▷ Marvel's spider

Insomniac recently launched the game Marvel's Spider-Man from Sony. An exclusive to the PlayStation 4 consoles that has given a lot to talk about for a couple of years. Especially knowing the good work that the Insomniac Games company has demonstrated with each of its previous games. On this occasion, they faced the challenge of creating their first licensed game, that entailed maintaining the inherent characteristics of the wall-climber but having the possibility of creating and expanding the world around it in their creative way. The result is a round game in many ways, as is often the case with most Sony exclusives. Above all, product quality prevails, not producing something for its own sake. Even with those intentions in mind, there is a chance that it may or may not gel between players. Therefore, we have put cobwebs to work, to assess how good this Marvel's Spider-Man is.

Another story for our neighbor Spider-Man

Unlike movies, hardly any Spider-Man game starts from the protagonist's origins. In this case, that trend is repeated, and we begin the story with an already seasoned Peter Parker, who has been a superhero for several years.

On any one of those days, he hears a police broadcast and sets off. It is an excuse to put the arachnid character into action and show us on the way and little by little, the basic movements to perform, as we are presented with different new situations. As the logical and is already known, throughout the adventure we will come across a large number of winks, characters and enemies already appeared in the comics. Above all, we see how many of the friendly and enemy characters appear in this plot with a solid past that explains the reason for their present actions.

Squeezing the PS4

The technical invoice of Marvel's Spider-Man is very good, and it is something that can be seen from the beginning, for example, in the modeling of the protagonist's costume. Even so, the main characters, despite having a good model and textured, still look slightly removed from other games like God of war or Detroit: become human. The enemies and citizens of the game do not have such a good finish, but still enjoy a large number of polygons. Enough to give the desired impression.

If much of the scenarios, textures and particles present in New York City show greater realism, although it is true that a slight downgrade is seen with what was previously shown at E3. All in all, the city is enjoyed as one more main character. There are some details such as the saliva of the enemies splashing after being hit, the reflection of waxed floors or puddles of water, the breaking of the ground when falling from a great height, etc.

The texturing present in most objects more than fulfills its purpose, and it is an aspect that we can easily notice during those missions in which we must use Parker's camera to take photographs. The drawing distance is really good, being quite wide and with hardly any popping,

In this section, in general, they have achieved a good optimization and the robustness of the game is noticeable, since on rare occasions we have seen a bug or failure during the game. However, such quality makes the loading section sometimes slow down a bit more than expected. Luckily they are not tedious waiting either.

Music, on the other hand, although charged with a certain epicity, is not overly noticeable. We will truly appreciate it when we are swinging quietly between the buildings.

The dubbing into Spanish, like almost all those made in Sony's first party company games, is very good, both the timbre chosen for each character and the intonation of different situations. It is an important section for many Spanish players and in which Sony almost never disappoints.

A Colossal city to explore

The first thing we find when starting to play Marvel's Spider-Man is an open world that we can travel at our whim. From the first moment we are given freedom to explore the city while we are taught the basic movements of movement and combat. Despite that freedom, there won't be much to do around the map until some missions in the main story are completed.

The way of carrying out the missions is typical: go to a point on the map, watch a video and then carry out the mission. The average hours of gameplay is around 20 hours, but of course, that is only for the main missions. If we add up the hours needed to complete most side quests, challenges, and collectibles, this amount skyrockets. In our case, it took us about 29 hours to get almost everything. It is true that it also helps to know where everything is on the map if we activate an antenna that is distributed. The variety of things to do is very high.

In the main missions, we will already play several sticks. The most common thing will be to fight, but at many other times, these fights alternate with moments of stealth infiltration, persecution, investigation or solving a simple puzzle. Do not forget either, the final battles with some well-known villains, although they are missing that there would have been more. In these fights, as is usually common, you will have to use some specific mechanics to be victorious and almost always include a QTE or quick button press event.

The stages of chasing and puzzles arise in moments numbered and are quite well resolved, perhaps the moments of infiltration are those that are a little less successful than the rest but provide the necessary contrast so that at no time does the game become monotonous due to having to repeat missions of the same style.

Among the secondary missions, the most common will be to get involved in some random crime that occurs in the city: a robbery, a kidnapping, the pursuit of a vehicle or an attack. At first they are fun to do, but after repeating them several times it can be tiring. The rest of secondary missions, which as I said, will be unlocked as we play, they will have an icon on the map and we can do them whenever we want, such as: hacking antennas to unlock more markers on the map, missions of research posts, look for old Peter backpacks and other missions that we will let you discover for yourself.

Fighting the Amazing Spider-Man

Although the comparisons are odious, any player knows that the combat style presented in the Rocksteady Studios Batman games, set a precedent that many games have followed with more or less success. In the case of Marvel's Spider-Man, they are based on that same scheme and the end result is very satisfactory. In addition to hitting and dodging, we will have a wide range of options when combining punches with cobwebs. We will be able to attract enemies that are further away, wrap them, leave them glued to surfaces, throw stage objects at them, blind them and countless other combinations. All this only using the specific buttons. To add even more combat options, we will have at our disposal different gadgets that we can select in a drop-down wheel while the action slows down. Finally, if we press L3 and R3 we will unleash a powerful special attack depending on the suit we are wearing.

In general, the buttons respond wonderfully at all times during combat, and the same happens when moving around the city, both the swinging between buildings, and the multiple ways of moving around the city: running on the facades, sneaking between stairs and structures, gain momentum, etc. are perfectly implemented and it is a delight to make use of this locomotion. Sometimes we'll find ourselves swinging around New York just for the fun of it.

Difficulty is an aspect that has been on the lips of many, and the truth is that the game is not a great challenge at its greatest difficulty, as if other games could be from the beginning. It is normal that they want to reach a wide sector of the public but that is as simple as putting even more difficulty modes. The basic game brings 3 modes of difficulty named as the titles of some comic books of the character: Amigo, Asombroso and Colossal; but recently, after an update, a new higher difficulty mode was added.

Improving our friend Spider-Man

Every time missions of the main story, of the secondary stories are completed or some of the game's marks are reached, which try to achieve X number of some actions of the game, we will get Experience Points that will raise the level of the protagonist. With each level increase, we also earn Skill Points, which, as its name indicates, will be necessary for us to learn new skills. These are subdivided into three branches: Pioneer, to discover new special actions; Defender, to improve our defensive skills; and Cobweb Launcher, to get new offensive techniques. After completing some specific main quests, we will also be rewarded with a new gadget, which will automatically be added to our gadget wheel for use in mid-combat.

On the other hand, the secondary missions will reward us with a different token according to the mission that we can spend to get new Spider-Man suits, costume modifiers or gadgets. We will have 26 different suits with which to dress Peter Parker, each one of them with a special power, to which we must add the 23 costume modifiers although we can only carry 3 equipped at a time.

Replayability

Once we have completed the game, we will have the option to replay it from the beginning in New Game + mode, included after an update, and which allows us to keep all content and skills previously unlocked in the previous game. For anyone who is a fan of the game or wants to spend it on a higher level of difficulty, it is a very good option.

Conclusion and final words of Marvel's Spider-Man

Insomniac Games always does it, they are capable of launching games with a great technical, content and quality bill. In this case, they have done it again, Marvel's Spider-Man is a great game no matter where you look at it, whether you are a fan of wall-climbing or not. The company has managed to create a very interesting adventure and action game, with a very successful combat, which rewards being creative when fighting and not just pounding buttons.

One of the strengths of this game is the story, on which they have added a great plot load with several script twists that put the icing on a well told story.

It is appreciated that different types of missions have been offered to the game and have not only focused on fighting, although some do not reach the level of others. Including a multitude of secondary missions is not something new, but in Marvel's Spider-Man it is achieved that almost none becomes boring and I say almost none because the crimes could have a little more variety.

In some aspects such as difficulty or replayability, where the game limped a bit, they have been quick to launch an update that will correct them. However, it's a shame to see how some DLCs offer stories that could have been perfectly incorporated into the original game.

Marvel's Spider-Man, despite not offering any new mechanics, is made very enjoyable by the cohesiveness of the whole set. We see how again, Sony bets on games that waste more quality than defects.

Marvels Spider-Man (PS4) This is not the Spider-Man you have met before, or seen in a movie; At the same time he is struggling to balance his chaotic personal life and career 25, 00 EUR

ADVANTAGE	DISADVANTAGES
+ GOOD GRAPHICS.	- LOAD A SLOW MOVIE.
+ HISTORY WELL BASTED.	- LITTLE INNOVATIVE.
+ SPANISH DUBBING.	- SOMETHING OF SOME REPETITIVE CRIMES.
+ MANY HOURS OF PLAY.	- DLCs apart.
+ FUN COMBAT.	-

The professional review team awards you the gold medal and recommended product.

Marvel's Spider-Man

GRAPHICS - 92%

SOUND - 90%

PLAYABILITY - 91%

DURATION - 85%

PRICE - 82%

88%

Marvel's Spider-Man offers great gameplay and graphics although it innovates little.