Spiderman Web of Shadows: A Review, Critique and Commentary

spider-man web of shadows is among my favorite games ever and what better time to cover it than 10 years later just before the release of the only spider-man game since 2008 that might beat it this was the second spider-man game developed by treyarch and shabba games but the only one that had an original story experience from spider-man 3 meant shaban knew what needed to be done weather shadows features easily the best combat system in the entire franchise and among the best in the superhero genre it's got expertly tuned traversal and a story that's gripping from beginning to end the city and bosses are unique the characters are beautifully rendered and awesome to interact with what this game does well it nails there's nothing quite like revisiting one of your favorite games and realizing it's twice as good as you remember it that's why i'm making this video because with spider-man ps4 days away or maybe far in the past for later viewers this is the bar for insomniac other spider-man games have done aspects better but i don't think any an delivering is consistently good as this so for people watching on release this is the game that i believe and hope desperately the spider-man ps4 can beat and for people watching after this is the game that insomniac managed to top or maybe fail to ever match web of shadows is probably famous for its beginning the game immediately plays its best cards on the main menu with its iconic theme tune this is below only the spectacular and the rainy theme in my opinion making it the best video game spider-man track i've ever heard it reflects the dark in the light of the game the destruction and the heroism but also the spider the initial notes create that spider-like creepy crawly feeling their sudden and quick movements it also creates the idea that there's something mysterious something scary happening just out the corner of your eye which is exactly what happens in the story the intro only gets better moonlight sonata packs a gruesome nighttime battlefield shield fights symbiotes but it's a losing battle spider-man walks to the edge of the building and drops the voices of other characters echo as he swings picking off symbiotes in the city which cuts into a front shot of spider-man this is where you take control basic swinging and combat are tutorialized effectively as the game shows you the extent of the invasion the game shows the best aspects of the combat system with the wall combat and lining up symbiotes like bowling pins for you to swing kick the shield agents that you save can't tell you where mj and the search party are but she soon shows up with luke cage she asks for you to come with her but a dark figure is seen in the fire and spider-man can't decide a symbiote grabs you and you wake up somewhere else it's day and the city isn't in ruins anymore but you're about to be venom approaches ready to kill you once and for all until part of the venom symbiote latches onto you and you get this iconic line get ready for a world of pain the black suit's ability to throw cars is demonstrated in your first fight with venom you can do whatever you like here but you're clearly intended to throw cars as much as possible the black suit quickly overwhelms venom even as he attempts to kill mary jane but he escapes in seemingly impossible speed and mj is rushed to hospital this is where the game's main story starts in a relatively calm afternoon set harlem you know this city is going to hell you just don't know when or how so have fun web of shadows was criticized for its graphics which does confuse me spider-man 3 came out in the same generation yet it was far less visually appealing while three had a ps2 version as well so did web of shadows it was simply a different game the wii version just downgraded the effect prototype came out a year later was practically the same game but even it couldn't hold a candle to weather shadows so i'm not entirely sold on the criticism admittedly the game doesn't have a distinct visual style from the get-go the trees buildings and grass are just non-stylized 2008 renders of trees buildings and grass nothing more but the game's visuals get a lot better when you factor in the character models the effects and the sky boxes the afternoon gleam is iconic for spider-man it's the de facto time of day for him and web of shadows captures that perfectly most of the trees have brown leaves which complement the sun well and harlem is of course made of brown bricks at night the skybox is simply immaculate the symbiotes have always had a gothic element in the comics and the movie the church setting is practically iconic so it's great that the extremely powerful moonlight during the night gives a gothic element to the city as nightfalls and the stakes grow the visual style starts coming out kingpin's tech mercenaries look unique and instantly recognizable the symbiote invasion brings black biomass tendrils connecting building to building and streets littered with rubble all the symbiote models are distinct and fit the style perfectly the helicarrier stark tower and the shield presence give web of shadow's third and fourth act a more than unique style one showcased perfectly by the intro cinematic the animation quality is frankly incredible and works excellently to distinguish the black and red suit in the red suit spider-man stands relaxed but clearly ready for action in the black suit spider-man cranes his neck and tenses his hands into claws giving the camera a more aggressive animalistic glare a strike with the red suit is all comicy and superhero-like the strike with a black suit makes spider-man's arm shake with tension the basic combos convey this too with extremely simple but explosively powerful attacks like a stomp and an elbow hit for the black suit the red suit has quicker flurries of much flashier blows but they're clearly not as impactful and then of course there's how good the heroes and villains look spider-man's colors and shine is perfect but what you might not have noticed is his eyes they look extremely angry in comparison to any other spider-man suit and that's because they look far more human than the bug eyes you usually see with the slightly downwards angle pointing towards the center circle web on his face it looks like a frown and that's reflected in the black suit as well the symbiote skin looks stretched around the eyes giving him a permanently enraged look in keeping with comic book style all the spider suits are drawn nude as in they're rendered a spider-man's actual skin with the suit adhering to every sinew and indentation of the muscles the black suit's skin like um skin only makes the model look more beastial venom doesn't look quite like he did in the comics probably to distinguish him from spider-man but the messed up white spider lines in the blue skin work perfectly as substitute moon knight wolverine and luke cage all look great but the villains are even better the sword feathers that make up vulture's wings are a really unique and interesting idea especially given how well the game uses them in the boss fight black cat has fire in her arms and boots as usual and a mask that doesn't make her look like a muppet for once electro looks like a dark and gritty realization of the classic design with the yellow crown looking like a metallic gold new york's buildings discounting the tendrils are the only aspect of the game that didn't really sell me stark tower spectre industries the baxter building black cats penthouse and fisk tower all look great but that's about it other buildings look drab i like the black and white window lighting because it complements the nighttime skybox perfectly but that's about all the character buildings have with roofs just being some possible grey concrete texture and skyscrapers looking pretty much the same it's a big weakness because in a free-roaming spider-man game this is where you gotta knock it out the park however new york does have space up its sleeve it's actually fairly destructible all the cars explode 9 out of 10 objects on roofs will be destructible all storefronts can be shattered bus stations fences and stairs can fall apart too it gives battle some real spectacle when it comes to knockback this game doesn't pull its punches literally getting hit hard in this game can send you so far back that the force alone can destroy cars and smash storefronts both web strike crushes cause explosions that mess up the environment too giving them that much more brutality new york isn't the best window dressing compared to other titles but that's never been its primary function it's the stage for you your swinging your traversal this is probably even more controversial than the graphics the traversal in this game is criticized for its simplicity but i think it's excellent and here's why it's accessible but it has a very large skill ceiling as in you can jump in and be competent just fine you can swing around as fast as you like without having to worry about crashing into buildings but if you want to make it look cool if you want to be a lot more efficient you can seriously push the limits along with your web swing you've got a web zip that allows you to maintain height while going straight very useful for flying over buildings but if you're not holding a direction the zip will shoot you up in the air if you land and press jump immediately after you get a big jump which looks cool and keeps up speed if you contact the ground you can hold on to the web for as long as you please which allows you to swing around to redirect maybe get higher or even come back for another swing kick you can pull yourself up on your web to gain height faster you can jump in mid-air you can web run along the side of a building then jump off in this cool animation you can also turn around the side of a building quickly with it and dismount walls with style when you're webb running up a building you can web zip yourself up it which can sling you straight over the edge if you press the right button on a lamp post or traffic light you can swing around them or perch and you can instantly latch yourself to anyone you touch with the jump button if you press jump just before hitting the ground spider-man breaks his full which is useless but cool all the same if you hold the right direction while falling next to a building spider-man grinds along it if you press jump off a swing it's boosted giving you some breakneck momentum and very cool animations if you hold jump during a swing it completes its arc far faster and puts spider-man into a one-handed swing which looks very cool boosting is best when you've got a long swing but it's not as useful when it's short because you don't want to reach the top of the ark in half a second if you're looking to go forward there is actually parkour in the