3.5/5 ★ – PenguinKiddo's review of Ultimate Spider-Man.

(Updated!) Ultimate Spider-Man is a great adaptation of the comics that came before it. But if you’ve never read an Ultimate comic or even played a Spider-Man game, this is a pretty basic Spider-Man game with a few fancy bells. Visually the game is popping with color and the cutscenes are told with such energy through the use of comic panels. It all looks good, but it’s when the game is in motion that things can look funky. The music is definitely underrated, with some pieces really fitting the mood of web swinging or chase scenes. Gameplay is split between Spider-Man and Venom, with Venom being one of this game’s biggest selling points. Spider-Man’s gameplay is almost similar to how he played in his previous game, Spider-Man 2. However, most of the mechanics have been simplified. Combat has a noticeable lack of combos which can make fighting basic thugs a bit boring. Web swinging is still great, and the ability to climb your webs adds some depth into how you traverse. Venom is obviously much stronger than Spider-Man, and so there’s more going with his combat. You can throw cars which helps with taking out bigger threats or groups of enemies. In a funny way, it’s a simplified version of Hulk: Ultimate Destruction which came out the same year. You can leap tall buildings and smash enemies in a similar fashion. What does make Venom unique is his need to feed on people for energy. It’s honestly a weird yet fun mechanic that can make Battles intense when you’re low on health. As for the story, it does feel like a story that belongs in the comics. Getting the writer and artist from the Ultimate comics to help makes the game feel more authentic. Sadly, the story itself isn’t very interesting. You don’t need to read the comics to understand what’s going on, but it’s a lack luster story by itself. The voice acting is hit or miss, but all the actors do a fine job. The levels do a nice job of teaching you the mechanics, but some bosses will kick your butt the first time. Especially the final boss, which can be cheap at some moments. There are also some chase scenes that can either be challenging or annoying on some runs. The game will add sections where you need to save civilians during the chase which is actually really cool. But other then those two types of missions, there isn’t too many different scenarios you’ll go through. Once you’ve finished the main story, there isn’t much to come back to. You can collect tokens to unlock comic covers or alternate costumes, but it’s so tedious that I just never bothered to find them all. The biggest downside to this game is just having nothing to do after the main story. And the story itself is short, so it’ll disappoint you if you really dig the gameplay and want to continue playing afterwards. Overall, Ultimate Spider-Man is a good game. But with all the style and uniqueness added, it never has enough to make you want to come back. If you’ve never played it, I’d say give it a shot. Unless you’re a big Spider-Man fan, I wouldn’t pay more than $20 on it. It’s a good game, but it could’ve been so much more. It could’ve truly been Ultimate.