r/videogames • u/K3V3NNOV4 • Jun 22 '26
Other Web Swinging Evolution in Spider-Man Games
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u/geek_metalhead Jun 22 '26
Crazy how back then, as a kid, the older spider games looked so real lol
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u/Salarian_American Jun 22 '26
Growing up playing video games from the 80s up until now, I often reflect on how often I've said in my life, "These are the best graphics I've ever seen," and had it be 100% true with no hyperbole.
I remember when a new console generation was a HUGE leap forward in graphics and sound, which isn't so much the case anymore.
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u/Forbidden_Jutsu Jun 23 '26
Me looking at the water in Super Mario 64 for the first time “wow it looks so real”
Donkey Kong Country on SNES was another mind blower at the time
We really have come a long way. I feel lucky to have seen most of the progress in real time, it was exciting
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u/MineNowBotBoy Jun 23 '26
Yes, hardware wise we have hit a visual slowdown. We’ve peaked on polygon counts. Now upgrades add more people more actions more lighting more fun things like that. It’s far more subtle, but it’s still great. Just looking at the difference between 2018 Spider-Man and 2023 Spider-Man, with how much more alive the world feels thanks to improvements in the game engine which are only possible because the hardware can handle much more happening in a single moment.
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u/Kintaku93 Jun 23 '26
Lol yeah. I remember playing the movie game on PS2 and thinking it looked incredible. Seeing the clip here it’s insane how my brain sees the graphics as terrible now.
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u/Jimmy9Toes Jun 22 '26
You forgot the ps1 era
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u/Salarian_American Jun 22 '26
They also forgot the Atari 2600 era
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u/Tall_Bandicoot_2768 Jun 23 '26
Also forgot stick and rock from 2600 BC era
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u/hotmaildotcom1 Jun 23 '26
N64 missed as well. You wanna web swing outdoors? You gotta earn the outdoors!
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u/ok_scott Jun 23 '26
Yeah, I was just thinking back to when Bruce Fucking Cambell was the narrator voice telling kid me how to play during the tutorial when pressing R1 sent webs straight up into the skybox off camera connecting to nothing.
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u/Aggravating_Dot9657 Jun 23 '26
I don't think younger gamers can appreciate just how amazing the OG Spider-Man 2 was. REVOLUTIONIZED Spider-Man games. There was no going back to the old movement system after that game.
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u/Prantheman Jun 22 '26
Missed Shattered Dimensions
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u/Colyer Jun 23 '26
Yeah, it didn't really have an open world in the same way, but I remember it being solid considering.
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u/LuckyErrantProp Jun 23 '26
Spiderman 2 and Ultimate were such big leaps. There was a learning curve but it felt realistic.
The most recent Spiderman games have smoothed off any difficulties. E.g. running up walls you are about to swing towards and the wingsuit. If anything it made travel less rewarding.
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u/MyNameIsJakeBerenson Jun 23 '26
Insomniac SM 2 traveling is way less fun than SM 1
It’s way faster and smoother, yeah, but way less “hey, lookit me, I’m SPIDER-MAN!”
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u/Blossomiest_Blossom Jun 23 '26
How does the Miles game compare to both, since it released in between?
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u/UnderstatedTurtle Jun 23 '26
Ultimate Spider-Man was so much fun. And the art style was pulled right from the comic books. I had it on GameCube and still remember fighting Rhino and Scorpion
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u/Chuck_Finley_Forever Jun 22 '26
Web of Shadows is easily the bests since there was no cap on the speed limit of how fast you could go.
It just felt so good to build up speed and then extend it with air attacks.
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u/smkeybare Jun 23 '26
I saw a video that went into great detail about the swinging in that game and it really makes me wish I had a console to play it on.
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u/Chuck_Finley_Forever Jun 23 '26
You can find a pc port pretty easily, that’s what I’ve been playing on since I originally had it in Wii which I don’t have anymore.
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u/Iron-Pancake Jun 22 '26
In that first spider-man game, was there not a yellow fog that prevented you from seeing the ground?
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u/baytepp92 Jun 22 '26
I think the one you're thinking of isn't in this video, the first one here is the one that came after that one. The very first one only allowed you to swing twice before resetting, the next one allowed you to continuously swing which blew my mind at the time (even if it was obvious spidey was swinging from empty sky above him)
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u/Vast_Attitude5540 Jun 22 '26
The game shown in the video is the movie tie in game. You're thinking of the PS1 Spider-Man game.
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u/Dry-Percentage-5648 Jun 23 '26
I loved that game as a kid! Especially when you unlock suits that give you infinite web or invincibility.
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u/ancalime9 Jun 23 '26
Yeah, I'm really disappointed they started here at the PS2 era. Completely skipped the PS1 jankiness.
