Platform reviewed – Playstation 2
Other platforms – Gamecube, Xbox, PC, Game Boy Advance
Developer – Treyarch, Digital Eclipse Software (GBA), LTI Gray Matter (Windows)
Publishers – Activision
Genre – Sports game
Rating – 7+
Release date – June 2002
This is how his story begins; good-hearted, yet solitary, Peter Parker is your average nerdy teenager trying to make his way through the bowels of a typical American high-school. Who would have thought that it would be he would be granted what so many of us would want, super-hero powers.
While on a school trip Peter was bitten by a genetically altered spider which escaped from captivity, it is the next morning that he discovers his perfect vision, muscular body and the mysterious, glue-like substance which adhered itself from his hands.
Using his new-found abilities in order to gain money to impress his love interest, Mary Jane, it takes the death of his beloved Uncle Ben to realise that “with great power comes great responsibility.” It’s these words which change Peter into the Amazing Spider-Man, a super-hero who fights for the justice and safety of New York from the many perils it is faced with.
Though all is not as easy as beating a few petty thugs and bank robbers, no. At an OsCorp lab a new nemesis is about to reveal himself and is just as fast, strong and agile as the web-slinger.
With great power, comes good game-playability!
Now as you have guessed this game is based on the Marvel super-hero movie, Spider-Man, which was out just after the new millennia. Overall this game is a pretty good example of how to make a pretty good video game based off a movie with its decent gameplay, level design and horde of secrets.
The downside though is the limited game length of the main storyline, with it being able to be completed in a short amount of time with limited challenges to slow you down.
The enemies and bosses you will encounter are nothing spectacular, though combat in this game can be quite difficult and clunky with hordes of bad guys which can result in you taking quite a beating. This downside is saved though by the quite useful list of combo moves Spider-Man to execute against them, by pushing different buttons in different orders you can use new moves to make fights so much easier while also increasing your in-game combat score; the variety of moves you use causes this score to be extremely high giving you a nice overall combat score, moves that are used repetitively though decrease in value the more you use them usually, causing your overall score to be quite low.
Levels are split up into different styles and involve both indoor and outdoor levels. The game opens with an optional tutorial with hints and narration done by Bruce Campbell; here you learn how to use the powers and abilities Spider-Man has to offer such as how to hang down from ceilings, spin webs and overall just beat the webbing out of the bad guys as well as the basic game controls.
Metal Gear Spider!
Now the gameplay style is mixed between aerial acrobatics, combat and stealth to give the game a pleasant change now and then, the only downside is the fact that the controls as a whole can be quite annoying to deal with, especially on the indoor levels.
Now it may just be me due to how I use the analogue stick for movement, but the controls on foot feel quite sloppy. It’s not at all smooth and takes a while for it to register you want to change direction, sometimes causing you to go onto a wall and start to climb up it without you even wanting it to. This is nothing that would prevent the games completion though and on the whole is still extremely playable, it’s just a little annoyance which makes some of the levels a bit clunky, especially when it comes to fast moving stealth.
Take to the heights of New York as you web-swing from building to building!
When on stealth missions you must stay in the shadows which are on walls, ceilings and floors. Obviously the aim is to not let the enemy see you and if you pull that off then a stealth bonus is rewarded to you after the levels completion.
With the slightly bad controls and also the bad camera angles these not only affect these levels but also the combat. While the Lock-On function is pretty good at countering the bad camera angles even this has its flaws as you are reduce to clunky jumping around dodging attacks, the lack of a decent dodge introduced in later Spider-Man games make normal combat against thugs not all that enjoyable.
Now previously I mentioned aerial acrobatics, and while this game claims to have it I don’t feel it’s up to scratch; sure it’s playable, but the movements of swinging are so dull, simplistic and boring. You press the swing button and that’s it, you’re off, you can then change direction as well as go up and down using the directional buttons and can speed up by holding down the swing button (but at a cost of easy manoeuvrability).
In some outside areas though, usually when very high up above some of the tallest buildings, it looks like the web hasn’t actually stuck to anything. Sometimes it looks like there is no way it could have attached itself to anything; this is corrected though in the games sequel as the web attaches itself to the building and can lend a hand in swinging in different directions as well as with the speed.
That possibly would not have worked in this game though as you are limited to how far down you can go, once you pass a certain point you fall to your death, failing the level you are on. As well as this you are also bound by the confines of the level parameters in the distance, as if you try to swing out of them you will be automatically bought back into the level’s area of play. In saying how the swinging mode in the sequel would not work in this game it may have worked if utilised correctly and may even have made the aerial chase scenes that much more acrobatic and enjoyable and faster.
