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Spider-Man has faced off against many a foe in his long and storied career, but none quite as sinister as the last two video games based on his adventures. After two excellent video game outings, the movie-based Spider-Man 3 was a bug-filled mess rushed to release, and Spider-Man: Friend or Foe grounded our favourite hero in favour of action of a more kid-friendly kind.
After years (no, decades) of trying but failing, Hollywood finally got comic book movies right. Video games haven't fared as well. Director Sam Raimi is responsible for the silver screen version of Spider-Man and offers this insight as to why video games movies, well, suck:
There has been 40 years of different comic books... Writers have had to really get into the characters of the superheroes themselves. They explore their relationships, their loves, their villains, their stories — there's so much more to draw upon...
Activision treated us to an early look at Spider-Man: Web Of Shadows at Comic-Con this week, giving us a taste of the game's suit-switching mechanic and highlighting boss battles with classic villains Venom and Vulture. In Web of Shadows, Venom has infected the people of New York with a symbiote plague, creating hundreds of mini-Venoms that our friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man must dispatch.
Peter Parker has been infected by the alien symbiote, too, but has total control over its abilities, allowing him to switch from the more nimble red and blue suit to a more destructive black and white suit on the fly. Both suits have their advantages and disadvantages, as the black suit lets Spidey whip foes with symbiotic tentacles and carries a heftier punch, but can result in more collateral damage to the city.
Let's jump right in. Here's Spider-Man creator Stan Lee talking about video games at Comic Con:
When you talk about games evolving over the years and becoming more like movies, in many ways, they've gone beyond movies", he said. "To do a movie is difficult, but it's linear. There's a beginning, a middle and an end, and that's it — you write a story.
In a videogame, you're writing many stories within the story. It's a totally different structure and a totally different philosophy of writing and, I think, a much, much more difficult one. I get the feeling more work goes into these videogames than even goes into the movies.
I marvel at the fact the games look as good, and in some cases better, as the most expensive movies. [Those] guys are just geniuses. Now you watch one of these games and it's like watching the greatest superhero movie, except you're part of it. It's indescribable.
Yep, Stan Lee is awesome. But we knew that.
Games Are Exceeding Movies [Eurogamer] [Pic]
Following the whole "Seize Control" theme they kicked off by allowing fans to vote on the preorder bonus for Spider-Man: Web Of Shadows, Activision is now giving players a chance to decide which box art the game ships with this fall. The choices are limited to the left image, which is almost mildly appealing, and the right one, which for some reason makes Spidey's arms and hands into display monitors for concept art.
While you struggle between mildly pleasing and completely stupid covers, keep in mind the special message below the voting section on the website. "Activision shall not be bond by the outcome of the community vote and Activisions decision(s) and selection(s) shall be final and binding". So yeah, vote, but don't expect it to actually matter. Awesome.
Packaging Artwork Vote [Web of Shadows Official Site]
God of War designer David Jaffe is sad. Sad and angry. He is a Marvel fan — no, he is a "Marvel fan for life". And as such, he knows one thing: Spider-Man deserves way better. In a recent blog post, he writes an open letter to "The People Who Make Marvel Comics Video Games", stating:
The same source that leaked details on unannounced Microsoft and Activision products has tons of data on a huge line-up of future Spider-Man licensed games. Two of the titles—which appear to be planned as Wii exclusives—take advantage of control schemes unique to Nintendo's console, with Wii Balance Board support for one, a unique "web shooter" controller for the other.
In Spider-Man: Agile Warrior, players control Spider-Man's feet via the Wii Balance Board to make him jump, soar through the air, climb walls and kick and cartwheel foes. The other Wii exclusive title, known as Spider-Man: Webmaster looks like it will ship with a game-specific controller that lets players flick their wrists to shoot web balls, aim their webs via the Wii Remote and use gestures to swing across Manhattan.
But that's not all. There are a total of fourteen potential Spider-Man games in development to some degree—though some may simply be nothing more than concepts. The full list after the jump.
Man, the HMV at Oxford Street in London is going to be jumping this weekend! Not only do they get Ubisoft's Jade Raymond showing off Assassin's Creed on Saturday, but now Spider-Man himself is going to be showing up tomorrow to personally sign copies of Spider-Man: Friend or Foe. This is truly a big deal of course, because as the webhead is busy scrawling out his name for you people (To Dave, My Biggest Fan. Love, Peter P Spider-Man), god knows how many innocents are being mugged, raped, and murdered on the streets of New York City. Like my uncle always used to say, with great power comes great opportunities to travel abroad and write your name on stuff. The only drawback to the whole event? Having to actually buy a copy of Spider-Man: Friend or Foe.
Posted by Logan Booker at 9:29 AM on September 14, 2007
Recently, Activision held its annual Activate Asia event, this time up in the temperate loveliness of Cairns, Queensland. Activate is like a mini-E3, except there’s more sun and water, and less fanboys. Well, no fanboys.
Among the many games the publisher displayed (which we’ll talk about soon), was Spider-Man: Friend or Foe. Now, I’m a big fan of Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, so despite the bad rap our US counterparts dished out on the demo, I was optimistic.
When Spider-Man: Friend or Foe was first announced, I had hopes that the new offering might be a means of redemption for the shoddy piece of work that was Spider-Man 3. If the demo released on Xbox Live this morning is any indication, what we are getting instead is a game that tries to be a cartoony, trimmed down Ultimate Alliance but ends up feeling more akin to the Spider-Man beat-em ups of the SNES era.
