Spider-Man returns, this time battling the forces of evil in a time-travelling epic that will probably never make it into the history books.
The Pros
- Interesting time traveling concept
- Alternate timeline versions of familiar characters
The Cons
- Overwhelmingly dull setting
- Story makes no sense
- Combat and objectives feel repetitive
Spider-Man: Edge of Time Review:
Last year, Activision made a very smart decision. There is, after all, a limit to how much variety you can have in a Spider-Man game. He swings on webs, punches guys in the face and has a sassy attitude. How do you release a Spider-Man game that doesn't feel like it's exactly the same as the seemingly hundreds that came before? Activision's solution was to offer four Spider-Mans (Spider-Men?) in the place of one. Shattered Dimensions brought along the familiar Amazing Spider-Man, sure, but he was joined by a 1930s-inspided Spidey, a Venom-infected Spidey and a high-tech, futuristic Spidey. It was a breath of fresh air for the franchise, giving fans the opportunity to play as a handful of vastly different super heroes.
A similar concept carries through in the latest entry, Spider-Man: Edge of Time. This time the roster is cut in half, with only Amazing Spider-Man and the high tech Spider-Man 2099 being featured.
Now Try To Follow Me
As with any time travel-related tale, story in Spider-Man: Edge of Time is a little tough to follow. See if you can stick with me.
The game kicks off the year 2099. That era's Spider-Man is named Miguel O'Hara, who is a scientist working for the multi-national conglomerate, Alchemex. The head of Alchemex, one Walker Sloan, is unhappy about the present state of his company and decides to do the most reasonable thing he can think of: Travel back in time to the 1970s, form the company again using futuristic technology to make him unbeatable, and basically take over the world.
Meanwhile, in the process of discovering this plot, O'Hara realizes that Sloan's actions will end up killing the early 21st century's Spider-Man, the familiar Peter Parker. O'Hara sets out to save his fore-bearer, who, because of Sloan's actions, now works for Alchemex instead of The Daily Bugle.
If your mind is starting to hurt, you're not the only one. The story in Edge of Time is tricky to follow. It is, however, cool to see familiar faces, like Doctor Octopus and J. Jonah Jameson, and how their lives are altered because of Sloan's time travelling. J. Jonah, for example, becomes a late night TV newsman. And Doc Ock...well...he's still a crazy guy with mechanical arms. The more things change. . .
Hope You Like Science Facilities!
One of the cooler aspects of Shattered Dimensions was its variety of locales, from train yards to deserts to carnivals. In Edge of Time, all of the action exists within the walls of Alchemex, both in the future and in present day. I hope you like mechanical steel doors and robots, because you're going to be seeing a lot of them!
There's really nothing exceptional about the setting at all. Every single room feels like it was ripped from the Generic Science Facility playbook, with laser walls, automated turrets and hackable computers. Setting the game in two different timelines at once seems like it would be a good excuse to make one timeline vastly different from the other. In practice, the only way to easily tell that you've switched from the past to the future is by looking at which Spider-Man you're playing as.
A Tale of Two Spideys
Speaking of the two Spider-Men, they don't feel vastly different from one another either. The basic controls and powers are the same for both, with the only major difference being the Spidies special abilities, assigned to the left trigger. In the case of Amazing Spider-Man, he's able to activate his super senses, dodging incoming attacks while unleashing powerful melee blows on his foes. Spider-Man 2099, on the other hand, is able to create a digital decoy of himself, distracting enemies, thus letting him get the jump on them.
There are upgrade options that are unique to the two web crawlers, but none of them are dramatic enough to really make them feel all that different. Some increased web damage here, an extra combo attack here, but nothing staggering.
Equally uninspired are the objectives you'll have to complete throughout Edge of Time. 2099 and Amazing are working in tandem, affecting each other's timelines through their actions. This manifests as walls appearing or enemies changing, but the raw gameplay is never altered. You're often tasked with running into a room and beating up a bunch of guys to find a key. Or running into a room and beating up a bunch of guys to flip a switch. Or running into a room and beating up a bunch of guys to, well, just beat them up. Occasionally there's some exotic gameplay, including a few freefall sequences that have 2099 plummeting at super sonic speeds, dodging debris, but those moments are few and far between.
Swing Away!
It's not that Spider-Man: Edge of Time is a poorly crafted game. It's just an overwhelmingly dull one. In this increasingly-crowded holiday season, this game feels like pure, uninteresting filler. Hardly seems worthy of the $60 you could easily spend on something far more memorable.
Comments
Displaying 1–18 of 18
diabeticspidey
The story wasn't as terrible as One More Day, or Spider-Island. In fact, to anyone with a brain, it was easy to understand. Sure, the game has a flaw or two, but no game is 100% perfact.........not even the much revered Call Of Duty games.
L_Luigi123
i thought this game was awesome and it was new for a spider man game also i don't see how the story was even a little confusing i guess g4 must hire retards at there company its either that or the person who wrote this might not be into it and likes to play shooter games all the time and doesn't really even think about the other games and focuses on multiplayer and ranking up and doesn't even give awesome games like this a chance and because of games that are big on multiplayer other games that are really awesome story wise get crushed on reviews and and dont sell to much
FaYt2021
What? A Spider-Man game that wasn't good? No wa... oh wait, yeah, that seems about right. Spider-Man games should've died after Web of Shadows. That was an amazing game, but now its fond memories are diluted by this drivel. I hear they are planning on make a new Spider-Man game already. I hope that gets canceled right away.