Now as you could possibly guess from the way I have described the levels you may have gathered that this game is not free roaming. This game goes level by level through different areas so it does not give you the option to explore New York at your leisure, this choice of gameplay is a reason why the game has limited game length and by adding a free roaming function in it could have made the game that little bit longer.
Though the game is not all bad camera angles and so-called aerial acrobatics, no; the boss battles in this game are fun yet tough incertain situations. They offer challenges and different styles of combat which will require you to get to grips with aerial, ground combat or a mix of both.
The main storyline events may be short, but the other special features present in the game helps keep the game as a whole relatively long. The special mode and gallery are two other features which will offer a few extra hours of gameplay. With the gallery featuring a movie viewer as well as production art you unlock there is replay value in finding hidden secrets.
Shhhh! It’s a secret!
As mentioned before there is a load of combo moves Spider-Man can learn, but just how do you get them in the first place? Well the answer is that you must locate hidden golden spider icons around the various levels, some are easy to find, while others are more difficult. Taking the time to find these extra moves will definitely benefit you in the long run.
These are not the only thing to look out for though, secret areas in some levels are also available and while they do not necessary unlock any specifically they do cause you to gain a nice bonus upon the levels completion.
Multiple times have I mentioned bonus scores that you receive at the end of levels and apart from showing just how well you finished the level they also have another use, unlocking awesome features in the special menu. Now this menu contains the credits, the many training sessions to help you get to grips with both basic and advanced combat and overall control settings, a level warp to previous levels, a cheat section and a secret store.
The main thing you should focus on is the secret store though as the points you aquire at the end of each level adds up as bonus points and can be used to unlock content such as a special Pinhead Bowling training session, secret movies and the ability to play as different skins for Spider-Man such as Peter Parker and Alex Ross‘ original design for Spider-Man (which will also allow you to fight Alex Ross’ early design of what the Green Goblin was going to look like too).
Depending on if you get enough of these bonus points you may even unlock a whole new way to play (which I won’t spoil); this mode increases the games replay value as even though the levels and what you have to accomplish stays the same the actual plotline has been altered with new controls and abilities to master.
The graphics are not too terrible though nothing extremely beautiful and picture perfect, all in all has pretty good content with enemies and allies looking like what they are supposed to, though the different type of thugs usually do look the same with very little variation and colour changes. The combat actions and fighting styles are varied and pretty well animated both for Spider-Man and the bosses, though for the random thugs the overall graphics and animation is pretty basic. The jumping, crawling and other basic movements of Spider-Man are all well done which makes the annoying controls a little bit more bearable.
The graphics for non-CGI cutscenes, unlike the standard main cutscenes which are viewable in the games gallery, look exactly like the in-game graphics; they are not very smooth and the faces look quite flat. On the plus side though there is some lip moving which fits in slightly with the voices, so the synchronisation of the two are pretty good, but like most of the game nothing spectacular.
The music used is fitting for the environments and creates, in some parts, a super-hero sense of accomplishment and greatness, especially in the earlier levels when Spider-Man is just starting out in his wrestling outfit (the link showing the movie not the game, if it had those kind of graphics then… wow).
The rest of the sound is pretty good as it creates the right atmosphere for the variety of levels; for sewer levels the music is vastly different then when you are soaring through the air being attacked by a load of robots. Some of the music is in fact reused though from time to time though it’s nothing too bad or noticeable.
Defoe VS Maguire
The voice acting though is the main part of this game; it’s good to see both Tobey Maguire and Willem Defoe provide the voices for Spider-Man and the Green Goblin. While these are the only voices which are similar to the movie the voice acting from Defoe is extremely good in my opinion, he captured the Green Goblin using his voice just as well as he did from acting as him in the films. What he says and the way he says them just makes his fight scenes really enjoyable to play; Maguire on the other hand has okayish voice, though just not as good as Defoe; sure his voice sounds exactly as it does in the movie and everything (obviously) but something is just off.
The price for this game is extremely cheap both on the High Street and online from places such as CEX, Amazon and ebay; though the game is not all that special it is worth a play especially if you enjoyed the Spider-Man film; the price for it is worth it for that purpose.
While the game is not that great visually and has quite bad controls and camera design overall it’s a good game, just nothing special. The upside though is the replayability when you unlock enough bonus points as well as a handy feature to select a difficulty for the game, causing you to unlock different bonuses after each difficulty is cleared. With standard graphics, okay music and sound as well as an alright combat system this game is an alright buy.
7 rupees out of 10
Green Rupee Gaming 