game too you can slide right over any parked car from any direction it looks good the problem is you have to push for an extended period of time so you're just walking into the car until the animation triggers the only reason you'd want to do this parkour animation is because it looks cool otherwise you just web zip or jump and it doesn't look cool so you don't this and the fact that the web running is a little hard to control are the only two problems i have with the movement i don't really care that webs don't always stick to buildings the traversal is easy to pick up but it's going to take you the entire game to master and when you do i truly believe it's one of the best city traversal systems out there the speed and the animations really do make you feel like spider-man you can see that just from the way that spider-man only gains forward momentum when the tension from his weight hits the line comparing it to other spider-man games is largely pointless nostalgia will always be the biggest factor and i can't say i'm free of that they also have different goals spider-man 2 wants extremely large scale heavily skill-based swinging ultimate spider-man wants small-scale heavily skill-based swinging this wants accessible a large-scale swinging with a high skill ceiling it depends on what you like and that in part depends on what you played first despite whether shadow's having a deep and extremely fun traversal system it doesn't incentivize its use like other spider-man games instead it goes for collectibles in this game they're the spider tokens or as i like to call them crack cocaine seriously these [ __ ] are so addictive that i've collected thousands it's the exact same concept as crackdown's orbs and it's also the exact same reward agility you need to collect a certain amount to level up and with each level you get faster there's 11 levels and each one requires a fair deal of spiders so there's a hell of a lot of collecting to do it's worth it though a level 11 spider-man who's mastered the boost mechanic and web zips is faster than light it's like no speed any other spider-man game has done before spiders are gonna be love it or hate it i imagine some people would rather have an experienced sport upgrade for swing speed but personally i love it not only is it addicting but that very addiction is what causes so much more use of the traversal mechanics and that will result in the player learning more about the traversal mechanics which means collecting more spiders which means faster swinging which means more enjoyable traversal and so on the longer you collect the finer collecting is the fun of the game is i think sourness to the system is rooted in the fact that they're all the game has to offer with regards to mini side missions the game has side missions just none of the classic spidey stuff obviously pizza delivery would be horrendously inappropriate and there's no point in combat challenges when you can't move five feet without getting into a fight but why are there no races no time trials there's not even any bomb disposal apart from in one mission apparently there was intended to be a black suit rampage mode but it got cut before release why this seems like a product of shabba having all of 17 months to make this game which is incredibly tight i think spiders were the best substitute they could have come up with given the time constraint you'll spend the vast majority of your time playing web of shadows free roaming in new york city and that's due to mission structure many missions in the game are simply go out and do x number of things in the open world it's not got the cinematic flair of a cutscene rich narrative but it is free and it makes use of new york perfectly because this city is far from empty it's dynamic act 1 starts in harlem and scattered around the city will be random crimes gang wars on roofs in the streets gang vs police gangs beating up civilians they're everywhere and most missions in act 1 revolve around smacking them up in different ways side missions until act 3 is simply beat up x thugs or save x amount of civilians basic stuff but because of the combat the gameplay carries the basic objectives it's not even an hour before the thugs bring out submachine guns heavy hitters with baseball bats and cars act 2 swaps the thugs for kingpin with heists on the sides of walls gliders police fights big ass mechs and then deranged civilians start showing up as the symbiote affliction starts to take hold at the height of the infection the symbiotes roam the streets you've got to rescue trapped civilians escort shield operatives destroy hives and the list goes on as the infection gets worse the fledgling symbiotes of the villain cast provide increasing threat and all of the encounters in the open world are dynamic the city can change states in half an hour of gameplay with more and more types of event popping up and it's entirely your choice as to how much time you spend there you could do the kill 500 symbiote mission if you wanted to if not just blast ahead outside of main story objectives the game's only as repetitive as you make it i don't think web striking 40 snipers was particularly gripping and destroying 15 hives isn't either repetition and boring gameplay is a recipe for disaster but with combat this good doing it all the time and whenever i want is a dream come true i've talked this up for long enough let's get into what makes combat so good in a word freedom the game's combat works perfectly in and flows freely between ground air and walls for each setting there are exclusive move sets and two for each provided by the black and red suits there's trade-offs between each one for each setting and you've got to think about that with each setting transition in air the black suit can't hold its weight but on the ground it's a beast with the freedom provided by every corner of new york being a possible combat setting there needs to be something to tie them all together to pull you from one enemy to another quickly in this massive setting and that is a web strike this was introduced here and done best here too it's a single button pressed to begin a web strike and the same button just before impact to connect it the normal web strike bounces you off the target but there's also an aoe highly damaging crush and a throw these moves are necessary for this massive environment and they're incredibly powerful too so much so that you can get by by spamming nothing but you'd have to be a sadist of course but i wouldn't put it past anyone some enemies are capable of countering the strike which is signified with the broken web you have time to abort it or to over counter which cancels out their counter though this is a damn risky move with regards to efficiently taking out a group the web struck can be the best move in the game but not reliably due to the best versions of it having the tightest timing window really once you're up close and personal the air wall or ground attacks are far better it's simply how spread out enemies can be that creates a repetitive reliance on web striking it's a necessary sacrifice but i do wish shava had held off insane moves like the web strike crush until a bit later in the game insane moves early on is one of the most intentionally comedic aspects of the game spider-man's move set is very clearly intended for taking down symbiotes and super villains not poor people who listen to [ __ ] [ __ ] get money one too many times the black suit is capable of throwing a truck so when you leap onto big g and hit him so much that his skull becomes two-dimensional it gets a little funny after a couple upgrades spider-man can web strike throw people off buildings down 15 stories the symbiote slam whips people back so hard that their brain stems should become soup and then smacks them into the ground so hard that the bounce back sends them three feet into the air the black suit can web strike grind people mid-air or on the ground into buildings cars other people then punch them across the street making nearby cars explode you can pick up cars and throw them directly at thugs even with civilians or other thugs inside in act 2 you get a few more abilities a personal favorite was the one where you could tendrill a guy into your grasp then crush their necks so hard that the blowback can knock cars into space as the symbiotes start taking control you'll find yourself with bladed tendrils that can sweep in a huge cone in front of spider-man when she can then further upgrade with a couple more cracks of the whip and an explosion of tendrils from spider-man's chest don't forget the red suits tornado which can hit the enemy a couple hundred times in the span of a few seconds bombastic isn't quite strong enough a word but badass fits the bill perfectly the symbiote of spider-man makes kratos look like a [ __ ] with this much diversity in how you deal damage combat is really hard to get bored of there's 10 ways to dispatch each enemy and they're all gonna look good looking good might seem superficial but this is a superhero game the audience aren't looking for devil may cry they're looking to see spider-man beat up bad guys in the coolest way possible timing and suit choice are where the skill potential shows up i've talked about web strikes which heavily reward perfect timing but there's also blocking encounters this is essentially parrying you block just before the hit lands and then you unleash a counter attack for the black suit it's a highly damaging burst for the red suit it's less damaging but it webs the target up which can be better on more dangerous enemies then you have to account for combos the best example would be the black suits tendrils post-electrophyte the first black suit combo is the elbow spin and that requires a simple sparring of the attack button but you can get an upgrade that empowers your attacks if you pause between the first and second attacks so if you have the time before an enemy hits you it's best to go for the empowered version then there's the tendril whip if you pause before the elbow spin you instead whip these bladed tendrils which is essentially the most powerful attack in the game it's a real crutch late game where the symbiote numbers get overwhelming the difficulty here is how hard it can be to get a window to initiate the whip especially since it's only worth using when you're being swamped so timing certainly plays into the skill of the game but uniquely there's the added depth of two suits spider-man 3 had this too but it was crap there so i don't count it as we know the suits have different move sets but that also means they have different strengths the red suits web strike twist is far better for single target damage than the web strike grind though to be fair i don't see many enemies surviving webstrike grind the red suit fires webs which is excellent for