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Spider-man 2 is terrible. *Spoilers*

Lambhalf

Member
Ok I am not going to go on about the story except a few parts.
Harry as Venom? Ok not bad, but it still felt out of place. The whole game felt like a what-if scenario.
And who could forget that Manly Jane calling her little podcast "The New Normal". Gag.

But that's not the problem; I can waive away story issues fine and it's not too bad.

However, the gameplay don't go well with this game's "ideas."

The hunters weren't bad, but some of them required you to do certain moves just to beat them up. Ok whatever.

But what is not ok is the symbiotes gang-banging you by the tons while you struggle with the controls using your ultimate alts just to survive.
They brought out the new symbiote types way too early like they were in a rush, and let's be honest they didn't need all of them, just a few would have been fine.
The giant troll symbiote was laughable.

I know game development is hard, but they took the old Spider-man which was a good game in itself and wrapped it up in all these new types of crappy enemies that are there to waste your time.
The last half had me frustrated, bored, and wanting it to end. But even then it felt like it ended too soon to really get going.
I liked the original Spider-man; it was tough but fair. But this was way out of hand.

Flying Venom. Really guys?
You done fucked it up!
 

The Cockatrice

I'm retarded?
Flying Venom. Really guys?

Huh? Its comic-book accurate afaik and it was the most awesome scene in the franchise. The symbiote enemies early on? Maybe Im not remembering right, but they are end game enemies and you're supposed to be overpowered by now. I had 0 issues with them on highest difficulty. Actually the entire game felt easy. The rest of the complaints regarding some of the cringe shit are valid tho, but it didnt ruin my experience at all.
 

sendit

Member
Booty Slapping GIF by Holymatrimonty

Classic Film Vintage GIF by FilmStruck
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
I think everyone knows the second game isn't better than the first overall.

But, it hit the magic 9/10 on metacritic for some strange reason.....wasn't it insomniacs first game to do so?

Overall I enjoyed my time with it but so much of it was an eye roll.
 

Certinty

Member
Copying and pasting from another thread but I totally agree it’s not a great game. Which says a lot because the first game is one of my favourites.

But yes, a lot of the game is severely lacking and even Insomniac themselves admitted it was somewhat rushed.

The last 'act' of the story is shockingly bad. After the Venom Times Square fight, the game goes into overload with the rushing and pacing. It takes what should have been half the game and makes it into a two hour finale full of poor missions, not great story telling and bad character development. Huge disparity from the rest of the game where missions are far more in depth and better in quality.

Game launched with countless bugs. The game freezing for people, the audio muting, spider-cube just to name a few issues which were very prevalent. By far Insomniac's buggiest title I can ever recall. I had far more bugs in 25 hours of SM2 than I had with hundreds of SM1, MM, R&C, SO combined.

Game was somewhat unfinished. There were suits for example which had placeholders put in and were updated a few times after launch to get them in the state of where they should have been to begin. For a good 6+ months, the game post-story was broken with the same few random crimes appearing.

The side content was overall maybe even worse than the first game. In SM1 one of the biggest complaints was how poor and repetitive the side content was. In this one they fixed a few of these issues with good side-story arcs such as the Flame missions, but the rest was worse. No Taskmaster challenges (just the repetitive combat Mysterio ones), the drones were copy and paste filler, the random side-missions were uninteresting and what not. Let alone there's zero replay value in any of this content (unlike the first game).

Then of course Miles Morales launched with NG+ and the option to pick time of day and weather post-story. This was promised as an update in 2023 for the game but later got delayed to 2024 with a further delay before releasing. Which is made even worse given the game has literally zero post-story content so fans have been left with nothing to do in the open world for months.

It’s just not a great game in the slightest. How it took longer to develop this from the foundations the first game gave them than the first game did from scratch is utterly mind blowing.
 

Embearded

Member
I bought the game a few weeks ago and i just took the black suit so i spoiled myself a little reading OP, but i also wanted to talk about the game here as i have many complains for the story:

1. Peter cannot find time for MJ and a job, but Miles, a teenager, can find time:
a. Study
b. Have friends
c. Produce music
d. Be spiderman
On top of that he and his nerd friend have over the top know how on electrical engineering and computer science. Every time they talk about that stuff i cringe.
I really really hate these story elements.

2. Looks like MJ has no problem with her not having so much time about Pete. As i said i haven't finished it yet but it looks like MJ is going to be this career driven dynamic woman while Peter will be a stay at home dad making pancakes. She is also riding a cool bike now!

