The Amazing Spider-Man 2 Review

The combat remains mostly unchanged from the first game, using a system similar to Rocksteady’s Arkham franchise. Enemies will swarm Spider-Man, and players will attack who they choose, countering every so often. The combat is not particularly challenging, but Spider-Man’s attacks and movements are fun and over the top, which makes the fights exciting. Even so, some may find the combat repetitious, as most fights will turn out the same way: repeatedly pressing the attack button and countering when necessary until all enemies are down. The only time this situation changes is when an enemy variant makes his or her way into the showdown. There is a combo multiplier that appears once Spider-Man begins to dish out justice, but its inclusion is puzzling. Most players will be able to reel in ridiculously high combos after almost every encounter, but they hold no reward besides a personal pat on the back. In the first game, once the multiplier reached a certain number, Spider-Man was able to use special web attacks incapacitating his enemies. That feature is almost absent in this outing, as the special web attacks are rarely available for the player to use. As for the boss fights, they are plentiful, but none of them require great strategy to be overcome. Besides a few appearances by favored baddies, none of them are particularly memorable either. Instead, one quick maneuver that weakens or throws off the villain will allow Spider-Man to finish the job with his fists.

Hands down, the worst and most obnoxious gameplay mechanic The Amazing Spider-Man 2 incorporates is the Hero/Menace bar. While Spider-Man ventures the city, random events, such as petty crimes, fires and vehicle chases, will occur in a fashion similar to Treyarch’s Spider-Man 2. Players have the choice to either help out with these events or simply ignore them. If you help, the hero bar increases along with his “Heroic Level.” If you choose to ignore the event, the bar depletes and Spider-Man is labeled as a menace. Once this happens, a task force run by none other than Wilson Fisk will seek out Spider-Man with murderous intent. At first, the hero/menace bar is not much of a problem since there are only a few crimes happening at once. However, towards the end of the game, there are events happening all over the city, and there is barely enough time to reach their location. Because of this mechanic, the player is constantly being punished. If the player decides to participate in these events, they are greeted by the same four or five events over and over again, and they must suffer through loading screens for each of them since the event does not take place in the open world, but a separate arena resembling the city. Worst of all, there is no reward for keeping your “Heroic Level” high besides an unnoticeable stat boost. If players ignore the events, they are constantly hounded by a relentless task force who are stationed throughout the city. This mechanic is nothing but an exercise in frustration as it botches any joy of freely swinging through the city as Spider-Man.

On the PlayStation 4, the game looks serviceable, but it is not pushing the hardware by any means. Any framerate drops were barely noticeable, and the only glitches encountered were a few enemies who got stuck on a wall while running toward Spider-Man. Manhattan’s appearance is decent at first glance, but a closer look reveals weak textures along with numerous copy and paste jobs. When it comes to character models, most of the prominent figures boast some interesting, well-made designs. Unfortunately, Peter Parker is not one of them. The nerd’s head looks too small compared to his body, and his facial features resemble that of Seth Macfarlane rather than Andrew Garfield. The other mixed bag is the character animations. As noted earlier, Spider-Man’s movements during combat or action sequences are enjoyable to watch. Unfortunately, his movements during conversation come off as awkward simply because people do not wave their hands or shake their heads in that manner. The same goes for the henchmen who wave their assault rifles with one hand towards each other while discussing business. It comes off as laughable.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is the typical sequel that fails to surpass the original. Beenox attempted to fix the flaws that plagued the first game only to create new ones. What is worse is the inclusion of gameplay mechanics that tear the fun right out of the game. After all, video games are meant to be fun. The best graphics and story can only do so much, and this game lacks even that. Without gameplay that players can enjoy and can continue enjoying time after time, a game cannot and will not be considered amazing; and that is the fate suffered by The Amazing Spider-Man 2.