downsizing a threat especially since you can fire them from pretty much anywhere the web strike throw can be used to stick a webbed enemy to a wall there's not much utility in this but it looks cool webs also play into the three special attacks the first is the multiflora where you come at the enemy from all sides good for single target but not as good as the beat down however multiflier webs them up which can be very useful and more dangerous enemies the other two are big web bursts which is pretty much the best crowd control spider-man has if you combo that with a suit switch into the tendril whips you've got a series of attacks that very few crowds are going to survive instead of webs the black suit has 10 drills this is the perfect distance closer providing a substitute for the web strike if you're dragged onto them you can immediately begin smashing them up and if they're dragged onto you you can either swing them behind you then back onto the ground with an aoe or choke them out so hard that the blowback knocks other enemies out the way the only real difference between the two is how cool they look and how much aoe damage you'll get the special attack tendril grasp also incorporates multiple tendrils to bring everyone close before coming down with the slam the most major differences between the two suits though is the air attacks until very late game the black suit's air attacks are crap and as you can get right next to the enemy the red suit however has a full flurry of combos that track enemies from large distances in the air it's by far the superior suit contrasting to the ground where the black suit dominates this encourages suit switching when you change setting and more specifically when it's worth it this game's difficulty curve is very aggressive by the end of the game you'll be fighting top level symbiote bruises by the dozen and they're going to kick your ass as the situation grows the black suit grows with it at the start of the game it's portrayed as a more powerful combat suit that should only be used when necessary throwing cars gets you two black points skewing your suit alignment near the end though the black suits upgrades begin getting better and better the tendril whip is godly you also get an air attack that extends the range of the basic swipes and adds a highly damaging finisher the web strike crush gets its final upgrade making it more powerful than ever it becomes better than the red suit all the time and in every way through this the game sells its story through the gameplay because it wants you to experience the need to give into the darkness to fight the darkness this is brilliant it's an awesome way of using the player to tell the story but it's only here that the game nails the difficulty curve this is pretty much the combat's biggest problem there's no way of changing difficulty in this game so if you know what you're doing early on there's no real way of making the game any harder when it's too easy what's the point in optimizing your attacks the largest problem with difficulty lies with enemy design kingpin gliders are dispatched with a few basic web strikes every time maybe you'll throw in a tendril attack maybe a few air swipes but that's it basic goons will die to anything so these enemies practically provide no threat apart from in large groups bigger kingpin dudes however have stunning wall attacks that can deal a lot of damage fast and they always come in packs heavy hitter thugs have bats so strong that they can knock you halfway down a street with a single swing and they do this to counter web strikes making them extremely dangerous basic thugs though have nothing again submachine guns can be overwhelming in large groups but with movement that fast it's hard to get overwhelmed point is early game enemies are divided into two categories useless fodder and serious threats you can either overwhelm with the ease or have to take a more cautious and efficient approach in most games it's supposed to be everything in the middle balanced by group size and composition here group size is everything five thugs are completely useless their shots don't mean [ __ ] if they can't take half your health by the time you've destroyed all of them but four thugs and a heavy hitter requires you to think you might want to chuck a car at him or try to swing kick and you definitely want to get rid of him first big tech guys aren't much of an issue but even having one in a group of gliders and goons changes things having a single dangerous enemy in the group is a massive distinction and the game always has these group divisions because of how the dynamic city is apart from acts 3 in the mechs you don't just find randomly strewn enemies they're all in their troops or gangs so you judge each combat encounter in that way a group of kingping goons would remain far more interesting if you added gliders than a big guy but due to the division you mostly find gliders on their own you mostly find goons on their own where they're completely defenseless this manner of grouping also works into the mission structure and for the most part it works alright destroy five wall heists for example means you will always get the full experience of taking down a wall heist there will never be no defense or overwhelming defense of the drill because the group ensures a set amount in the same way hives early on will always be defended by symbiotes and fighting groups of deranged civilians seems more immersive because instead of just finding single targets on random rooftops it seems like they're congregating and planning something this use of the dynamic city is one half of the missions you'll undertake throughout the game i don't think it's so bad because they're not restrictive the open world is essentially the mission to complete it you have to web swing from location to location however you please and you'll probably have plenty of non-relevant combat encounters along the way which makes free roaming a consistently alive and enjoyable experience the game moves pretty quickly so the state of the city rapidly changes too from thugs to kingpin to deranged civilians to symbiotes to shield fighting symbiotes to a full-on shield counter operation within 5 hours if you move pretty quickly and for the kind of game this is a combat heavy free-roaming spider-man game it works perfectly arguably better than a more cinematic story could have done by act 3 the invasion the game steers away from groups of enemies so much and more focuses on attempts to rescue civilians hovercraft extractions apc extractions planting bombs saving civilians it fits the setting far better and act 3 fixes many of the problems with enemy design symbiotes are everywhere and yes these walkers are one-hit acquitters that fall into the useless fodder category but you're never asked to fight them you're only focusing on the cool symbiotes the grabbers the basic enemies they rob civilians and attempt to infect them they also have a grab attack and a web strike counter the grey dudes are similar but they jump after you and slash your face off gorilla looking enemies show up further in and these have a ranged grab attack with a hell of a lot of health electro lings are amazing looking symbiotes that teleport from post to post firing electricity at you vulturings fly and deal damage from head butts and chucking knives at you there's also the big carnage looking guys who deal huge damage have loads of health and are pretty much the most dangerous enemies in the game there's a lot of variety they're all dangerous and while not all of them are hugely distinctive or require specific strategies to beat there's enough so that you're challenged consistently and you can't god mode your way through every threat every time the city has a major change in state there's usually a boss fight or a very important mission to punctuate it the game's main missions do an incredible job at being memorable and that's because the game only ever uses cinematics on important plot points very little time is wasted in this story and that's what we're going to look at next acts 1 starts right off with a boss you and venom in the street as we went through earlier after mj has admitted to hospital gang members show up along with luke cage this begins the focus of act one cleaning up harlem with luke he shows you the ropes of your abilities as spider-man the spider sense the web strike the swing kick because why would spider-man know that he's probably glad he didn't to be honest because i gotta say the spider sense isn't very good it looks and sounds great it does a good job at allowing you to danger and a good job of detailing where enemies are on the xbox and ps3 versions where it fails however is in the camera hitting the button might lock you onto the enemy immediately in front of you that you're currently fighting or it might lock you onto some random [ __ ] three blocks away and then you'll have to scroll all the way down to the right target while you're being repurposed as wallpaper paste right stick moves the target but that also controls the camera and this is no dark souls you really want free camera control in the multi-target battles on pc it's worse even moving the mouse will change targets when it does go on to the right guy you're golden the camera works great but if not you can end up losing half your health through these basic ass issues simply having a marker over who you're going to lock onto or better yet locking you on to the closest enemy that's near the center of your screen would fix all these issues web of shadows has the freest and fastest combat not just in the spiderman franchise so i can forgive a few camera issues but having lock on this unreliable is pretty bad the city continually enters worst states as act 1 goes on cage's plan other than beating up thugs of course is to set up a parlay between the gang leaders the rolling sevens agree after you save them from a drive-by and the park caves agree after you tell their leader to be there or be square tonight at sundown in the park be there or be square be square you from queens or something just show up or else it seems to be going well until a round of 20 snipers come out and take aim this is pretty much a massive web strike spam fest which can get pretty intense if you're not particularly experienced with the system taking out the first wave reveals their motives the gang war had been set up and the attempts at pisa not being allowed after taking out the second wave of snipers the leaders pull guns on one another this is the point at which you make your first moral choice red or black the red suit option exposes the setup leading to an agreement the black suit options let them kill one another putting the gangs to rest either way spider-man decides to track down whoever could have hired those snipers and kingpin is at the