I need a web-slinging sickness bag.
After more than 20 years of comic books and cartoons, I'd like to think I'd be a pretty good superhero if I was bombarded with cosmic rays or given a mysterious green ring. However, after spending some time with Spider-Man 3, I'm starting to doubt I could save New York without throwing up all over it.
The camera is super-villain bad in this game.
As Spidey swings around New York -- a version of the city that's 2.5 times bigger than it was in Spider-Man 2 -- the camera swings and swivels like mad behind the hero. Granted, you're in control of it via the mouse, but it's nonsensical control. Rather than have the mouse direct the webs you're slinging with the handheld device, Spider-Man 3 has you use your A and D buttons while the mouse controls the camera, combat and webbing. The convoluted controls are one of several flubs that remove the fun from your time in Spidey's PJs.
Just like Pete's descent into darkness, Spider-Man 3 gets worse the longer you play. The game opens up with Bruce Campbell acting as our familiar narrator and walking Spidey through his new found controls. Ol' web-head can now web zip with one button; his Spider-Sense turns the screen black and white while displaying enemies in red, allies in green and objectives in yellow; and Spider-Reflexes allow the wall-crawler to slow time and counter attacks with a single button press. You get the basics down while saving some folks from a fire, and get your first glimpse of New York.
Yargh.
It might make you carsick, but there's plenty to do in Spider-Man 3. The title features 42 missions, a plethora of random events such as hurt cops and gang fights that pop up as you swing around the city, races, skydiving challenges, 75 gang tokens, 35 secret tokens, 30 skyscraper tokens and 30 subway tokens for the web-head to tackle.
If the same handful of crimes in the last Spider-Man game kept you happy, the expanded roster of events -- Activision said there are three times as many events in Spider-Man 3 -- will keep you playing. Can they get repetitive? Sure. It seems every mission has you stopping a car, but sometimes you'll get to do something cool such as follow a speeding police cruiser to a crime scene. Even better is the fact that the pop-up crimes aren't just there to be there this time around -- they play into Spidey's Crime Fighting Index. See, New York is broken up into different gang zones. These zones are visible on the in-game map as well as tracked on Spidey's stat menu. It's up to you to patrol these areas, bust bad guys and watch the zones turn from angry, gang-controlled neon to peaceful, Spidey-influenced green. The better you do, the more upgrades you get for your health and reflexes.
But please don't let the expanded crimes fool you. Like any super-villain in Peter's life, this title's got problems.
Although New York is prettier than last time, Spider-Man 3 is not up to snuff visually. Cars, buildings and textures pop in and out as you shoot through areas; you'll still see the same civilians over and over; the frame-rate chugs along as Spidey swings; the view gets a smear of Vaseline as lights in the night crop up; and collision detection is laughable - watch in horror as Spidey sinks into window awnings and stands with one foot off of a car.
However, the biggest problem in Spider-Man 3 is the simple fact that the missions aren't fun. Even if you're just in this for swinging and random crime -- which also suffer from the aforementioned framerate and car-stopping problems -- you'll have to suffer through the storylines to improve Spidey's skills, and you'll find yourself ready to web your own eyes closed in frustration. Guarding gas dispensers from a horde of attacking lizards and defusing bombs in the subway become exercises in anger, and they only serve to propel you towards terrible bosses.
Look at the leaders of the Arsenic Candy, one of the gangs plaguing your city. While the rest of the all-female crew can be dropped with a few punches, the mallet-toting leaders of the group are all but invulnerable to regular Spidey attacks as they hide behind their wobbly hammers. To win, you have to let the girls come at you. When they do, a yellow fist appears over their heads, you hold down the reflex button, time slows, Spidey dodges the attack, you press another button, and Spidey hits back to inflict damage. It's easy, but it's also excruciatingly tedious.
"But, Greg," you say. "It can't be that bad. You beat those girls in a few exchanges, right?"
Sadly, I was right.
The Kingpin fight is twenty minutes of joyless reversing. Spider-Man stands in the middle of the room, the Kingpin attacks, Spidey dodges, and Spidey punches Fisk once in the face. If I punched him more than once, I risked getting caught in a combo or running out of Spider-Reflexes and watching Fisk land a devastating attack. I played it safe and patiently countered the mountain of a man one slow, boring punch at a time.
