Spiderman returns to New York with new skills, new stunts and new enemies. The city is invaded by thousands of symbionts, will our hero make it this time to revive the fortunes of his videogame saga?
Web of Shadows
In Web of Shadows, we will once again take on the role of Peter Parker to fight a sinister alien threat that has engulfed the Big Apple. During the adventure we will be able to meet many glories of the universe The Marvel movies, both as allies and as enemies. The story is not based on the famous films of recent years, but was written specifically for this video game; however in some parts it appears a bit bumpy, and it will take a few hours to fully take off.
In the role of Spiderman, however, this time we will be able to count on two costumes: Peter will be able to take advantage of the elegance, agility and acrobatics of the red costume or the use of wild and brutal force with the black costume, kindly offered by Venom. However, this kind of symbiote caused the infection in New York, transforming unarmed citizens into hideous creatures with superpowers, which will be the main enemies of the adventure.
gameplay
As you progress through the story, you will have some choice alternatives, even if the latter will not be crucial to the plot. Unfortunately, the game itself will sometimes force us to repeat certain parts, making everything much more cumbersome. It is a shame because the initial part of the game, especially the first few minutes, make the action frenetic, agitated and surprising in the eyes of the player, a frenzy that gradually diminishes until it leads to a flat routine that will not leave you until the end. end.
During the game we will meet Eddie Brock, Luke Cage and a large number of other characteristic characters of the comic; furthermore, by keeping a certain behavior in some points of the game and according to our choices, and the characters we will recruit on our side we will advance towards a certain road or another that will lead to see also different endings, not a little stimulating the replayability factor title itself.
One of the most important aspects of the game is the care and environment in which the adventure develops. The game consists of 8 large areas; Between missions, you can get around the city, lively and frenetic at the right point, in an almost free way, climb the skyscrapers and balance between the buildings or whiz through the avenues, something that will undoubtedly entertain a lot of players. for hours, giving you a pleasant feeling of freedom at any time, without finding a place or area that is not accessible.
Moving around New York is in fact very fun and intuitive: just press the right spine of the pad to shoot our web and point the direction with the analog stick, after a few minutes of play it will become a joke to swing between the skyscrapers of the city; other actions, such as climbing buildings, double flipping, or moving slower or faster will also be very easy to learn and use, however the same cannot be said for the combat system.
Not so Friendly
The main problem in Web of Shadows is its rapid descent towards banality: in fights by pressing only two buttons (which are the same) we will be able to win in most fights. In fact, in the game, the enemy always targets himself automatically with the left dorsal, thus allowing us to move and attack him freely, always having him in the center of the viewfinder. The shots and the various moves, visually are very spectacular, and it will be quite easy to chain them to perform long and devastating combos, the problem is that the enemies that will appear in front of us will never require new tactics to be defeated, therefore we will always end up using the same combination of moves.
The hordes of enemies are innumerable and quite repetitive, the final bosses of the various levels do not offer much more variety than the normal ones, you can find yourself repeating the same attacks and the same movements for several minutes in a row before defeating them, which is not very exciting ; if we then add that the difficulty level cannot be set and there are no other modes besides that Story, the only reason that pushes to replay it is, as mentioned before, the vision of the new endings.
How to make a Spiderman licensed game boring? It seems difficult but if the majority of the missions are only about killing a certain number of enemies using the same moves, then the goal is achieved. And it's a real shame because the title would have been very interesting if only all its aspects had been exploited. The rpg-like component that has been introduced is original: once a particular mission is finished or a certain boss has been defeated, experience points are obtained that are used to unlock some skills, at the expense of others, allowing a minimum of customization in the style of play. Unfortunately, even this feature alone does not improve the overall situation much because it does not make the combat more engaging and varied, but only enhances the moves our hero already knows how to use.
Graphics and Sound
The visual sector of this new Spiderman stands at good levels, the character models are modeled and animated in an excellent way, however to an expert eye it does not escape that there has been a considerable recycling of textures and polygonal models: citizens, members gangs, soldiers, henchmen and symbionts will all seem the same after a few hours, ditto for the city of New York, and this detracts a little from the graphics that the game has to offer. On a purely technological level, the version Playstation 3 does not have particular problems, but occasionally accuses frame drops in the most excited phases of the game, the vertical sync does not work as it should and this leads to both popping and clipping problems (polygons that appear out of nowhere instead of gradually appearing from distance ). On the other hand, the refraction system of light is very good: both on Spidey's costume and on the countless windows of the skyscrapers the light effects are wasted; As for the sound, it is quite discreet: the orchestrated music is an excellent accompaniment for the game phases and gives that typical Marvel Style feeling; the voices of the dubbers are excellent while the sound effects are discreet.
Spiderman: Web of Shadows it could have been an excellent title, however its extreme repetitiveness, the flatness of the combat system and the poor development of the plot undermine it in numerous points. Recommended for Spidey lovers and those looking for an action / button-smashing game without too many pretensions.
