At least it's better than the movie...
written by: James Cooper on 7/9/2007 8:42:48 AM
Spider-Man 2 is widely regarded as the best super hero video game ever. It was the first super hero title to offer an open-ended style of gameplay and a massive city to explore. While the game had it’s share of flaws, it was a big step in the right direction. A few years down the road, and now Activision and Treyarch have returned with the obligatory tie-in for Spider-Man 3, and while it follows the same formula as the popular Spider-Man 2, and even improves on some of the problems from the previous installment, Spider-Man 3 only passes for decent in today’s market.
Much like the previous installment, Spider-Man 3 ‘kinda’ follows the story from the movie. ‘Kinda’, meaning that while it follows the major story points, it does so in a very disjointed way, making it even less entertaining than watching the disappointment that was the movie. Peppered throughout the game are several original storylines taken or inspired by the comics. One of the storylines involving Lizard and Kraven is actually well played out, for the most part. The new stories add length to what would otherwise be a very short and unfulfilling game, and thankfully they usually work pretty well. Unfortunately the story points that do actually tie-in with the movie make little sense, as they don’t take the time to set up any context for what’s happening. For example, Sandman shows up out of no where, and there’s no mention of him being Uncle Ben’s murderer, as in the movie.
At its core, the gameplay in Spider-Man 3 is Spider-Man 2 with new bells and whistles. Gone are the tedious side quests that involved such actions as saving hapless civilians from falling off building roofs (how did they get up there, anyway?) or saving a child’s balloon. Instead, Spider-Man 3 replaces the random quests with a gang-oriented set of missions. The city is split up into three sections, each one a piece of territory to a certain gang. Throughout the game, you’ll be given missions that relate to said gangs, but you’ll also be able to partake in random missions stopping the hoodlums from muggings, robberies and all sorts of badness. It’s a leap ahead of the boring side quests of Spider-Man 2, but it still leaves a lot to be desired in terms of variation. For some reason, nine times out of ten, stopping a crime involves catching a getaway car, pummeling it, and beating the snot out of the baddies inside it. It’s fun the first few times, but some variation would have been welcomed here.
The best addition to the gameplay this time around are quick-time like events (made popular by Shenmue) where your reflexes are tested through a series of timed button presses. These events are often times very, very cool in the way they play out, and add a cinematic flavor to the game that the previous titles were missing.
The most obvious difference in the gameplay is the ability to ‘utilize’ the power of the black costume. I say ‘utilize’ because the gameplay remains largely unchanged while playing with the costume on. While playing with the black costume on, your strength increases several times over, and you fill a ‘black rage’ meter as you fight. Once the meter is full, you’re able to unleash a special attack on your unsuspecting enemy. The addition is fairly gimmicky, and while there’s little else they could do to change up the gameplay with the black costume, it still feels somewhat underwhelming.
Combat plays out pretty much like it always has. Spider-Man has various combos available at his disposal through hitting the two attack buttons in different order. It’s not a deep system, but it really doesn’t need to be. This isn’t Prince of Persia, after all. It gets the job done for the most part, but not without a few hitches. As the combos all play out in pre-determined animations, you’ll oftentimes find yourself pummeling someone who is already dead, or swinging wildly in the air because your first attack knocked your enemy away. It becomes very frustrating in the more difficult areas of the game, and some of the game can be hard enough without these issues getting in the way.
On the topic of issues, Spider-Man 3’s biggest enemy is its camera. There aren’t a lot of issues with the outdoor camera, but as soon as you get to the inside environments, its like the camera has no idea what to do. While wall climbing or web swinging inside, the camera bounces all over the place, getting stuck on nearly every surface. The same can be said during fights sometimes, too. While the camera issues never make the game wholly unplayable, they come damn close sometimes.
They say Manhattan is 2.5 times larger than in Spider-Man 2, but I think they’re being generous. While the game does feature many more interior environments than Spider-Man 2 did, I would be hard pressed to call it that much bigger than the last title. Areas like building interiors and subways do help to liven things up instead of just swinging down city streets all the time.
The 360 version suffers from some pretty brutal load times. The most obvious, for whatever reason, is the transition of going inside (or out) of the Daily Bugle. You can end up waiting for up to ten seconds for the game to load at times, and I even came across a few instances where the game simply crashed while loading. At least the game doesn’t suffer from the nasty frame rate issues of the PS3 version.
At least Spider-Man 3 looks pretty good. While it won’t be winning any awards for graphical achievement, the game does a serviceable job of recreating Manhattan and the characters within it. The character designs are pretty good, I’d say, especially the ones for the villains that haven’t appeared in the movies. Instead of putting their comic book appearances in the game, the developers have re-imaged all the villains to appear as though they are something that could actually exist, which is the take Sam Raimi has been using for the movies. The redesigns work for most of the characters, but Rhino, as expected, still looks goofy as he ever has. Poor guy can’t catch a break.
All the movies cast comes back to reprise their roles for the game and they all do a fair job. The supporting cast all do a good job as well, offering a distinct feel to the characters they play. Scorpion, in particular, I thought was well cast. Kraven, too. The games soundtrack has that same sweeping heroic feel that the movie does, and while there’s not a load of different songs, they still do their job and add to the experience at the time. My big gripe with the sound is the battle taunts... No one wants to listen to the same one liners a dozen times in each fight. Please, please, stop putting these in the damn games, or at least give me the option to turn them off.
Spider-Man 3 can be fun to play, but it can also be the bane of your existence. One minute you’re enjoying yourself, swinging around the city and the next you’re cursing the damn camera because you’re hardly able to navigate the environment. The boss fights can lean into tedium at times, as well, which isn’t a good thing. Overall, I can recommend Spider-Man 3 as a rental, but I wouldn’t recommend a blind buy on this one.