top of the list as soon as you make it to this tower black cat is seen attempting an escape like many of the previous games what follows is a high speed black cat chase sequence this is backed by the score for every other chase sequence but it's awesome nonetheless the root chosen in the easily controllable traversal system makes the actual act of keeping up with her fun and good looking the black cat fight is among the best fights in the franchise due to her agility she can mess you up without issue the entire city is at her disposal air walls or the ground so it's an incredibly open fast-paced fight she's got this whip thing that pulls you towards her and knocks you about she's also capable of punking you into a kiss jumping over you and just generally beating the crap out of you black cat is only vulnerable to web strikes some of the time but others you'll have to abort the black suit's tendril will pull you in close but the air attacks suck ass so it's better to be in the red suit for the damaging both special moves you have available are usable here but the beat down is better for damage once you get black cat low enough she jumps onto kingpin's glider dudes and you've got to chase them down when it's next time to fight they don't go away so she's got backup most of the time if you aren't paying attention she can kill you pretty easily it's a damn good fight simply because of how open and free it is and that she's among the only powerful agile enemies it's like fighting a true match which seems almost appropriate black cat gets pissed off at one point and kicks you in the face would you respond to by booting her off a building this imperils her because it's a cutscene not as if we've just been smashing her skull inside out or anything you save her and then she hits you yet again and then it's off to her penthouse felicia you in there kitty kitty kitty i'm right here you idiot i can't tell if that was intentionally funny black cat explains she's still in love with you and your dumb ass messed up her plan to take kingpin from the inside she proposes that you stay with her and that this city will be yours this is one of the hardest moral choices in the game it's a love triangle kinda like the witcher 3 and every young adult book ever written a pretty smart application of the moral choice system if you ask me the problem stems from the fact that you assume red to be mary jane and mary jane has had very little screen time thus far she's either been chewing her ass out or being wheeled to hospital she's clearly spider-man's love but from the player's perspective there's no connection to the character it's only really a hard choice on your first playthrough because you don't know what will actually happen if you select each option but if you've ever picked the red option here i'd say the chances of you doing that again are fairly low red option forces you to spend the next few missions with moonlight [ __ ] moon night he's cool and he really needs a goddamn netflix show but he's a total dork in this game and you're going to be getting your missions from whoever you pick for a while whoever you do pick will serve the same function as cage they'll tell you where to go what to do provide advice and chat about superhero stuff among the most remarkable things about this game is that this is a full-on marvel universe not just spider-man iron man the rest of the avengers and the fantastic four don't seem to be available but you will find luke cage moon knight black widow wolverine black cat practically the entire shield force and plenty of recognizable villains from the spider-man universe too many of these characters will end up being your quest givers they direct you through the story give side quests and even have conversations with you about law and stuff all the voice acting here is immaculate just try to keep a low profile okay and stop throwing people off rooftops if you can help it best black cat voice ever moon knight luke cage and black widow are all great but wolverine really knocks it out of the park there's some kind of damn superhero fashion show cause i got some orange and brown tights that put you to shame what not a fan of the new me first off you smell like death second you look like one of those emo kitties they got all over the internet jibbering on about how hard their life is when they've never even known true pain oh my god you have on my face page don't you dork i do not ah you totally do shut up kid will you add me as a friend i'll poke you you poke me back i said shut up all the dialogue is well written spider-man might be a [ __ ] but the rest of the characters have funny and interesting lines black cat explains how she sometimes wishes she was a superhero you try to reassure her but she sees through your lies she even questions you about spider-man and peter parker wondering how you ever go from being a superhero to being a nerd so easily it's always fun to talk to these characters about anything and that connection is yet another way that the game sells its world as for the quests black cat directs you around the city beating up kingpin's new thugs as you go wall heist kingpin vs the police gliders they're a hell of a lot more varied than the thugs and far more dangerous too with even the basic plums having a web strike counter soon you hear word of a planned attack on the daily bugle but it turns out to be smoke screening for the real target the courthouse i hope you like memes because this mission is one oh yes the spectacular bomb squad kingpins men chuck bombs at the building you've got to grab them and get them to the disposal containers before the timer runs out if you're good enough you can mash up nearly every bomber before they even plant the bombs but this is much harder to achieve on consoles because you don't have the same degree of camera control soon after kingpin brings in his mech troopers these are some of the most in-depth enemies in the game ground attacks only work for so long before the pound sends you flying away air attacks have a similar problem swing kicks however are far more useful knocking the mech back and dealing significant damage you just have to be accurate enough to pull them off with missiles flying at you if you get really good you can time the comeback for a sequence of kicks other pretty good damage sources are the special attacks specifically the beatdown the web strike which needs to be timed just after impact and the black suit's car throwing ability this stuns the mech and allows you to pull off its missile launcher after a quick time event the button sequences are the same every time so you can end up memorizing them which i don't like at all but i do like that if you pull it off a second time you can fully disable it by getting into the cockpit and pressing buttons with the courthouse defended kingpin's plan is in tatters black cat tells you where you can find the guy who's manufacturing kingpin's gliders and what do you know it's vulture yeah another boss already the vulture fight is proof of how well this game's combat works in air initially you can beat on vulture as much as you like the beatdown and web flurry are serious damage dealers here web strikes especially the web strike crush are extremely useful but will only work some of the time the black suit has the tendril which brings you in close to deal at least a couple of blows but the red zoo has far superior in air attacks so switching depending on where you are is really important if you want to optimize your damage as the fight progresses kingpin's gliders show up and you've got to use these as stepping stones to get to vulture through bouncing off these guys in the odd web zip the entire fight can be hosted in the sky similar tactics work well throughout bouncing off glider guys crushing vulture using special attacks at every opportunity and switching suits depending on your range from the boss vulture hasn't got much in the way of attacks just some blades and a counter so you can rely on spam but if you want to have fun you can try to optimize your damage which does require a lot of button skill to be honest i think the fight should have been harder bunch of didn't need more counters to your moves he needed more moves of his own deciding what to do with him is the moral choice here and it's a good example of how shallow this system can be red ties him up onto a sign and says the police are going to get him black ties him up onto a sign and says that you'll mess him up if you see his [ __ ] ass again that's it with vulture dealt with spider-man turns to kingpin his base is apparently on this massive skyscraper after you fight your way up the side only a few troopers on the roof remain but they're attacked by these lunatics the deranged civilians attack you too and you have to defend yourself using the black suit against random joes is pretty hilarious here but there's the added issue of the news chopper they capture everything you've done including chucking civilians off the roof in plain view of police officers the police now shoot on site in the city black cat tells you to beat up some of these deranged civilians and then go to hell's kitchen daredevil no actually wolverine the wolverine fight is the most unique in the game he doesn't believe you're human anymore and you have to balance the fight around getting him to believe you that means red alignment which means sticking to the red suit wolverine will utterly pancake you in hand-to-hand combat it's extremely difficult to get a hit in getting him airborne allows you to abuse the air attacks on the red suit which wolverine has trouble responding to you can do that with a web strike crush or throw but web striking is counted half the time and it's really hard to get an uppercut in there's a significant temptation to use the tendril which would allow you to get ground hits in every time and i think this is intentional shabba knew that only the black suit could counter wolverine on the ground but they wanted that as a test of the play as well throughout the fight wolverine will pounce onto a wall and ask you some spider-man trivia so game skill is only half the test being a nerd is also important some of the questions are pretty easy stuff like who peter's parents are but how i'm supposed to know whose killers they tracked in berlin i don't know either way this is a really creative way of turning wolverine to your side and it's not the only way at two points in the fight waves of deranged civilians will show up and wolverine accuses you of summoning them you get red points for everyone you stop black points for letting wolverine kill them and many black points for attacking wolverine this happens as many times as it takes for you to convince wolverine that you're the real spider-man you and him walk throughout the city finding just how many people who