Welcome back to the Big Apple, conditions look bleak as Sandman has covered the town in… uh sand, and now both Spider-Man are ground around town, searching for petty villains thinking they could do crime in both Manhattan AND Queens? Big mistake.
Only this time, we’ll be doing a Miles Specialty as part of this release on PC. Think smaller, not larger. Think of something full of potential in the palm of your hands, which you WILL feel as if this game is going to heat you up as you traverse New York in double time.
I think that’s all.. about the Deck.
Of Spider and Men, And Venom
Summary wise for Spider-Man 2’s story, is that Peter Parker and Miles Morales get to meet up with Peter’s old buddy Harry Osborn, as they all try to stop Kraven the Hunter from hunting down one of the previous game’s villains, The Lizard aka Dr.Connors, with both Harry and then Peter using an exosuit that has the Venom Symbiote to fend off this new villain, alongside the intended consequences of using THAT suit from a prologue amount of time.
It’s a pretty good follow-up to both previous titles, with incredible continuity between them, with previous side characters from both games given their own arc, and still helps players see how both Peter and Miles have matured since the last time we played them. Both have their own respective moments within the story that helps them “be greater, together”, pardon my usage of their own tagline.
The gameplay is mostly the same, with how the combos now work when both Spider-Man are in the same area together or even when Peter gets the Venom powerup, you’ll see more changes in ways of beating up goons, including the symbiote being part of the combat as well.
Most of this has already been covered in our first review back in 2023, so now it’s time for the nitty-gritty of the PC port.
Silver Linings Port
The PC version can be described as a bit lackluster, considering the magnitude of the game’s popularity, and a bit of an interesting port as well since it is running fantastically on the Steam Deck, with it getting Verified at the time of writing this review.
The usual current-gen ports do include the usual AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution, Nvidia DLSS setting, and Ray-Tracing availability that could make playing the game on even the lowest of graphics cards (like I’ve seen it run on a Nvidia GTX 710, for some reason!) and for the Deck, which this review is based on, does well to stick to a solid 30 to 40 fps at the Deck’s 900P resolution, with the game’s Frame Generation doing the heavy lifting to make it as smooth as if you’re playing the Spider-Man release on the PS4.
The only part where it kicks the Deck’s ass was the intro fight with Sandman, with my lend unit doing its best, hot fans and all, trying to render quickly as Spider-Man gets thrown outwards from the battle zone and you have to quickly swing back The most aggressive frames drops were from this portion of the game, as the later on battle, when we were helping The Lizard escape Kraven, that part is more solid with less intense pieces.
And when the proper open-world is available to our control, those frames solidify to the aforementioned PS4-esque frame rate, which considering I’m playing it on a device that could be bought anywhere, is pretty neat.
And three weeks after its initial release, this port is what exactly players would have wanted at launch, really. But hey, better late than a lackluster port forever.
Verdict
Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 could have used more time in the oven to make the PC version as good as it can be, considering the content we have in this is less than the first game’s release on PC, but Nixxes was dealt a bad hand and has shown that they are still working to make it the best version on the market.
Price-wise though, it feels a bit much but it would be a great game to get it on sale and enjoy all 10.4ft of Venom in all its Ray-tracing glory… or on the go. Your choice.
Played on PC (via Steam Deck). Review copy provided by PlayStation Asia.
Also read our PS5 review here.