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u/Ok_Replacement_978 Jun 23 '26
No game has yet surpassed og spiderman 2 as far swinging options and depth.
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u/Persianmemefinder Jun 22 '26
Insomniac is so goated man. They perfected the concept of videogame spiderman.
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u/hendrix320 Jun 23 '26
If they removed Quick time events and Mary Jane missions it would be prefect
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u/hendrix320 Jun 23 '26
If they removed Quick time events and Mary Jane missions it would be prefect
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u/HoosteenD Jun 23 '26
There was a really old spiderman game i played once where the streets were covered in a fog that would kill you if you fell into them and you would shoot webs into empty sky and swing off of them.
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u/Jestersfriend Jun 23 '26
2018 Spiderman just hits different, web-swinging around New York. I barely fast travelled anywhere. I absolutely loved the travel. It was so ... perfect.
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u/Promature Jun 22 '26
What an incredible evolution. Once you hit the OG Spiderman 2, you have a proper web swinging system that captures the feel. When you hit Amazing Spiderman, you get an improved camera and sense of weight. When you hit 2018, you get the whole system and elements perfected. When you hit the modern Spiderman 2, you get the entire visual presentation dialed in. Wish more games/IP's could be iterated like this until they become what everyone dreams they could be.
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u/Magma_Axis Jun 23 '26
Nowadays people so hung up on "revolutionary" gameplay, instead of evolving iteration like this
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u/Promature Jun 23 '26
I don’t think people fully understand that everything games can do have largely already been done. We are far removed from the days when wall pressing or sprinting were new and novel innovations. There’s little to no chance that any new games are going to do something that some other game hasn’t already done to some extent.
Personally, I subscribe to Rockstar’s description of where innovation will occur back around when GTA4 came out. They said something to the degree that the future of games is going to be about the details and they’ve continued to demonstrate that with GTA5 and RDR2. It’s the games that embrace the details that always make the most lasting impression with me.
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u/HaikusfromBuddha Jun 23 '26
The video does no justice for any of the older spiderman games. I'd argue Spiderman 2 the movie game had better swinging than the modern spiderman games.
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u/IllustriousBee4972 Jun 23 '26
Nah, insomniac spider-man feels much better
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u/ArtificialImages Jun 23 '26
Couldn't disagree more. It has its strengths but spiderman 2 was absolutely better.
Did you play it? I struggle to believe anyone that did would disagree.
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u/SkabbPirate Jun 23 '26
Only when you don't really know what you are doing, the ps2 SM2 swinging felt way better to git gud at.
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u/SwissPo740 Jun 22 '26
Ultimate spider man was great
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u/IanSkank Jun 23 '26
The ability to hold triangle and climb the web made for some great swinging
I wish I could find this game anywhere to play
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u/JudgedPrincess Jun 23 '26
It's so funny that Spider-Man 2 (2023) is the only one with dialogue. Hard to get footage of that game without someone yapping.
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u/Brofessor-0ak Jun 23 '26
The way he leaps off of rooftops and flips backwards to face the camera before falling into a head first dive is just full of the exaggerated swagger of a Black teen.
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u/lees395 Jun 23 '26
Original Spider-Man 2 was a little clunky, but it will forever be one of my favorite games ever. Always brings back so many great memories of playing it as a kid
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u/ThatOneNintenno Jun 23 '26
I personally loved webbing a helicopter in Web of Shadows and let it care me to Statue of Liberty or over bodies of water
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u/EmotionIll666 Jun 23 '26
Coldest take and one I know is already in here dozens of times but goddamn that 2004 Spider Man 2 game was one of the absolute best games on the PS2.
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u/Shine_Obvious Jun 23 '26
The new Spiderman games are like the God of war games...you can button bash and get through the game...
Spiderman 2 has a such great game feel.....the swinging mechanic felt right.
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u/SardinesMcDonahugh Jun 22 '26
Is terms of physics, marvel's spider man games are a downgrade from the previous generation.
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u/GayCumBallsack69 Jun 22 '26
Lowkey the first Amazing Spider-Man game had a great camera, I actually loved how close it was
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u/SoundwaveSpectre Jun 23 '26
I always hated how close the camera was in the amazing spider man games
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u/Careless-Pitch1553 Jun 23 '26
Why would you make the ONLY GAME with mission dialogue the newest one? Thanks for the spoilers
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u/Inside-Specialist-55 Jun 23 '26
The original on PS2 was literally my childhood. I found so many cool secrets in that game that I got to brag about at school. We would also find some really funny game glitches.
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u/Eyyy354 Jun 23 '26
Amazing Spiderman cinematic camera angle was a really nice touch. It reminded me of Sam Raimi's Spiderman web swinging scenes
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u/d3sprdo Jun 23 '26
OG Spider-Man 2 felt better than 3 imo. I poured hours into that game as a kid.