3. Side quests are stupid tasks no one really cares about. We are playing as Spiderman in NY, surely there are more important stuff than helping teenagers ask their boyfriend out. Boring as fuck.

4. That stupid podcast girl and all the "woke" elements of the game with pride, blm, lgbt etc. It is so forced, it feels alien. I don't know if NY has a absorbed this culture so deep, i live on the other side of the world, but damn its everywhere. There are times i feel sorry for Peter, like i felt sorry for Eminems character in 8 mile, growing up in a place he doesn't belong or some shit.

Sometimes when i play the game it feels like i am watching through some kind of "feel happy" lenses, like everyone in this world is on "happy drugs" or something like that.
I understand its a fictional scenario but its triggering uncanny valley feelings to me because they made the world feel realistic yet it feels like i am in the Matrix, only it is run by over the top gay unicorns.
 

Vlodril

Member
I thought gameplay wise was better than the first one. The web you can stick whenever you want to make a thread between two points was fantastic. Story wise was a huge downgrade. Still enjoyed it.
 

FingerBang

Member
I don't understand the issue with the symbiotes being brought in too early. Finished the game at launch, got the platinum. Enjoyed it overall, even though some of the story parts were whack, and the DEI missions (Miles and MJ) were awful. It was more of the same, but still the kind of game I'd recommend. It has excellent traversals and combat.
 

The Cockatrice

I'm retarded?
That's fine, but is this game a 90/100 for you? I don't get this high score.

I usually do my scores like this:

Story: 8.5/10 - I hated MJ and I dont like how they're sidelining Peter in favor of Miles, but despite those annoyances and some small woke crap, Peter and Harry(two white males) are still the main aspect and their dynamic was emotional. Also Venom. I love Venom. The fights against him were perfect.
Gameplay: 8.5/10 - an improved version of the second, not much changed, better boss fights.
Audio: 9/10 - fantastic voice acting(even Miles improved), great soundtrack just like the first, I still listen to the music on spotify.
Technical stuff: 8/10 - I was not impressed by it visually, had to play it at 30 FPS on PS5, because the 60 FPS version looked like a blurry pos. There were also some annoying bugs at launch. Still, that being said, the vistas, character models, lighting, load times, especially the black cat teleporting sequence stuff was fantastic.

So, 8.5 overall.
 

Cakeboxer

Gold Member
I usually do my scores like this:

Story: 8.5/10 - I hated MJ and I dont like how they're sidelining Peter in favor of Miles, but despite those annoyances and some small woke crap, Peter and Harry(two white males) are still the main aspect and their dynamic was emotional. Also Venom. I love Venom. The fights against him were perfect.
Gameplay: 8.5/10 - an improved version of the second, not much changed, better boss fights.
Audio: 9/10 - fantastic voice acting(even Miles improved), great soundtrack just like the first, I still listen to the music on spotify.
Technical stuff: 8/10 - I was not impressed by it visually, had to play it at 30 FPS on PS5, because the 60 FPS version looked like a blurry pos. There were also some annoying bugs at launch. Still, that being said, the vistas, character models, lighting, load times, especially the black cat teleporting sequence stuff was fantastic.

So, 8.5 overall.
85 sonds fine.
 

hinch7

Member
After playing this, I'm not sure if I can stomach another Insomniac Marvel game if the next follows in the same footsteps. Utter tripe from a narrative POV.

Shame because the gameplay mechanics and traversal was improved quite a bit from Miles and SM1.
 
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Embearded

Member
Still haven’t played it……..which says something as a big PlayStation fan.
To be honest, if it didn't have the open world and some side stuff like the Mysterio, random encounters etc, i would be very displeased with the purchase.
I bought it for 50€ mainly because i also got a Pro and LG C3 so I wanted to see the glorious graphics.
Swinging around the city is very nice, but not 50€ nice.
 

Kenneth Haight

Gold Member
To be honest, if it didn't have the open world and some side stuff like the Mysterio, random encounters etc, i would be very displeased with the purchase.
I bought it for 50€ mainly because i also got a Pro and LG C3 so I wanted to see the glorious graphics.
Swinging around the city is very nice, but not 50€ nice.
Yeah I’m a cheapskate even though I have a pro. But I have plenty of other better games to play.

