet... Really, I don't know how far he can go now XD

BTW, I 100%'d the game on Friday. Now we wait for the DLCs and NG+.

Currently playing the first game (the PS5 remaster) and yeah, out of the gate... Those wings make a diference, ho-ly shiiiiiiit. 

Spoiler

Again, pretty much everything when it comes to Norman in this universe is denial, delusion, and shifting the blame. It can be hard to see that since this Norman is also a lot more sympathetic than other variants, since this time he is legitimately doing EVERYTHING in his power to save Harry, and there's even things here that indications deep depression and days being harder for Norman to live without Emily.

But it's still not that out there to see Norman cannot face the reality of the situations, and he'd rather find an outlet to blame rather than himself or face the harsh truths. Even in the first game when Otto has him on death's door, Norman would rather blame Otto's cowardice and lack of ambition, rather than admit that he was performing horribly unethical experiments and drove Otto away as a result, and that Otto's turn to villainy can be fully blamed on Norman's continually selfish actions.

Norman is a flawed man that's desperate, yet with the Osborn ego, he also cannot accept responsibility or reality. He'd rather blame Spider-Man for 'killing' Harry, rather than accept the reality that his son is lost, and it's primarily his own fault for using the Symbiote, dangerous as it was.