A Redditor Played the Spider-Man PS4 Demo 8 Times – Here’s What They Thought
A redditor by the name of Troy Cavalieri, or u/troyisprettydamncool, has recently made a post to the r/SpidermanPS4 subreddit which goes into detail on a lot of mechanics in the upcoming Insomniac Games title Marvel’s Spider-Man.
He mentions how he had played the San Diego Comic-Con demo for the game 8 times, and beaten Shocker 4 times.
“That’s about 140 minutes for those counting at home. (Apparently there was someone there who did it over 10 times, so if you’re here, feel free to add stuff). But these are my thoughts, and the cool things I noticed:”
Of course, you’ll be thinking, well if he played it 8 times, clearly he loved it – and while that’s true, most of the post is actually about cool things he noticed and details that we didn’t know before.
“[I]t’s not as “ultra physics realistic” as something like Spider-Man 2, so it’s a lot easier to learn and fun even for beginners. The closest I can compare it to is like a mix of Web of Shadows mixed with the good parts of TASM2 swinging, and also with some of that Insomniac fluidity and snappiness. Still physics based, and the webs attach to buildings (I checked, they also connect to poles and trees) but it’s a lot easier to pick up than something like Spider-Man 2.”
So, it seems that the web swinging is designed for an actual feel of momentum, and we know that the whole mechanic is actually based on momentum – you go faster the bigger you swing. Web swinging is such a huge part of Spider-Man video games, and it’s something that players claim only Spider-Man 2 had gotten right. Comments from people who have played the game all praise the awesomeness of the swinging in this title, so Insomniac have to be proud on that front.
Web Swinging isn’t the only part of a Spider-Man game, there’s also combat. From videos, the combat in the game seems to have taken inspiration from the likes of the Batman: Arkham series and the Middle-earth video games, but apparently this isn’t the case.
“It may look like Arkham combat, but the only thing that’s similar is the squiggly lines. It feels a lot like something out of Devil May Cry but a little bit easier. Air combos are really nice, since they actually give you a little bit of space from melee enemies, but you’re still vulnerable to guys with guns (you also have an air dodge where you web zip a little).”
Troy also pointed out that Insomniac try to make sure Peter Parker never actually kills any of the enemies he fights. You can read more about that in the actual Reddit post.
“So in the demo there were:
- Drug deals (fight in an alley, usually turns into a car chase, doesn’t always if you’re good enough)
- Car chases with a bomb in a truck (I always took out the car first, then the truck, then took care of the bomb, but I think you can do it all in any order you want)
- Store robberies
- Shootouts in the street
These were all pretty fun, and they didn’t get tooo repetitive (I wish that there were more animations during the truck chase, since I saw the same “swinging through the window” animation every single time. It was still cool though. And Spidey had a different quip each time which I liked.”
It seems that there are a lot of cool random crimes happening throughout the city, and the variety in the demo alone speaks for the detail and passion that is going into this game.
The post has over 1,000 words of content, so I definitely recommend reading that in full. Here are his overall thoughts, however.
“So yeah my overall thoughts are: I can’t fucking wait for September. I honestly miss the game already. I did pretty much everything in the demo, but those couple things like all the backpacks and the chemical research station are pretty much keeping me up at night. There’s honestly so much to do in this demo, which is why I was able to come back so many times without getting bored. I feel like Insomniac really knocked it out of the park with this one, and you can bet your ass I’m gonna be first in line on September 7th.”