It never drops in price that much. I’ll buy it when it’s more than 50% off maybe. But this year I’m planning on not buying anything for the first 6 months. My backlog is ludicrous.
 

FoxMcChief

Gold Member
Gameplay is slightly better in sp2 (mostly the traversal) everything else was better in sp1.

Shit sequel that only got 90mc for a mix of sony bias\being an activist wet dream.
Wokeflation helped this game score higher than it should have.

It has a great combat and traversal systems. But sadly everything else was just not good. I’d say it’s solid 6/10.
 

GymWolf

Member
Wokeflation helped this game score higher than it should have.

It has a great combat and traversal systems. But sadly everything else was just not good. I’d say it’s solid 6/10.
I would not use the word great to describe any free flow combat system to begin with but the traversal was great, sure.
 
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Embearded

Member
I just remembered the mission where you play as MJ and she speaks that SymkaIdontGiveAfuck language (which google tells is Hungarian) fluently after being there for a few months and the other party doesn't understand she is not a native speaker.

I mean come the fuck on writers, should i expect MJ to get a nobel prize for peace and biggest anal gape by the end of the game?

And please i dont want to hear Ganke cracking quantum encoded out of this world data on the fly while making stupid jokes again.

I don't want to hear anything again about Kojimas writing after that.
I really thought it was the Japanese who write such cringefest scenarios but Insomniac has surpassed them.

Extremely stupid and immature writing from Insomniac in this one.
 

Lambogenie

Member
Didn't bother with it. After the first one and the Miles Morales game I was kind of over the formula.
Same. I found the first game got tedious. Miles Morales was a short game and I really wanted it to end even sooner!

The fact MJ still has missions and any gameplay at all is a fucking travesty. The worst part of 1 getting more? Stupid whoever signed off on it and demanded it.
 

MonkD

Member
Huh? Its comic-book accurate afaik and it was the most awesome scene in the franchise. The symbiote enemies early on? Maybe Im not remembering right, but they are end game enemies and you're supposed to be overpowered by now. I had 0 issues with them on highest difficulty. Actually the entire game felt easy. The rest of the complaints regarding some of the cringe shit are valid tho, but it didnt ruin my experience at all.
Sure, Donny Cates used the wings a little bit. But I'd be hard pressed to call this Venom comic accurate. Horrible adaptation and characterization all around. This character served the role of some kind of herald of Knull (someone the symbiotes in the comics revolted against), and had no personality on its own.

Kraven was kind of cool. But I also feel like his power level took away some of what makes his character cool as well. The biggest crime besiedes Venom was probably killing off Spideys established rogues, and doing it off-screen.

I'm alright with the gameplay. The traversal and the combat felt great. But besides the speed of the traversal the original game feels way better and more cohesive in every way. I guess less is more if the more you're adding is unpolished garbage.
 

MonkD

Member
I just remembered the mission where you play as MJ and she speaks that SymkaIdontGiveAfuck language (which google tells is Hungarian) fluently after being there for a few months and the other party doesn't understand she is not a native speaker.

I mean come the fuck on writers, should i expect MJ to get a nobel prize for peace and biggest anal gape by the end of the game?

And please i dont want to hear Ganke cracking quantum encoded out of this world data on the fly while making stupid jokes again.

I don't want to hear anything again about Kojimas writing after that.
I really thought it was the Japanese who write such cringefest scenarios but Insomniac has surpassed them.

Extremely stupid and immature writing from Insomniac in this one.
I'm alright with MJ being good with accents. That's the closest she'll ever be to comic MJ (actress). I guess.
 

Gonzito

Gold Member
For me the problem with this game is how unrealistically nice everyone is. There is no conflicts, no arguments, everyone is too nice and as a result every interaction between characters becomes dull. When you play the Arkham games for example, characters argue with each other and there is constant conflict like in real life which makes things exciting and interesting. But with Spiderman 2 everything is sanitized and childlish, to the point where the story and dialogues just feels boring and uninteresting. I guess that the fact that Sweet Baby Inc and all these sick leftist worked in the game have a lot to do with this issue I am mentioning. There are too a lot of woke shit in the game, that chick in the radio was an insufferable activist that made me cringe constantly, and some of the sidequests are just blatant woke propaganda.

I found the gameplay to be good but at the same time the game felt like it needed more time in the oven, the last part was very rushed. All in all, I think this game is a great example of how as a player, you cannot trust reviews anymore, because even the game is good, that 90 in metacritic makes no sense
 
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