Ultimate Spider-Man Review

Missions

Occasionally, you have to actually complete missions rather than swinging and jumping all over the city, and these tasks are exactly like they were in Spider-Man 2. You’ll rescue people and break up bank robberies when people call for help out on the street as well as beat up a bunch of thugs in combat missions. There are also races just like in SM2 where you have to swing through markers spread around the city. Unfortunately, these missions get repetitive pretty quickly and the boring races are required this time around to advance the story. Rather than having set story missions you move to at your own leisure, Ultimate Spider-Man forces you to collect a certain number of objects, beat a number of races, and do a bunch of other junk before the story will move forward. Lame. Luckily, the boss fights and actual story missions tend to be better which makes all of the running around worth it.

Minor Issues

Ultimate Spider-Man is definitely a fun game, but there are quite a few things that hinder the experience a bit. The biggest and most disappointing aspect is that the locomotion aspect of the game – just moving around the city – isn’t nearly as fun as before. I spent hours just goofing off in Spider-Man 2 but that isn’t the case with Ultimate Spider-Man. The Venom sections are considerably better and jumping around the city and eating people is quite fun, but there isn’t nearly enough of it. Also, the game is very short in spite of all of the item collecting and races you have to play through. You can beat it in just 6-7 hours which is pretty darn short these days. All in all, Ultimate Spider-Man feels like a step backwards instead of forwards for Spider-Man videogames.

Graphics and Sound

One area where Ultimate Spider-Man definitely doesn’t disappoint is in the presentation. It copies the visual style of the Ultimate Spider-Man comics perfectly and it really does look like a comic come to life. The characters are all extremely sharp and absolutely fantastic looking and the animation is very smooth. Cutscenes are presented in panels like a comic book but with lots of animation and movement. The city of New York is slightly smaller than in Spider-Man 2, but it looks considerably better and is more varied thanks to some lower lying residential areas and a generally tighter and more claustrophobic overall design.

The sound is also very well done. There is a ton of spoken dialogue and the voice actors do a great job with it. Sound effects for combat and the busy city streets are also pretty good. The music is also well done and there is more of it than in the last game.

Bottom Line

Overall, Ultimate Spider-Man is a good, fun game that, unfortunately, couldn’t meet the impossibly high expectations set for it. Don’t misunderstand me, it is still a good game that is worth playing, but I am a huge fan of the Spider-Man 2 videogame and Ultimate Spider-Man just isn’t as good. There are a lot of positives here, though, and the storyline, presentation, and ability to play as both Spider-Man and Venom definitely help shore up the somewhat weak gameplay. If you are a Spider-Man fan, you’ll be happy with what Ultimate Spider-Man has to offer and I think most people will be pleased with a purchase. It isn’t perfect, however, so giving it a rental before you add it to your collection is probably a good idea.