The worst news? Kingpin isn't the exception when it comes to boss battles - they all suck. New Goblin? Run in circles while Harry shoots crap at you and then reverse his attack to win. Kraven? Let him rush you, reverse and win. Scorpion? Run in circles to dodge his laser, let him rush you, reverse and win.
I wish I had more good news for you, but I don't. One of the photo missions has Spider-Man standing in a populated park taking pictures; most pedestrians don't react to battles in front of them; and let's not forget the lame Mary Jane Thrill Rides in which you and MJ swing through the city collecting hearts that are floating in the midair.
Stan Lee must be rolling over in his bed of money.
©2007, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved
This action-adventure game is neither amazing nor spectacular.
We understand that there are hardcore Spider-Man fans out there. There are people who will eat up anything and everything Spider-Man related no matter how bad it is. We can't stop these people from running out and buying, say, Spider-Man 3 for the PC. Heck, they probably already have their copies and are already writing in an angry letter about the score we're giving this game, but we feel it's our duty to warn our loyal readers about Spidey's latest adventure for the PC.
For starters, let's get one thing straight: Spider-Man 3 isn't a complete loss, but it's damned close. The biggest gripe we have with Activision's newest addition to the Spidey game franchise is how poorly the game runs. Both on computers in the office and on our home systems (both of which are fairly beefy dedicated gaming PCs) Spider-Man 3 chugged along like the Kingpin in a wading pool filled with molasses. This was the case even when we turned all the detail settings as low as we could get them and dropped the resolution down to 800x600. It's frustrating to see this game run (relatively) fine on consoles but so poorly on our PCs.
We figure this is most likely the result of poor optimization and high system requirements. The shoddy frame rate directly affects gameplay, especially certain "heroic" scenes that play out just like the interactive cut scenes from Resident Evil 4. During these segments you'll have to quickly press the button that appears on the screen to have Spidey successfully pull off an impressive stunt. Press the button too late, or press the wrong button, and Spidey will fail. A poor frame rate will throw off your timing and make these segments a tedious and repetitive task.
Keeping the Streets Clean
Throughout Spider-Man 3 you'll fight a number of street gangs and other hoodlums. You'll be able to beat them down in random and pre-set missions where you'll help clean up the city. Your missions will include finding stolen goods, finding and defusing bombs, rescuing civilians, and chasing cars and choppers and other vehicles though the streets of New York. You'll also pick up photography missions from the Daily Bugle.
When you're not fighting crime you can take part in a number of different challenges, such as thrilling Mary Jane by taking her out web swinging, or racing through different checkpoints to set new speed records. There really is a lot to do in this game. Between the main storyline (which is similar but not exactly like how the film goes), the crime-fighting and photography missions, and all the challenges, there's enough content to keep you gaming for a very long time... in theory.
Punch, Kick, Repeat
Sadly, these missions end up getting repetitive. It's true that as you play you'll learn more moves and become more powerful, but combat is so simplistic that you can't help but be bored after a short while. You have two attack buttons, a jump button, and a button for your web attacks. Pounding away on the different buttons is usually enough to pull off a number of wild combos.
You don't have a block button -- instead you have a dodge button. When you hold this down time slows down and Spidey will automatically dodge any incoming attacks. You can't hold down this button forever. A blue bar on your hud goes down as you use it, and when you run out you have to wait for it to recharge by itself. We wish there was still a block button so that you're not left completely defenseless when the bar runs out.
The only part of the game we really like is the web-swinging, and even that is hindered by the poor frame rate. Fans will be pleased to see a number of spidey villains appear that aren't from the movie, including Rhino, The Lizard, and Kraven the Hunter. Bruce Campbell is back as narrator, and as always, his quips are enjoyable.
At its heart Spider-Man 3 is a boring game with high production values and a big license attached to it. The developers have done a good job of recreating New York City, and we appreciate the freedom the game allows. Graphically the game can look spectacular, but there doesn't seem to be a PC that can run it well. The music is solid, and most of the A-list Hollywood cast from the film voice their characters in the game. It's easy to see how appealing this all looks on paper. Sadly, once you load the game up and get playing, it quickly becomes obvious that this is really just a rushed port that isn't worth your time.
©2007, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved