Marketing image supplied by Activiion
In my experience most movie-based games fall flat, but once in a while one comes along that makes me think there is hope. The Amazing Spider-Man is one such game. Though to be fair, this isn’t exactly based on the movie since the story and timeline are a continuation of the movie that is opening in theaters today.
I’ll try not to include much of the plot of the game since it does give a few spoilers of what to expect in the movie. Feel free to discuss the plots in the discussion below though, and if you haven’t seen the movie yet, I’d recommend avoiding the comments for now.
Gameplay is well thought out and the controls, for the most part, make sense. Web swinging is fluid and fun, but it does take a little getting used to. The physics are good, most of the time, but occasionally you’re left wondering how Spidey managed to not only survive that face-plant into the side of the Oscorp building, but also transition to running up the wall. All this happens in real-time, but you can also use Web Rush to slow things down and pick your target. Web Rush reminds me a little of the Dead Eye Targeting system in Red Dead Redemption, but you are only able to target one thing.
As you level up there are a number of upgrades to choose from. You’ll get one character upgrade per level, allowing for increased damage and fancy moves. Tech upgrades tend to improve the web shooters or costume. I managed to unlock all the tech upgrades, and all but 2 of the character upgrades before I finished the game. I could probably have gotten them all if I’d spent more time on side missions.
The plot and missions flow smoothly throughout the game, but I was occasionally left wandering around an area looking for the objective. Maybe I’m just too accustomed to playing games with distinct quest markers. I started the game at the mid difficulty setting and found that most of the enemies and bosses were easy. I ran into a couple bosses, namely the first big robot, and the final boss, that I thought may have been a little too hard. Tip: Be sure to use your Web Retreat, even when you don’t think you can.
One cool part of the game are the comic pages that can be found throughout the city. As you accumulate more pages some of the original comics to feature the game characters are unlocked. You can read the comics in their entirety.
I cruised through the main story, taking time out for a few side missions, and completed the game in about 12 hours. I then spent another hour or so cleaning up the city and hunting down some comic pages.
It’s definitely worth playing, and IMO a lot better than any other Spider-Man game I’ve played.
Wired: Great story, lots of geek culture references, and you get a phone call from Stan Lee in the middle of the game.
Tired: A couple of the bosses were glitchy. Difficulty varied significantly throughout the game.
The Amazing Spider-Man is available at Amazon for the Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, DS, and 3DS. If you order through Amazon you will get a code to unlock Stan Lee as a playable character.