look normal but are actually these creatures who suggest that you use your black suit to pick them out from a crowd if you hold spider-sense you activate your symbiote sins which reveals civilians who aren't what they've seen they also know if they've been detected and attack immediately you tell wolverine that this probably has something to do with venom your idea with seeking out venom seems to be just walking through the street and hoping which makes just stumbling upon a symbiote cult gathering a little bit ridiculous within the alley symbiotes gather and venom welcomes you the second venom fight is probably one of the most difficult bosses in the game and that's because at any point you're fighting him you're also fighting hordes of symbiotes and hives which is entirely confined to these small enclosed areas hives have this big knockback attack which can deal serious damage they along with all the symbiotes and venom are capable of web strike countering so you've got to be on the ball with that too hand-to-hand combat can be pretty punishing without properly distancing yourself because of how many symbiotes there are they'll stun lock the life out of you and without the uppercut it can be extremely risky like most fights both the black suit and the red suit have utility but you're really going to need to be switching here the black suits tendril is invaluable it's uncountable and picks enemies out from the crowd it also allows you to get close to venom in the hives without relying on a web strike the red suit though has air attacks on its side and a hell of a lot of this battle is airborne with how quick the symbiotes are between phase one and two venom goes on a rampage throughout the city turning random civilians into symbiotes you've got to follow him but you can also do a bit of damage with swing kicks vehicles and the tendril there's not really a point to doing this though because through eating civilians he gets a lot of his health back i don't really like this combat on the move is something web of shadows does exceptionally well and pointlessness is punishing it's also worth noting that this phase is buggy as hell if venom gets off his set course so it's best to leave him to it for your sake phase two is the same as phase one with more symbiotes and two hives instead of one this really ups the ante as both hives can now do that heavily damaging knockback attack after you finally smack up venom he runs away and you don't follow for some unfathomable reason this was pretty dumb but overall even with the bugs and the lack of polish in the middle it's a good fight it incorporates venom's plan excellently shows off his ability to infect people and the extent of the symbiote infestation all while providing two damn intense combat arenas with venom and an army of symbiotes with venom down the city starts falling into chaos hives sit out in the open the grabbers steal civilians that you need to rescue there's a lot of saving to be done shield sets up a quarantine zone which is where you head next civilians beg to be set free and black widow rolls up telling you that you're under arrest and then electro shows up and into yet another boss fight you go the electro fight is considered by some to be the best in the game electro is desperately searching for his sister and he tells spider-man to piss off multiple times you follow electro as he zips between perch to perch sometimes firing electricity at you it's pretty much a test of your maneuverability since you need to dodge his projectiles and deal damage at the same time like most bosses he has a web strike counter so it's not always reliable after having searched two shield checkpoints he tries to shake you off his tail the boss now revolves around keeping up with electro but you can still deal damage while doing so he'll set up electric gates that you've got to jump through all over i find it easier to web run at this point the symbiotes are in open warfare with shield as you chase electro down web striking and dealing any damage you can you'll see shield fighting symbiotes on rooftops and my favorite wolverine fending off a small army of them the detail here is incredible it really helps you get immersed into the intensity of the situation electro leads you over to some disused train tracks which is where most players will be able to get him pretty low if you get him too low before a certain point he won't take any more damage which i do feel is a tad irritating i understand the fight needs to reach a certain point but just having him absorb some help from a lamppost or something would maintain the immersion once electro hits the right point he'll attempt to absorb power from a transformer station but it proves far too much for him he's then probably shot in the head by black widow unconscious he lays next to the quarantine zone where his sister recognizes him from the crowd sadly there was a reason she was in quarantine and her symbiote infection sees the stronger host in electro symbiote electro unleashes an explosion incapacitating everyone in the crowd and that's that that was four bosses vulture wolverine venom and electro in the span of one relatively short act act 2 is almost like a boss rush that serves to introduce all the major players in act 3 and i think that's the reason it's so engaging there's not one bad mission here every single one is memorable and they're packed tight now just before the game is reaching its crisis point is the perfect time to get players as invested as possible mj calls again and then you go to find kingpin who's attempting to leave the city you know you need someone a lot smarter than you to help get rid of the symbiotes the candidates are tony stark and reed richards and you can't get a hold of either reed is out on a mission in another dimension fair enough but tony isn't explained he simply can't be reached spider-man says that if they could be here they would and i have to wonder what's more important than a full-scale invasion that could threaten the entire planet i appreciate that shabbat might not have been able to use these characters iron man especially since the movie came out in the same year but they could have come up with a more convincing excuse instead of those two you settle on tinkerer who's being held on reich's prison moon knight and vulture offered to fly you over there who you pick means pretty much nothing this is apparently spider-man's first crime he means after chucking civilians off a building caving in poor people's skulls millions of dollars of property damage blowing up innocent families while they're still in their cars yeah the whole first crime thing really really really doesn't work varicose prison is a pretty cool setting and it does feel weird to beat up people who aren't explicitly bad the first section simply involved pressing some buttons which is a bit boring but soon after you bust out rhino everyone's favorite spider-man character you can use rhino to smash through enemies walls generators but he controls awfully so it's pretty difficult you also need to keep rhino's anger in check but this gauge only amounts to a timer because there's no real way of preventing it changing still it's a cool experience to ride rhino through a prison not something i expected i also like that they use the awful handling to their advantage by placing mines everywhere when you get to the right place you can choose to release rhino when any superhero is flying about or sending back the way you came under the impression that you can escape another pointless choice you immediately find tinkerer but are then ambushed by black widow and kingpin and moon knight and vulture there's a lot of bickering but eventually kingpin convinces widow to go along with your plan you're shuttled over to manhattan as you watch the helicarro blowing up bridges and hear spider-man narrate how screwed up the city is apparently black widow put everything on the line to use your plan she shows you the small thought around stark tower that they're using as a base and you need to go save the shield operatives in the city and then you let loose i don't like post-apocalyptic settings at all i actively avoid them it took me a while to figure out why but i now believe it's the sense of loneliness that you are the only one left and everything else is dead or wants you dead it taps into some kind of paranoia that i have locked away somewhere in my head that all of that is true that i'm on my own against something unstoppable i carry those feelings away from the game whenever i stop playing this is why i've played weber shadows 10 times but only completed it twice the second half puts me on edge but even going into the game knowing that i still regard it as one of my favorites and that to me speaks volumes as to how well this setting is realized through the following sequences the game shows off the extent of the disaster from many angles if you head over to harlem you can fight with the gangs against symbiotes you can save shield agents in the field throughout the city and aid in apc extractions where you need to defend a group of civilians until they all make it into the vehicle random cars will get attacked by symbiotes and you need to bust up the car enough so the civilian gets out then take them to the nearest safe zone everywhere is donald ducked in this city so it can actually be difficult to stop someone falling into the symbiote turns all of this is backed by a horror type ambient soundtrack it's perfect for the setting but in my opinion not for the game spider-man web of shadows is a game that very much wants you to be free roaming for free roaming the player needs to want to be in the city and horror ambiance creates the exact opposite feeling it's designed to make you want to get the hell out of there that's certainly what it's used for in horror games i believe this is counterproductive and that they would have been much better off creating a dystopian sound without anything necessarily horrific after you've saved shield's arses widow tells you to make kingpin help you he's holding out his tower fortified with an electronic fence in tens of his men to disable the shields you have to clear out the goons then spam a button to swap the direction of this big metal pole really not sure how this contraption works there's three of them total after prying open the door you bust in and tell kingpin what's up he agrees but only because he'll have the satisfaction of knowing spider-man needed him to save the city you'd also agree to be kingpin's [ __ ] your first task is to repair the generators on the buildings because now the symbiotes are overrunning it you basically have to do the exact same thing you did the first time but it's slightly harder this is dumb shameless padding and it really should have been cut once the defenses are back up black