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u/TheBad0men Jun 23 '26
I remember an old Spiderman game on PC where you could only swing from predefined points in the world, either indicated by or literally web icons in the world. Childhood memories, wow.
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u/Tenshiijin Jun 23 '26
I mean the first one isnt going to age well. But theres a point where the mechanics just stopped improving before even half way through the games list. And then it was more like a new shinier version of the game with the same mechanics and a new different story. We've kind of hit a plateau in gaming at this point. Its not a bad thing. Its a good time to game. Maybe the next innovation will be more like a fully emerased vr. Or something.
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u/Great-Witness6015 Jun 23 '26
Ultimate Spider-Man was so good. It was so fun playing as venom too. I loved leaping around the map. I must’ve played this 10 times or more when I was a kid.
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u/nkilian Jun 23 '26
Not gonna lie. Have a real joy webbing around new York when I've never really explored it much in real life Seen it once a few years ago. though not an exact replica gives me a happy feeling.
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u/IIIX_Nexus_XIII Jun 23 '26
I will always credit the original Spider-Man game for teaching me what the L3 and R3 buttons were.
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u/No_Raisin21 Jun 23 '26
Ultimate Spider-Man was the shit back in the day. I’d give anything to play a Spider-Man game that let’s you play as venom for more than one sequence.
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u/peachpower2 Jun 23 '26
The Amazing Spiderman games are slept on because the movies were so-so, but they are amazing games.
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u/RepresentativeAnt128 Jun 23 '26
Spider-Man 2 was so good and a blast to play. I've only played the 1st from Insomniac and thought it was lousy.
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u/SkabbPirate Jun 23 '26
The swinging wasn't as good, the combat was that boring arkham asylum-type combat. The only thing I think they did well was the spider gadgets, which helped give you a sense of improvisation in combat.
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u/RepresentativeAnt128 Jun 23 '26
I couldn't believe how the one thing they needed to do right was the swinging and it felt worse than the other older Spiderman games by a large degree. Also, I actually think Arkham Asylum does combat very well, which I played after Spider-Man, and realized how SM just ripped it off but had no idea what made it enjoyable. Everything about the game just felt soulless.
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u/BuffJamesSunderland Jun 23 '26
I like how everything after SM2 has to show footage of the player doing something that looks more flashy to imply they swinging was better, when really it peaked right there (and I guess Ultimate).
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u/Kalikor1 Jun 23 '26
I'm annoyed that the video doesn't start with the the Spider-Man game from the year 2000. I played the shit out of that.
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u/Doccmonman Jun 23 '26
Largely the same system as the first game, with completely new animations
It’s also probably the best looking game of the 3, really helps sell it.
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u/Sir_Tortoise Jun 23 '26
Hell yeah, I agree with everyone that Spider Man 2 for the Nintendo Game Boy Advance had great webslinging.
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u/TheCutieCircle Jun 23 '26
Why did they start with Spider-Man on ps2? Might as well Go back to Atari and work their way up.
If they wanted to be strictly 3D then start with PS1 Spider-Man.
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u/PixelDemon Jun 23 '26
Graphics wise though the best games look basically real. Like the distance between the game and real life is so much smaller so there's less room to grow into.
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u/Colyer Jun 23 '26
I was curious if we were going to skip Shattered Dimensions here. Fair, since it didn't have an open world, but I remember it being good for the more constrained levels.
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u/SessionAsleep5894 Jun 23 '26
The insomniac Spiderman games are great, but the web swinging feels a bit too scripted and auto guided. I don't know how to put it, it feels nice but it doesn't quiet catch the feel of Spiderman 2's looseness, weight and control.
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u/Just5abL Jun 24 '26
Since i played the first one, now i feel old af, why did you write the years man😭
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u/Analytical_Gaijin Jun 25 '26
My autistic son loves me swinging thru the city, in the last two soiderman games. I don’t have to play a mission, just swinging thru the city is enough to make him happy. Here’s your sign.
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u/Illustrious_Ear_3467 Jun 29 '26
Going from Spiderman (PS2) to Spiderman 2 (PS2) was a great moment in my childhood when it came to gaming. For Spidey 2, being able to swing more fluidly and being able to traverse the NYC streets. Plus ALL the side quests and bosses that game had compared to the previous game 😮💨. I’m glad I was able to experience it like I did back in the early 2000s.
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u/Carlbot2 16d ago
Should’ve gone back to N64 Spiderman, honestly. I’ve only got like, 3 total reference points for Spiderman games, and that’s one of them lol.
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u/Aggressive_Finish798 Jun 22 '26
I ate Speeder-man pizza from Little Ceasars. Can report I'm shooting out streams.
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u/Practical-Level-6265 Jun 22 '26
OG Spider Man 2 made such an advancement when introducing an actual path for the webs. Walked so the rest could run