Preview- The Amazing Spider-Man
The Amazing Spider-Man game is set just after the events of the film. This has given the developers more freedom to explore things they couldn’t do if they were following the story structure of the film and allowed them to branch out and discover new possibilities. This includes exploring Peter Parker’s ‘untold story’ as he takes on characters such as Rhino and Iguana.
Thankfully this game sees the return of an open-world environment to explore as you swing your way across Manhattan. This is truly the best style of gameplay for the franchise and a new camera follows Spider-Man’s movements as he swings across the city at speed. This is an impressive effect and really shows off the feeling of freedom and free falling across New York, however it may leave those who suffer from motion sickness feeling slightly nauseous.
A new feature for the game is the Web Rush mode. Triggering Web Rush will slow everything down and give you plenty of time to choose your next move. The game displays destinations for Spider-Man to sling to with yellow icons. With just a click of a button Spider-Man will jump to one of the icons without you having to maneuver him there. This is a time-saver and is especially important when completing missions as that extra few seconds to think can be vital to the success of your task.
Spider-Man has been brought into the 21st century as he now comes equipped with a smartphone. This gives him a map to navigate his way around the city and provides him details of new missions.
One mission sees Spider-Man helping police chase down a getaway car. Using his acrobatic skills it wasn’t long before Spider-Man had caught up with the bad guys and landed on the bonnet of their car. Then a small mini-game followed where pressing different buttons in time helps you dodge attacks and damage the windscreen. Upon completing the mini-game Spider-Man wraps the car up in a giant web before quickly moving on to find something else to do. It’s a seamless, quick and fun piece of gameplay, which is what a Spider-Man game should be all about.
The combat will feel familiar to fans of the Rocksteady Studios Batman games. Spider-Man can suddenly find himself surrounded by enemies, but using combinations, counters and special moves it doesn’t take long to fight them off. However if you take too much damage you will see that Spider-Man’s suit visibly changes with cuts and tears, forcing you to consider leaving the action for a short while.
As Spider-Man completes missions and progresses further through the storyline he earns experience points. These points can be used to customise Spider-Man with new moves and abilities. There is the suggestion that the Web Rush mode could have a cool down period which would be upgraded by using these points.
The Amazing Spider-Man looks set to be a return to form for the franchise, possibly even scaling the heights of Spider-Man 2 on the PS2 all those years ago. We look forward to getting more hands-on with the game in the near future.