Tech for education

Everyone loves superheroes. Whether were talking about movies, series, comics, or games, a protagonist with supernatural powers tasked with saving the world has always been a concept used and adored by people, so its no wonder were constantly seeing new games featuring all kinds of superheroes. And today we are talking about a special game, namely Marvels Spider-Man 2, the latest game from Insomniac Games and a colossal success in every way. It brings new gameplay mechanics, improves on many of the shortcomings of previous titles, and is a technical marvel. Its launching today, exclusively on PS5 right now, and its probably the best game Insomniac has ever made. Its not flawless and has a few minor issues, but the complete package that Spider-Man 2 delivers is a triumph of game design and storytelling that will be hard to match in the future. Without further ado, lets move on to the review. Story and atmosphere We start of course with the story. Spider-Man 2 picks up shortly after the end of the events of Miles Morales and features both Peter Parker and Miles, New Yorks new spider-man couple, in their fight to protect the city from villains. Im not going to go into too much detail about the plot itself, especially since the first major twist happens pretty early on and I dont want to spoil the surprise. But what you need to know is that Spider-Man 2 is the embodiment of a true blockbuster movie in game format. The narrative thread progresses quickly and is full of action scenes, interspersed with explosions, major confrontations and shocking revelations at every turn. It doesnt let you get bored and I was glued to the screen from the bombastic beginning to the emotional end. In addition to the two Spider-Mans, the game also puts more emphasis on Mary Jane, Peters current girlfriend, as well as Harry Osborn, his best friend, who appears here for the first time and plays a rather important role in narrative. Its a welcome change and the dialogues between the characters are full of charm and funny lines. The voice actors also did a great job most of the time, and overall I think the story is one of the games strong points. But it wouldnt be a story with and about superheroes if we didnt also have a powerful and diabolical antagonist to face, right And thats where Kraven comes in, a big, strong boy who wants to hunt down the citys currently rehabilitated ex-villains for fun, causing a lot of mayhem and terror in the process, of course. Hes a good bad guy even if not the only one, but I dont want to give away spoilers, but he falls into that generic villain trap. His threat is portrayed well during the story, so I have nothing to complain about, but a lot of times Kraven seems a bit one-dimensional. Moving on to better things, the developers have also thrown in all sorts of very well-written side stories in Spider-Man 2 that further shape the big picture when it comes to the characters personalities and personalities. Theyre welcome additions, and I had as much fun with them as I did with the main storyline, which speaks volumes for the level of quality of the side quests. Dont expect to see a different or completely new approach, though. Unlike titles like God of War Ragnarok or The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom where the developers have complete freedom to take the story wherever they want, Spider-Man is not the property of the studio, in this case Insomniac, but of those from Marvel. This means that those who had the task of writing the story in this game had to be guided by some narrative arcs already existing in the lore of the franchise. Thats not necessarily a bad thing, as I enjoyed seeing how the writers were able to integrate already known characters or stories into the narrative, but youll definitely run into a lot of familiar faces from both the movies and the comics. That being said, if you havent had a chance to play the first game in the series and the mini sequel, Im talking about 2018s Marvels Spider-Man and Spider-Man Miles Morales, I recommend that you do. Many of the characters you meet for the first time there also return in the new title, and you may be left out in some cases if you have no idea about the events that happened in the past. Alternatively, you can watch some videos on YouTube that explain the story to you, it works like that. Gameplay Now we move on to the gameplay, a place where Insomniac managed to refine the experience even more. First off, the combat is more accurate and satisfying, which I wasnt expecting to say considering how cool the fights have been in past games. But it happened, and the combat in Spider-Man 2 is a pleasure. Theres still a lot of square spam, but now youve got even more special abilities and cool gadgets to use as you please. Also in this chapter, a parry system was added in Spider-Man 2, similar to what we see in other games. Basically, some attacks from some of the enemies cant be avoided and must be parried, at which point the one youre fighting is thrown off balance and leaves you the opportunity to hit them with some shots of your own. And the variety of enemies you fight has been improved. There are more types of attacks coming your way and overall the fights are a bit more dynamic and complex, which I really appreciate. I was afraid this might make the game substantially harder, which could have turned into a problem considering I didnt want a souls-like with Spider-Man, but Im glad to say that things are not like that. Sure, you have to be more careful and every fight will test your reflexes, but most mobs die relatively quickly and I didnt find the game too hard, at least on the normal difficulty level. However, if you find melee combat in the open field challenging, another very good option would be to take a more silent approach. Stealth also plays a big part in Spider-Man 2 now, and in theory at least, its entirely possible to kill all the enemies one by one while going invisible. Your main tool for this purpose is a new gadget that works quite simply. You pick a wall or ledge for the spider web to cling to, press a button, and voila youve got some kind of wire in front of you that you can walk on top of bad guys and tie them to when doing silent takedowns. What hasnt changed from past games, and Im glad to say that, is how you get around town. When I first played Marvels Spider-Man in 2018 I quickly came to the conclusion that the way Spidey flies between buildings with the help of the spiders web is the most fun way to get from one place to another, and I can honestly say that I used the maximum fast travel option a few times when I was testing to see how fast the game loads, but more on that later. Until then, the webslinging system, as the folks at Insomniac call it, is back here and better than ever.