IceCold9210
This is a pretty decent review i suppose, other than the fact that the story, at least for me, wasn't at all confusing. It could be that I am already interested in the spiderman continuity, rather than having to be pulled into it.
drh1975
If this had been a Batman game, it would have gotten a 4/5.
reaperlord66
this what happens when spiderman fights batman batman wins 5/5
2ply
General idea of all the reviews i've read and watched is that it is a step backwards even when just compared to the previous game.
If you don't like or trust this review, look around at others and you'll see a lot similar points.. the game is just not up to par this time.
Hydrafiend
Its amazing that after Arkham City developers still have the attitude of "we got the license so just put out anything"-I think this comments sums it up:
It's not that Spider-Man: Edge of Time is a poorly crafted game. It's just an overwhelmingly dull one. In this increasingly-crowded holiday season, this game feels like pure, uninteresting filler. Hardly seems worthy of the $60 you could easily spend on something far more memorable.
People may disagree with the review, but its not a bad review.
drenalous
The game wasn't as bad as he made it out to be imo. i do miss the amount of web swinging other spiderman games had but the story was not hard to follow and beat em up is pretty much what all spiderman games were.
As for the game taking place in the Alchemex building, it was to both set the stage for what the game was about and also to incorporate "if i do something in the present, it affects the future." It would be hard to do that if 2099 was in the building but classic spidey was in a completely different area.
The controls being similar also made sense cause they moved between each spiderman very frequently and it would have been more frustrating having 2 completely different sets of controls for each and having to switch gameplay tactics on a dime. At least the animation was different.
i just think this review was too harsh, the game was enjoyable to me
drenalous
The game wasn't as bad as he made it out to be imo. i do miss the amount of web swinging other spiderman games had but the story was not hard to follow and beat em up is pretty much what all spiderman games were.
As for the game taking place in the Alchemex building, it was to both set the stage for what the game was about and also to incorporate "if i do something in the present, it affects the future." It would be hard to do that if 2099 was in the building but classic spidey was in a completely different area.
The controls being similar also made sense cause they moved between each spiderman very frequently and it would have been more frustrating having 2 completely different sets of controls for each and having to switch gameplay tactics on a dime. At least the animation was different.
i just think this review was too harsh, the game was enjoyable to me
drenalous
The game wasn't as bad as he made it out to be imo. i do miss the amount of web swinging other spiderman games had but the story was not hard to follow and beat em up is pretty much what all spiderman games were.
As for the game taking place in the Alchemex building, it was to both set the stage for what the game was about and also to incorporate "if i do something in the present, it affects the future." It would be hard to do that if 2099 was in the building but classic spidey was in a completely different area.
The controls being similar also made sense cause they moved between each spiderman very frequently and it would have been more frustrating having 2 completely different sets of controls for each and having to switch gameplay tactics on a dime.
i just think this review was too harsh, the game was enjoyable to me
drenalous
The game wasn't as bad as he made it out to be imo. i do miss the amount of web swinging other spiderman games had but the story was not hard to follow and beat em up is pretty much what all spiderman games were.
As for the game taking place in the Alchemex building, it was to both set the stage for what the game was about and also to incorporate "if i do something in the present, it affects the future." It would be hard to do that if 2099 was in the building but classic spidey was in a completely different area.
The controls being similar also made sense cause they moved between each spiderman very frequently and it would have been more frustrating having 2 completely different sets of controls for each and having to switch gameplay tactics on a dime.
i just think this review was too harsh, the game was enjoyable to me
shane75ver
I bought the game and like certain aspects of it, but I kinda miss swinging all over the city looking for enemies. It would have been cool if spiderman can explore a future city and more futuristic environments .
dabos90
This has to be one of the stupidest reviews I've read on this site. Frushticks complaints make no sense. I don't get what's hard to follow about the plot. Sloan alters time to make his company/himself more powerful. Amazing dies as a result and 2099 doesn't like this, so he decides to stop Sloan. Seems pretty cut & dry. "Speaking of the two Spider-Men, they don't feel vastly different from one another either. The basic controls and powers are the same for both" I would imagine so, seeing that they're both SPIDER-MAN! "One of the cooler aspects of Shattered Dimensions was its variety of locales, from train yards to deserts to carnivals. In Edge of Time, all of the action exists within the walls of Alchemex, both in the future and in present day." The crux of the story is about Sloan and the Alchemex company, so it's a safe bet the game takes place at the Alchemex building. Just like Batman: Arkham Asylum takes place in, guess what, Arkham Asylum. Lastly, he complains that all you do in the game is beat up bad guys. "You're often tasked with running into a room and beating up a bunch of guys to find a key. Or running into a room and beating up a bunch of guys to flip a switch. Or running into a room and beating up a bunch of guys to, well, just beat them up." Hate to break it to ya Russ, beating up bad guys is pretty much what Super heros do. So it shouldn't be a surprise that you'd be doing that in a Super hero game. As for the objectives. You nailed every action game on the head.
johnnygray
I'll probably get it in a year or two, due to my sheer love of Spidey. I had fun with Shattered Dimensions and this one has my two favorite voice actors from the first one. Maybe one day Marvel can have another really fun game. (Marvel Capcom doesn't count)
TheSledBaron
Even Spider-Man looks disappointed on the cover.
iwanneo
man that sucks, I noticed they did not even use comic pallets for the graphic, dam activision, is not enough that they destroy guitar hero franchise, now they are destroying spider man, they shoul take the IP of spiderman away from them, and call of duty is next!!
AWilke
This review was...short and lazy.
Displaying 1–18 of 18
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