widow and tinkerer arrive tinkerer explains his plan that they're going to plant a bomb on the empire state building which will send out a sonic pulse that will match up all the symbiotes but only if he gets 25 million dollars a castle a waifu and a pardon classic tinkerer with that sorted kingpin's got some more tasks for you kingpin also explains his true motivations for working with you so what's the deal tubby why are you all humanitarian now i've never known you to lend anyone a helping hand unless you were gaining something from it when this is said and done who will the people remember as their savior me no fool me wilson fisk when people remember me standing tall against the coming apocalypse my tower being a beacon of safety and hope in this chaos i will be the most admired man in new york i am at the very center of what will save this city i don't believe that everybody knows you're a crime boss people love a story of redemption boy maybe i'll run for mayor you are so full of it really really full the city is going to owe me and i always collect on my debts he then asks you to go rescue some associates of his trapped on a building on the other side of the island you mount up on hovercrafts and get this incredible view of the city the mission asks you to prevent kingpin's guys from dying but that's easier said than done when the electro links show up with their constant barrage of energy bolts and web strike counters they're pretty hard to deal with without using the black suits tendrils black cat also shows up halfway through to support you with kingpins guys safe black cats suggest you find the source of the electrolynx and i have to wonder black cat acts rather cold to you here almost as if you hadn't just been in a relationship a few days ago almost as if the game forgot some people picked the black option and just went with the red status quo hmm electrolux can be found guarding their purple tipped hives at this point it's pretty easy to see how much worse the symbiote infection is getting biomass tendrils wrap around the buildings and connect them creating this twisted street aesthetic once you've dealt with all of them black cat tells you to get them at the source kinda odd didn't she just say that while you're at it you might want to try stopping these things at the source while you're at it you might want to try stopping these things at the source yes yes she did run out of money or time this time the source involves following an electro linked to his hideout and what do you know the source is symbiote electro symbiote electro was encased in this big-ass symbiote cage electro is somewhat of a squishy boss in this fight but a lot of the fighting is against the electrolynx who attempt to feed electro power if he gains enough power he spawns a bunch of hives which you have to kill before anything else killing all the electrolynx before electro gains the right amount of power seemed extremely difficult to me i found it far easier to web strike a few and then just wail on electro the hives aren't that big a deal and he doesn't take a whole lot of punishment this game has some amazing bosses but i don't think this is one of them it's fun don't get me wrong but some of these mechanics just feel like fluffing up a basic ass fight the choice here is interesting red encourages electro to fight the symbiote and when he gets up all he can think of is his sister which is clearly too much for him black beats the crap out of him calling him a [ __ ] until he finally gets rid of it spider-man tells elektra that it was the symbiotes that took his sister an electro promises to kill them all i'm sorry how was the black choice evil here this isn't a psych ward the entire city has gone tits up and it was the symbiotes that took his sister another powerful ally is a damn good thing there seems to be a pattern emerging with these choices with electro dealt with the rescue ops are expanded to hovercrafts these flying things are not hovercrafts they're also not apcs but the game calls them both i mean you could argue that they are armored personnel carriers but then how does shield distinguish between them and the actual apcs semantics aside these are some of the most immersive missions in the game plural because you can find them in the city later too the hovercraft lines a bit away from the civilians and they make their way over as spider-man defends them this can actually get pretty tense the civilians all have weapons but there's a hell of a lot of symbiotes and the grabbers provide a real challenge they usually target whoever's running and you've got to book it over there before they're turned on a skyscraper if you tackle the rabbit at the wrong angle you can lose civilians getting very poor choice of worded these are fun sections but i have to wonder why exactly the hovercraft lands far from the civilians and why they go single file honestly i can't think of any other ways of making enough time for a substantial gameplay section so i'll forgive it with them evacuated black widow tells you that her operatives are being attacked by flying symbiotes it's not explicit but following how it happened to electro you can assume that vulture has been taken on the way there vulturings attacked the shield convoy which makes for a fun high-speed air battle the destination turns out to be specter industries moon knight suggests you beat up some vulturings and so you do 30 of them and you have to kill 15 hives too this is boring as hell bulgerlings are good enemies but no one wants to fight 15 rooftop hives they just bully you unless you spam special attacks or attempt to swing kick over and over after that the symbiotes begin a siege on the shield safe zone black widow gives a pretty cool speech i want every man who can fire a gun to limp crawl or drag themselves out here to hold this line shield is the last defense for all of manhattan maybe for the entire world stand correctly wow that goes for you too the symbiote walkers come forward and expel goo into the gate until it gets clogged up but even when the gates are down very few if any symbiotes come through the battle boils down to just jumping from the right to the middle to the left over and over beating up all the symbiotes each time the defense is nothing more than a couple men per quadrant it's not exactly helm's deep a big red carnage looking symbiote rocks up a bit later and attempts to smash through the door he's not particularly tough when he's alone once he's dead you call in an airstrike and carpet bomb the entire area seems a bit overkill to be honest are there not people living in those camps how on earth did they manage to avoid horrific cholesterol damage after carpet bombing your own base this is a stupid-ass mission if the symbiotes could breach the gates why haven't they done it already why hasn't venom done it himself why don't the vulturelings just fly over it come on the next mission takes you to luke cage and mj who are preparing the evacuation of harlem before you can aid them though you've got to find wolverine at the church the church mission is among the best in the game it's set at night which creates the perfect gothic setting symbiotes rush the building and attempt to break in you and wolverine fight them off but their numbers are a challenge if you fire webs at the bell however the sound stuns the symbiotes after holding out for long enough the civilians are evacuated but wolverine has to stay behind to free the apc he finds himself literally dog-piled by symbiotes and after the coolest intro in spider-man video game history you find yourself a little bit screwed symbiote wolverine looks awesome a perfect design the fight plays out similarly to wolverine's fight but spider-man is far stronger by now he also web strike counters less part way into the fight he uses the hive to gain symbiote armor which you have to break before dealing damage again this isn't exactly depth because it's effectively just more health at another point wolverine takes down the bell and chucks it right at you seems like a risky move given he's the symbiote now maybe that's why he chose to push it down from above instead of pull i'm not sure spider-man's too much of a badass for that [ __ ] to fly and you throw it right back at him after a game of tennis it eventually falls apart so it was completely pointless apart from destroying the bell which i assume the player could use to stun wolverine why given that the fight's easier than wolverine won i don't know don't get me wrong i really liked the sequence it looked awesome and it made the fight more memorable i just think it lacks weight when the fight is already much easier than it should have been with wolverine down you get two choices give wolverine words of encouragement or tear him in half i don't really see the benefit apart from being a [ __ ] in picking black here seems like a dumb choice you return to luke and mj afterwards and depending on what choice you pick they react differently but either way it's now time to defend the harlem convoy i always found the back two cars to be very difficult to keep alive but it's only the apc and the school bus that matter mj makes you promise to not use the bike suit but there are no repercussions whatsoever whether you do or not once you've escorted the vehicles to safety spider-man loses mj how that happens i've got no idea but he's pretty pissed kingpin makes fun of you and wait a minute two kingpins right i know for a fact that this bug doesn't just affect me i don't know how this made it fast play testing i mean seems like a pretty glaring fault to be honest and that leads into the intro we're all caught up fisk tower is attacked symbiotes launch a full-scale attack on shield everything's going to [ __ ] as we saw in the intro spider-man does eventually find mj but you can see black cat in the flames and spider-man is quickly swamped by symbiotes prompting him to use the black suit one last time this leads right into the symbiote black cat fight symbiote black cat is a bit weird it doesn't have the same level of freedom as black cat because it needs to be confined to this roof the focus isn't on her because there are loads of extremely dangerous symbiotes all over the place and she's not even that powerful i appreciate that the symbiote exaggerate its host's characteristics and black cat isn't hugely powerful to begin with her abnormal infatuation with spider-man is one of her major characteristics so it gets expressed powerfully i thought this was a bit weird being attacked by a symbiote that says it wants to be with you is just really really strange mary jane shows up halfway through on a hovercraft with a shotgun um this is arnold schwarzenegger level of badass it's this more than anything that makes her one of my favorite mjs she helps you fend off the symbiotes but obviously