Marvel's Spider-Man on PS4 : Everything We Know So Far - GameEN

We've spent a few hours with the PlayStation 4-exclusive Spider-Man game, and it looks amazing. You'll be playing it this September. Here's what you need to know.

Marvel's iconic comic book hero Spider-Man has starred in numerous video game adaptations over the years, and while some of his outings have been excellent, the results haven't always lived up to the webslinger's reputation. His latest title, Marvel's Spider-Man, arrives exclusively on PlayStation 4 later this week, and judging by the game's early reception, it's one of his best video game adventures yet.

Spider-Man is an action-adventure game set in an open world modern-day New York City and played from a third-person perspective. It features combat systems such as an aerial combat, spider sense and reflexes, and finishing moves. Spider-Man can push attacking enemies off of buildings, though Spider-Man will not let them fall, webbing them to the side of the building.The player will be able to use Spider-Man's abilities such as web slinging and wall-crawling as well other gameplay elements, one of which will be the ability to traverse using parkour, and the crafting and use of gadgets and alternative suits with special powers. Environmental combat, quick time events and stealth will also be featured in the game. Peter Parker (outside of his Spider-Man suit) will be playable in parts of the game and Mary Jane Watson will be playable in "key moments" of the game.

• Game: Marvel's Spider-Man
• Developer: Insomniac Games
• Platform: PS4
• Release date: September 7
• Price: $60 / £45

It's not part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe

Insomniac's new take on Spider-Man is all new — which is to say that it's not directly connected to any Spider-Man story told in past video-games or the Marvel Cinematic Universe. When it was announced, however, there was some confusion: the E3 2016 reveal took place just a month after Tom Holland wore the Spidey-suit in Captain America: Civil War.

This version of Spidey may not be connected to the MCU, but Polygon reports that he will be integrated into the comics continuity in the upcoming "Spidergeddon" even, a follow-up to 2014's popular Spider-Verse storyline.

You won't need that to enjoy the game, though. Instead, Marvel is giving Insomniac the freedom to tell an all-new story about Peter Parker's life as a hero.

And that's a good thing, because…

YEP, IT’S AN OPEN-WORLD GAME

The trailers made clear that this Spider-Man game will let players swing around New York City freely. It will act as an open world where Parker must deal with his dual life as a young man and superhero. Spider-Man’s New York will be the largest open world that Insomniac has ever created, and it was partially inspired by the studio’s work on the Xbox One exclusive Sunset Overdrive.

During our hands-on, we spent a lot of time swinging around New York, exploring Manhattan, and engaging in the various side activities that flesh out the city. The web-swinging is hugely important to a successful Spider-Man game, and Insomniac has put a lot of effort into theirs. Swinging through the city is easy and intuitive to start, but there’s skill to it, as well. Webs require tall buildings and anchor points to catch onto, so you can’t just swing anywhere — but Spider-Man also has abilities like a web zipline and a powerful spring jump that can help him pick up speed and cross gaps. Moment-to-moment, swinging in Spider-Man is mostly about balancing height with speed, making your swings take Spidey high enough so he can fall to move quickly, while also moving forward enough to cover a lot of ground.

The open world of New York sounds like it’ll be a major character in the game, and it’ll respond to the story as you play it. In the early parts of the game, Spider-Man is something of a celebrity, and you can drop in on crowds to take selfies and slap high-fives. Insomniac said that situation will change over time, and since this is a Spider-Man story, it’s almost a sure thing that public opinion will turn against Peter before the story is done.

You’ll find a whole lot to do in the open world, and according to Insomniac, new things will become available over time as well. The opening portion of the game has Spidey running around to reboot electronic communications towers used by the police, which gives him access to a network that identifies crimes happening in the area, which he can then go stop. Most of these are fairly generic, but each has a little twist — the storefront robbery becomes a bit of a side-scrolling brawl, the car theft has Spidey tossing guys out of the vehicle and then stopping it before it hits any pedestrians, and the burglary requires players to track down the participants before they scatter and escape.

All those activities give Spider-Man experience points he can use to unlock new abilities, and there’s a very robust and complex system of unlocks to work through as you play the game.

More than an open outdoor world

As much as those in Peter's life are important to a good Spider-Man story, one of the most vital characters is the city of New York City itself. As expected, there will be tons of side activities to tackle such as stopping robberies and other crimes. According to Game Informer, when they went hands-on with the game, there will actually be a good amount of interiors to go inside during these crimes so it's not like other Spider-Man games where you have to chase after a speeding car or beat up some guys on the street.

To make the city feel more alive, Insomniac has built a Marvel universe within it. Players will be able to find the Avengers Tower, the Wakandan Embassy, and likely other major landmarks within the world to help take the worldbuilding to another level. There's no word on if any other Marvel heroes will show up in the game but it'll likely be kept to a minimum as they're trying to make a Spider-Man game, not build an expansive Marvel games universe.

With a heavy focus on story and developing Peter Parker's life and world, a lesser team could forget to develop a really solid set of gameplay systems, but Insomniac isn't taking their eye off the ball.

Missions, Trophies, and so many different suits

Of course, New York City is known as the city that never sleeps so there's always something brewing on the streets whether it be petty crimes or full-blown robberies. Outside of story missions, our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man will get side activities to go clean up the streets. Crimes will play out differently each time so you're not doing the same repetitive task over and over again so you can grind for that trophy or special in-game perk. According to Game Informer, robberies can evolve into car chases and so forth so it's always shifting and keeping you on your toes.

