VIDEO Best Spider-Man games since 2000?

I was a big fan of the 1994-1998 Spider-Man: The Animated Series, and it had 2 quasi-official video games released in 2000 and 2001 for PlayStation.













I loved these games, and they also received Critical Acclaim, especially the first one.


Then, of course, came the Sam Raimi trilogy. I originally planned on getting their video-game adaptions but I just heard they weren't as good, so I waited (and naively hoped they would come back and continue the above series with a 3rd installment).

And well, I kept waiting... and I just never heard of any other good Spider-Man games.
I did try Web of Shadows when I saw it on sale somewhere, put it into my PS2... and was horrified to see it was a 2D game. On a Play Station 2! And then simply never finished it.

I still have my PS2, and those 2 games above... but I kind of fell out of gaming when I went to college, and never got a PS3 or Xbox, sticking to just a few PC games.

I saw there was a new Spider-Man mobile runner game for the iPhone, but it didn't look that interesting, and I'm not a big fan of mobile games anyways since there isn't much you can do with them.

Have I missed any truly amazing Spider-Man games in the last 16 years since those two games above came out? Games that are just as good as, or better than, the ones above?

 

I have the games of the first 2 films, the Web of Shadows PS2 game, Friend or Foe, the game of the first Amazing Spider-Man and the GBA version of Ultimate Spider-Man.

Out of those Ultimate is my favourite due to playing it a lot when I was younger, but the Spider-Man 2 game is the one that makes you feel the most like Spider-Man.

 

I was never much into the superhero games (Injustice doesn't count); but I just had to buy Spiderman 2 for the PS2 after seeing a demo of the free-roaming gameplay that takes place in NYC.

 

Spider-Man 2 was so good. The free roaming was fun, but I really loved the way you could dodge using Spider-Sense to slow things down. I don't know why that hasn't been in every SM game since (and I've played just about all of them!).

Those PS1 games were a lot of fun too, I love when there are loads of costume options.

 

Ultimate Spider-Man for the Gamecube was great.


Web of Shadows had some lovely visuals, and the web-slinging was beautiful

But wow, the voice actor for Spider-Man was just awful. And the game quickly became repetitive. Not as good as Ultimate Spider-Man, but it had its moments.

Shattered Dimensions was pretty cool

My only complaint here was that regular Spider-Man was voiced by Neil Patrick Harris, who, imo, isn't that great of a voice performer. What makes this even more frustrating was that they had the brilliant voice actor from the 90s animated series, but they only used him for the Noir Spider-Man.

Never played Edge of Time, but boy it looked fun

 

the new one coming out on ps4

 

Spider-Man 2

 

I never really liked Spider-Man 2. I actually prefer the Spider-man 3 game (ps3 version).

Though my all time favourite has just got to be shattered dimensions simply for that lovely Deadpool level that made me fall in love with the character

Deadpool: That was a live feed you just killed! Now what am I going tell it's folks? (begins to sob)
Spider-man: Tell them it was a mercy killing. If they've seen your show they'll understand

 

Hmmm... seeing lots of love for Spider-Man 2

How is it different from the other 2 games in that trilogy?



What's the gameplay and plotline like for Shattered Dimensions and Edge of Time?

And that video of Web of Shadows does not look at all like the 2D version I have for PS2. False advertising!

 

The PS2 version must have been the gimped version.

The best Spider-Man games to come out in the last 15 years are without doubt Spider-Man 2 (2004), Ultimate Spider-Man and Shattered Dimensions.

Spider-Man 2 was the first Spider-Man game, and possibly also first superhero game in general, to feature an open world. It was everything fans wanted at the time, except perhaps for the fact that you couldn't get out of costume and play as Peter Parker. For the first time, you could explore the city freely, even descend to ground level whereas previous games dropped you to your death if you descended below a certain height. You could wander off from the objective, and go free-roaming, doing side-missions, fighting random crime and completing challenges.

Your web-swinging was for the first time physics-based. You had to have buildings around you to attach webs to, and the web would actually attach to them. Your angle relative to the building, and how far away or close it was to you would affect your trajectory and swing radius. Your timing in releasing your web would determine the angle of your forward momemtum. It was so "real" that it took weeks of practice to become truly skilled at it.

Sadly, the depth of the control of his swinging has only regressed since. None of the games released since have had as intuitively feeling swinging controls, except perhaps its sequel. And they have returned to an automated swinging system where the web will attach to the air.


Whereas the film tie-in games were loosely based on the narratives of their movies, Ultimate Spider-Man returned to a comic-book world and aesthetic, but was similar to Spider-Man 2 in gameplay. It also had the added bonus of allowing you to play as Venom for half of the story missions.

Shattered Dimensions has a very simple afterthought of a story and plot, involving the breaking of a magic tablet, causing the Spider-Men from different dimensions to work togethe to defeat a common enemy.

 

I've only played Spider-Man 2....all the others have looked like major steps backward since. Swinging around the city and the combat were perfect.

 

Fun Fact:

I was playing shattered dimensions today and during the sandman level Spider-man randomly said

"Not sand! It's coarse, rough and gets everywhere!"

Played the game dozens of times yet I've never heard him say that before.

 

Well after hearing so much good about Spider-Man 2, I checked it out on Amazon and bought it (along with 1 & 3) for about 10 bucks! I also looked at some of the others, like Shattered Dimensions and Edge of Time and Ultimate Spider-Man, and they were selling for over $30, so I'm passing on those, at least for now. Thanks guys! I'll let you know what I think of them.

 

The first game has some fun stealth levels in Oscorp. You also get a chance to replay the entire game as the Goblin upon completion, with a different move set and abilities.

Entering the password UNDERTHEMASK will allow you to play in 1st person view, which feels weird, but is also somewhat exhilarating if you crawl down the walls of the skyscrapers in the first level. It's cool for the novelty factor, but I would advise against playing the entire game that way.

I would recommend that you play the first game first, as it will be difficult - and feel very unsatisfying - to go back to that game's controls after playing 2 and 3.