you need to stop her from dying she's got a lot of health so this isn't much of an issue but because the fight is contained to this tiny roof it gets pretty restrictive if you want to be effectively defending her once you finally beat symbiote black cat the full frees her from the symbiote the moral choice here is the hardest in the game because you can only assume what this means red means marry jane black means black cat is the final love triangle choice right and this is gonna be final surely well sort of if you press black to go with black cat you tell mary jane to suck on it and then you need felicia so you make this symbiote cocoon which wraps around her and brings her back to health but now she's acting all evil i don't get this the red suit choice is going with mj but bringing black cat along with you anyway it's implied she's going to make it so if you want to be with black cat you have to act like an evil backstabbing bastard why black cat isn't a necessarily villainous character the player shouldn't have to overtly be a villain to pick her it's odd depending on what you pick the next cut scene is different you lose everyone's trust in the black suit but it's fine and dandy in the red you're preparing to detonate the anti-symbiote bomb the symbiote vulture ambushes the crew the way he speaks is particularly interesting the symbiote this time exaggerates his englishness the day this fight acts as the final siege against the symbiotes and it certainly looks the part with this giant curved blade looking symbiote deposit coming out of the empire state symbiote vulture is a big step up from the original by now you should have the black suits air upgrades making it far superior to the red suit in air you can land on the platforms to cut off the vulturing supply but it's only a minute and a bit before you're thrust into phase 2. you can swing off the hovercraft which is very cool symbiote vulture is vulnerable to web strikes tendrils air attacks that beat down pretty much everything you can think of he's no challenge he's just got a big health bar the vulturing surrounding him are the true danger here it's a dense battle and you've got to keep your eye on the health bar as long as you focus vulture he goes down pretty easy and the symbiote defends with him vulture even without his symbiote encourages you to remove the detonator and embrace the power of the dark one what happens here is entirely dependent on what you've chosen throughout the game as far as i know it's a tally of all the red and black choices you've made so far and it's not affected by suit alignment red detonates the bomb destroying the black suit for good and every symbiote in the city with it black removes the bomb both will result in you being called to the helicarrier where venom and the symbiotes are making their last stand you're either going to kill venom or to stop the symbiotes whichever it is affects who helps you in the battle i don't really know how luke cage or wolverine get up here but i'll go with it the helicarrier stand is difficult red players only have access to the red suit and that is a serious handicap at this point in the game but i like that you really feel the effects of the sacrifice he made when you gave up the black suit the entire shield crew is symbiote your objective is to destroy three jammers but these flying shield arseholes make that a difficult task special moves are among the only practical ways to get a window on the jammers your allies can be knocked off the helicarrier and once that happens they're out for good the red suit's ability to regenerate health faster than the black suit is the help in going from one battle to another with all three jammers down the bombay doors open and you've got to take a bomb from the symbiote guard they're not very tough you plant bombs in multiple areas over the helicarrier and the game repeats the web strike chain motif to get you there problems begin to present themselves for spider-man when a symbiote about the same size as the helicarrier shows up the framing captures venom's scale perfectly here it's honestly incredible the courage of spider-man the seemingly unstoppable force of darkness contrasted against the tiny resistance is all here this one shot is a microcosm of the entire game spider-man tells venom that he's going down and venom's response is pretty hard to make out his voice at this point is so stupid and deep that i could just about here i think not after listening to it about five more times venom says that he's going to use the helicarrier to take the world spider-man appeals to brock's ideals of protecting the innocent but venom dismisses brock's importance let's just get it out the way this fight looks cool really cool and as it is with most giant fights and games that aren't designed around fighting giants this doesn't have much depth to it whenever venom puts one of his heads on the ground you web strike it you can only web strike bounce here and the timing is different from the normal too which would have been nice to know each head takes about three hits venom will occasionally spit out symbiotes onto the helicarrier to distract you which does make getting into position a little harder once you've destroyed the head spider-man tries to bait out eddie brock from the big venom thing it says they don't listen to brock anymore and attempts to smash you a bunch you eventually call out the original venom and he struggles telling you that he can't control the symbiote anymore you reach out for him and get a choice red or black red is by far my favorite venom realizes what he's done and attaches a line to the rotors that's right my flesh my mind my heart time to die like a man this is my favorite moment in the game venom knows that he's gone against his principles to protect the innocent and the only thing he can do now is to die and sacrifice as men are expected to it's really sad and i felt it was more appropriate than any one-on-one duel could ever be the black choice is the same but you kill venom by tying him to the rotor the bombs end up detonating the ship as it sinks dealing the final blow to the symbiote the final ending is dependent on your choice with black cat and your overall alignment after fighting symbiote vulture red has spiderman atop a skyscraper if you pick black cat he phones mary jane apologizing to her explaining that he did what he did because he wanted to win so much if you pick mary jane she catches you narrating the story and then you cheesily swing together off the building which is a stark contrast to the darkness of the rest of the game making it particularly sweet black has you ruling the city as its god the symbiotes bow to you black cat rules with you if you pick her black widow and kingpin plot to kill you using symbiote wolverine there's four endings that do actually take your choices into account and that's clearly a good thing weber shadows told a dark story extremely well by having the city practically being a character through mission design it's far more immersive than most the use of marvel's characters was consistently great speaking to or fighting them before they play their part in acts 3 and 4 meant a lot for the subsequent fights and their characters the black suits increasing power ties into the whole temptations of darkness theme that they went with for both spider-man and venom's character the fun stories told in acts 1 and 2 only serve to connect you with the city before it went to [ __ ] and the enemies you fought there ended up helping you in the invasion the game proved that you don't need extensive unskippable cutscenes or never-ending dialogue it managed to provide an immersive story with good dialogue voice acting and a spectacularly immersive city alone that's not to say it was without fault the voice acting is good venom in particular was written and performed spectacularly but spider-man's own voice stops it from being near perfect michael von's voice isn't really the issue it's just that he didn't sell the lines well at all he completely overdid the red suit spider-man's witty teenage character by heavy do you mean serious like in oh that's heavy bro or heaviest and possessing a large mass like a fat guy and while it contrasted well against the hyper edgelord black suit it often felt out of place but an issue with immersion in a game as immersive as this is a big deal it's the same reason that the two kingpins bugged me so much the fact that venom shows up only three times is considered by some to be a serious problem but i disagree though i do think he himself should have been slightly more present web of shadows benefits from a story device i've discussed twice before on this channel it's less of a story device more of a natural side effect of a character having an army venom and the symbiotes are effectively the same thing every action the symbiotes take is a direct result of venom's will up until he infects some more major characters this means that everything the force does that being the symbiotes develops and is a result of venom so he himself isn't present but it's still him pulling the strings i also think the rarity of venom's appearances punctuates those scenes so much more when venom appears halfway through the story it feels like something seriously going down like you're finally getting to the bottom of this mystery and when venom shows himself the size of a building at the final encounter that feels like the climax of an epic story and it wouldn't have had half the impact if the game wasn't so conservative with his screen time some raise issues with how much sense the story makes the only time it attracts attention to its logical flaws is when the gate is attacked the gate is dumb but overall the game doesn't make you think about any of its other plot holes and so i don't really consider them to be big issues but they are still worth discussing because as soon as you realize them they can sour the memory of the story first off venom is a grade a plank for starting his invasion on manhattan ireland if you wanted to take the world why didn't you just start in china where it would have been next to unstoppable if he must have manhattan first then why didn't he send some infected civilians off the island before playing all his cards he has flying symbiotes why didn't they just fly off the island and go infect the rest of new york and there are trains aren't there venom's master plan sucks and it could have done with some acknowledgement in game a couple lines of dialogue as to why venom couldn't get off new york would have gone a long way something like shield having symbiote sensors everywhere but manhattan island because they couldn't distinguish between when spider-man was wearing the black suit and when venom was some also raise issue with the mechanics of the symbiote it was only one other time