If you're a bit tired of beating people up (you're a superhero, it's your job, get over it), you can go and do some of the collectible missions like finding Peter Parker's lost backpacks. As we saw in Spider-Man: Homecoming last year, Peter tends to just leave his school bag webbed up in alley ways when he has to spring into action. Of course, this can result in some bags being misplaced so you need to go and retrieve some key mementos of Peter's. The items in the bags will serve as backstory for Peter Parker and fill in some of the blanks in the story as well as give you little trinkets such as the first pair of web-shooters he ever created.

There are other little side activities sprinkled in the world but Insomniac isn't going to divulge all of them before launch so that there can be some surprises when you play it. Similarly, they were tight lipped on the suit customization.

While it is now officially confirmed there will be dozens of costumes for Spider-Man inspired by comics, other games, and the movies, they're not revealing many of the suits yet. So far we know that there will be a more traditional suit that you start the game in, an upgraded one with the white spider which supposedly ties into the narrative, the Noir suit, and the Spider-Punk suit.

Each suit has a unique special ability tied to it, the Spider-Punk suit features the ability to pull out a guitar and strum it really hard to create an AOE attack. The other suits have their own benefits but Insomniac isn't willing to talk too much about them yet.

Oh, and one last thing: they're including a killer photo mode in the game. Considering Peter Parker is a professional freelance photographer when he isn't donning his Spidey suit should mean we'll have plenty of great tools to capture his musings around New York City.

Spider-Man has a lot of costumes, and they come with abilities

Don't like Spider-Man's new look? No problem. Insomniac has confirmed that Parker will have a whole closet of alternative costumes to change into — including a punk rock Spider-Man outfit (complete with a denim vest and, apparently, an electric guitar) and a costume based on Tom Holland's Iron Spider suit from Avengers: Infinity War.

Each costume comes with its own abilities too, which can increase your stats, give you new moves or protect you from certain kinds of attacks. Oh, and you don't have to wear a suit to use its ability either, you just need to have the suit in your inventory.

IT HAS A LITTLE BIT OF RPG DNA, TOO

Spidey’s primary form of getting stronger throughout Marvel’s Spider-Man is experience points, which he earns for winning fights, successful completion of missions, and a host of other things. The early portion of the game also includes side missions that are good vehicles for earning experience, like the construction sites still populated by Fisk’s goons. You can infiltrate those locations and take out the guys there (stealthily if you like, for as long as you can keep it going), and once the fight breaks out, you’re required to battle through a series of waves of reinforcements. Each of those sites also has bonus objectives, like beating guys by throwing them into each other or webbing a certain number to walls, that give more experience points, as well.

Points enable you to unlock new abilities or Spidey along three upgrade trees, centered on broad concepts like combat, agility, and web-slinging. Opening up new abilities quickly increases the kinds of combos and improvisational feats you’re capable of deploying against enemies.

There are other things to upgrade in Spider-Man as well, though, and they’re tied to other activities to complete around the open world.

The Avengers might be in the game. Maybe.

Look carefully at in-game footage of Spider-Man swinging through Manhatten, and you might spot Avengers tower in the background. On its own, that might just be a sly nod to the rest of the Marvel comics universe, but at E3, there were other hints. Specifically, a display featuring a prop newspaper had real-estate advertisements for the property that holds the Avenger's mansion in the comics, There's also reference to Daredevil's law firm. 

The game has a photo mode. And a selfie mode.

If you could climb the tallest building in New York, you'd probably snap a selfie, too. Now you can: Peter Parker's day job has made the transition to an in-game photo mode -- letting you compose carefully crafted pictures of the wall-crawler in action or stop and take a selfie with a civilian. Nice.

Insomniac is dedicated to getting web-swinging right

Talk to any web-head about Spider-Man games, and a single title comes up: 2004's Spider-Man 2. A tie-in for the Tobey Maguire film of the same name, the game nailed the feeling of web-swinging -- and Spider-Man games have been chasing that dragon ever since. That's why Insomniac Games has been adamant in interviews that it's going to get this crucial feeling of movement right. Earlier this year, GameInformer asked creative director Bryan Intihar if webs would stick to buildings. His answer said it all: "They better if I want this game to sell at all."  

The question and answer may be a gag, but the gameplay mechanics aren't. Past Spidey games have shown that having semi-realistic physics is essential to giving a game an authentic Spider-Man feel. Webs have to attach to real points in the world, Spidey's momentum needs to be dictated by how the player swings and when they let go of their webbing, and movement needs to be fast, fluid and non-stop. According to early impressions, Marvel's Spider-Man for PS4 has all of that in spades -- featuring a movement system that's easy to learn, but offers players nuanced control of the game's titular hero.

It has a ton of iconic Spider-Man villains

Eight years of fighting crime earns you a lot of enemies -- and some of Peter Parker's most iconic nemeses showed up in the game's E3 trailer, including The Scorpion, The Vulture, Electro, Rhino and Negative Man. There will probably be more villains in the game, too: in a subsequent gameplay trailer, you can see "Fisk" written on the side of some buildings, the name behind another Spider-man nemesis: The Kingpin. 

Considering the fact that Electro unleashed pretty much all the inhabitants of the RAFT Prison in the above trailer, almost any Spider-Man villain is possible.

You'll be able to play it this year

Marvel's Spider-Man for PlayStation 4 hits stores on Sept. 7, 2018.