in carnage usa which is by the way the only comic book i actually own that a symbiote was able to control people with their biomass alone following the actual law it's only a symbiote spawn that can infect other people like carnage toxin it breaks the rules for spider-man to be able to wear the black suit while venom is too but the game does try to explain this away spider-man states in his narrations that he felt something changed within the symbiote and that venom probably felt that too but when spider-man gained the black suit from venom he realized that the symbiote was now capable of replicating itself and from that came venom's plan to infect the island but then you have to wonder why does spider-man wolverine black cat electro and vulture get full symbiotes that they are in full control of when every other character gets a symbiote that renders them into mindless zombies again a couple lines of dialogue would have gone a long way here but i think the biggest problem with the story are the choices they don't make the story worse they're just poorly implemented both love triangle options are bad the first one is bad because you have no loyalty to mj at this point and the second one is bad because you can't pick black cat without turning into evil knievel some choices make no differences at all vulture's choice is just tie him up and joke about it or tie him up and threaten him ripping symbiote wolverine in half serves no purpose other than making spider-man evil it doesn't help anyone in any way if the choices are supposed to be good versus evil instead of passive versus aggressive then why give us choices in every individual circumstance why would we want to flip-flop between being a friendly neighborhood spider-man and a god of death on a dime but then not always this way because the black option for symbiote electro is clearly more logical and better than the red option so sometimes it is passive versus aggressive the choices never tell you what they're going to entail so you can only ever assume which only works for some of the characters how am i supposed to know that the black option for symbiote wolverine tears him apart instead of just helping him like the symbiote electro black meant just being with black cat the first time but the second time it means turning her into a symbiote the choice system is a mess the game would have been worse without the red and black paths because they're really cool versions of events it's cool to watch these cutscenes the different dialogue is good and the endings are awesome but the individual choices are just dumb i'd also like to bring up suit alignment this changes based on how much you use each suit and how many red or black points you get i thought this would affect the ending but it actually means nothing for the story it only affects how civilians react to you they're scared of a black aligned spider-man but love a red aligned spider-man what suit you're wearing is also a factor i can only fault this so much because the player will probably assume that it matters even though it doesn't and under this assumption the temptations of using the black suit feels so much more dangerous it feels so much more wrong to give into its power because you assume that that'll have a narrative impact it's only until you research it that the illusion is broken web of shadows had its problems the combat could get repetitive the enemy design was subpar until the symbiotes invade the choices sucked and spider-man's voice was crap and there's no problem hardcore spider-man fans bring up more than what happens after the ending the credits roll and you're spat out onto the main menu if you press continue again the credits roll again yeah you can't free roam after the story is done could have possibly possessed the guys over at shabbat to do this i don't know but it's not as big a deal as you might think because this game also features a new game plus in which you carry over your upgrades and your spiders so you can free roam after the story you just can't have story continuity and that's kind of a good thing if you think about it what enemies would you have to fight after the story the thugs kingpin and the symbiotes are dealt with so there's nothing left the city would be pretty messed up too with no life no civilians and nothing to do if you got the black ending you'd end up with an army and nothing to do with it it's an impossible situation for shabba with a new game plus you're in a calm version of the city with lots of civilian life and gangs to fight you can advance the story till any point you want before the palais so there'll be a good degree of enemy variety it's clearly the better way to go there is a problem with new game plus though the game never actually tells you how to get it if you press new game thinking that it would give you an option it overwrites your previous auto save and you lose it forever which is really really awesome the actual way to get new game plus is to press continue on the credits again so you watch it the first time after you finish the game then you watch it the second time then on the third selection you get the new game plus prompt genius really on pc you can download save so it's not a big deal but you're donald ducked if you make this mistake on console and that brings me off the weaknesses and onto the differences between the versions there were four in total and i know it was fashionable to have maybe two or three macs back in 2008 especially amongst superhero games but i cannot believe that there's four versions of web of shadows out there the first one is clear you've been seeing it thus far but it isn't my favorite version i actually prefer the wii version and yeah the graphics can't hold a candle to all the fancy effects on xbox and ps3 but you get a lot of immersion simply from moving the wiimote to make spider-man swing or web strike better yet the wii version has unlockable suits and they're all pretty awesome spider-armor iron spider scarlet spider spider carnage there's not many only about six but they're all cool some you just unlock by playing the game but others require a certain amount of spiders collected which gives you a lot more motivation to go for them on the xbox and ps3 you'd get allies instead so it was a trade-off but i was more than happy to buy the game twice allies is calling in a hero or villain to fight with you at the cost of your entire special meter it's not really worth it to be honest and bafflingly it's never tutorialized properly not once still it's a fun novelty apparently a lot of ps2 owners got punked into thinking they'd be getting the game in all the trailers and then when they booted it up they got this side-scrolling piece of [ __ ] yeah the amazing allies version of the game leaves a lot to be desired and considering that the ps2 is capable of a full new york it must have been a kick in the teeth the ds version was also a side scroller but it was much more like a metroidvania one that somehow managed to be better than the ps2 version it captured the sense of the symbiote invasion pretty damn well and is considered still to be the best spidey game on the platform that's no surprise gryptonite games were at the helm for the ds version and that's always a recipe for success i don't count the pc version as a real version because mechanically it's identical to the xbox and ps3 mouse and keyboard makes the game so much easier you wouldn't believe on a controller you need your right thumb on the x or a button to boost and jump which means you can't control the camera while swinging it's even worse in combat this completely destroys your level of awareness which isn't a problem on the way or pc version the console also has a major graphical difference from the pc and that's motion blur some people love it some hate it but in this game its effect is staggering level 6 spider-man on console feels as fast as level 10 spider-man on pc it creates a palpable sense of speed you can't get the pc version anywhere these days without uh raising any flags so if you want a copy it's that or ebay for a console edition it's one of the few games i'd outwardly go to the trouble of buying second hand web of shadows is far from flawless but it did for combat what spider-man 2 did for swinging and it did swinging amazingly too with easily the best story of the lot even above edge of time and a game designed around what people play for the free roaming this is pretty much the best spider-man game ever made in my opinion with a game this size and this damn good 17 months of development time must have seemed like an unavoidable death sentence i feel like that image of spider-man could represent shabbat against the inevitable failure that their time restriction would result in but thinking about it even with so little time shabbat made every move right to make a quality game they used the combat and the city to tell half the story and provide the length of half the game they used collectibles for level ups where the full development force was needed in the combat systems the swinging the bosses it was given this game is optimized for being great on a small time scale and it didn't get any recognition for that that's the lesson the industry could have learnt from this game that's the perfect swan song for shabba games who closed in 2009 and that's another reason this game's poor sales is a tragedy relatively few people know about it but with spider-man ps4 on the horizon everyone should for people watching now i think we know the bar and for people watching however long after insomniac spider-man released if you're looking for a spider-man fix you haven't gotten yet come play a web of shadows thank you all for watching please do subscribe if you're new i'll be working on the spider-man ps4 video as soon as it comes out if you'd like to help keep the channel afloat i have donation links in the description and if you'd like to connect i have a discord i'm becoming less active on twitter but you can still reach me there i've also got a list of channels i recommend in the description but that will only be true if i remember and the chances of that are slim thanks again [Music] [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: Whitelight

Views: 731,859

Keywords: spiderman, spider man web of shadow, spiderman web of shadows part 1, spiderman ps4, spiderman ps4 game, spiderman game review, spiderman game retrospective, marvel, superhero, avengers, wolverine, luke cage, spiderman swing, web swinging, web swinging gameplay, spiderman homecoming, vulture vs spiderman, review, critique, retrospective, superhero game, game review, logan, spider-man, games, action, game reviews, insomniac games, shaba games, treyarch, spidey squad, top videos

Id: Dxg-2icC0uo

Length: 70min 20sec (4220 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 05 2018