The Spider-Man Video Games thread!

[Xenon]

Marvel Super Heroes
Platforms: Arcade, Saturn, Playstation
Release (initial): 1994
Rating: 8/10
Notable: The Debut of Maximum Spider
Thoughts: This was a major hassle to get working. Honestly if I knew where to find a cabinet I'd have strongly considered just playing it for real. Sadly the only thing i could get working was the Playstation version. But whatever. This game is, for all intents and purposes, the second game in what would become the Vs. series of games. Starting with X-Men:Children of the Atom, Capcom developed a series of Marvel fighting games, CotA, then this, then X-Men vs. Street Fighter, then Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter, then Marvel vs. Capcom, MvC2, MvC3, Ultimate MvC3, and finally MvC Infinite, where Marvel's meddling diminished the game and may have killed the franchise. Modern Marvel oh boy. But we're not here to talk about that. Unlike the proper vs. series that followed it, MSH is a 1 on best 2 out of 3 fighter. There are 8 stages you have to play through in Arcade mode, six against the normal cast of Spider-Man, Captain America, Psylocke, Wolverine, Shuma-Gorath, Blackheart, Juggernaut, Iron Man, Hulk, and Magneto. The last two being against Doctor Doom and then finally Thanos. Against everyone but Thanos there are Infinity Gems that you and your opponent have. You start with one and then pick up another after each stage that has one on its card. By the end you'll start with five of the gems and are quite powerful. The gem effects can be quite game breaking. As Spider-Man the Power gem created a mirror that attacked the enemy from behind, which is mostly a visual effect but leads to massive damag.e But the Soul gem heals you and the Reality gem gives you projectiles, so there are a variety of effects. Thanos, meanwhile, will steal all the gems, and I only managed to knock one out of him during my series of fights with him. Thanos was also the only time I ahad to retry. I lost a couple of rounds, but Always pulled it out except vs. Thanos, who is just intentionally OP. I mean, he's no SNK boss, mind you, but I've beaten the home versions of the later games and I feel like those bosses were more spectacle and easier. But overall, game was pretty simple. I'm sure it's also quite broken from a balance perspective. Basically no one plays this one anymore. But I have fond memories of seeing this machine in the mid-90s and watching Spider-Man and Captain America and Wolverine in that beautiful animation style was always a thrill. For a lot of Marvel characters this series of games really defined how I think they should look. Iron Man, Captain America, Blackheart, this game is where my iconic versions of them all came.



For this I just did a quick run through with Spide-Man, then played with Cap until I faced Spider-Man so I could see his stage and listen to his whole theme. The Spider-Man run went mostly smooth. I took down Cap, Blackheart (close to satisfying but not quite Mephisto), Hulk, Shuma-Gorath, Iron Man, Magneto, and then finished up with Doctor Doom and Thanos. I got a perfect on Hulk and lost rounds to Shuma Gorath and Iron Man, but only lost lost to Thanos. That fight took like fifteen or twenty attempts because he's OP, but that was that. Afterwards I was surprised to see a pretty robust ending. I was expecting one scene and a couple of text boxes, but it was like three scenes lol. Still, a lot for a fighting game. As a fighting game this game is broken as all get out, and there's really no reason to play it when MvC and MvC2 exist. But it's got an ending advantage, at least, lol. highly recommended if you're fond of one of these characters, but that's about all its good for now.


(hindsight does weird things to some of these lines lol.....*sigh*)


Next Up: The Amazing Spider-Man: Lethal Foes

[Xenon]

The Amazing Spider-Man: Lethal Foes
Platform: Super Famicom
Release: 1995
Rating: 7/10
Notables: First appearance of The Beetle, Possibly the first appearance of Norman Osborn Green Goblin
Thoughts: This one is a little special. i didn't know it existed until I had the thought to do this little project. A Japan exclusive Super Famicom Action platformer starring our favorite wallcrawler. Fortunately others HAD heard of this and had translated the game, though the story is....uh.....odd. The story starts with Peter late for a date with MJ when his Spider-Sense goes off as the Beetle is pulling some heist. This leads to what must be Spider-Man's worst day ever, as he goes from level to level and bad guy to bad guy. Beetle, Lizard, Mysterio, Smythe (man that guy was super popular for like five years and then completely disappeared), Green Goblin, Scorpion, Venom, Doc Ock, and yes finally Carnage show up to torment Spidey, though you do get to fight Carnage with Venom's help. Adn...that's basically it. AFter each stage someone shows up or something happens to lead you to another problem where you'll go through the sometimes very short stage and beat a boss (except one level randomly doesn't have a boss and the last level has two). The controls are not bad but they are...a little different. you jump very high and have built in motion with your mostly useless web swing but you can attack, jump, jump kick, duck and kick, and shoot web along with a charging attack and an uppercut (Spidey will combo his normal attacks). The game is mostly easy eacept for Doc Ock, who has basically no strategy other than arrive with full health and trade uppercuts until he dies. Most other bosses are wholly unprepared for you to duck and kick, and you can even crawl on the ground (along with the walls, ceiling, and sometimes background) so you can just avoid all of some enemies attacks and kick them to death. But the presentation is beautiful and the action is pretty fun and while short (you have to play the whole level again if you die though so they're trying to pad it out) and timed for some reason this is in the running with Maximum Carnage as the best Spidey game so far.




As I mentioned earlier though, the story is kinda nuts. I don't know how much of this is translation issues but i suspect most is original. you see how I listed Green Goblin up there? yeah that's Norman. I checked the dates and this game came out in early 1995. Norman wouldn't be resurrected in the comic until the end of 1996. ANd it's not just that Norman didn't die in this universe, no, Peter specifically mentions that Norman was dead and Norman replies "the Green goblin never dies!", which is pretty crazy whne you think about it. There's no way this little japanese studio knew about Norman's resurrection in 1995. He'd been dead of over twenty years at that point. That he came back at all is one of the series first great blunders. But that's not all Despite otherwise appearing to be set roughly currently (Ben might have been Spider-Man at this time), it apparently takes place in a post-OMD continuity unlike Lost Hunt, because Mary Jane, though only referenced, is referenced as his girlfriend, which of course she wasn't that since 1978 or so, lol. It's a bizarre little thing that kinda fits (at least right now) but it would have been a mistake at the time? I also don't love the ending. You never do figure out why everyone was up to no good today, and the end is Doc Ock setting his lab to explode while he escapes, and then Carnage comes in and you and Venom have to fight him before escaping the lab. Then Venom is going to fight you again, but Carnage comes out, having survived thanks to an ominous "deal" with Otto, and then runs off while Venom chases him and Peter...just says F it and leaves to go meet MJ. Like....what?

So yeah, maybe you don't need that translation patch. Play it because you want a fun 2-D Spider-Man game, which this basically is.



Next Up: Seperation Anxiety (28 to go)

[Xenon]

Venom and Spider-Man: Seperation Anxiety
Platforms: Super Nintendo, Genesis
Year: 1995
Rating: 6/10
Notables: First appearance of the Venom spawn, don't ask me their names no one knows or cares.
Thoughts: Seperation Anxiety accomplishes the rare feat of being a Video game sequel that is actually worse than its predecessor. Though not by a lot. The sequel to Maximum Carnage, my experience with this game was limited to seeing the ad in Gaming Magazines and wishing I could play it too. It's probably for the best I never got the chance. This game plays almost identically to Maximum Carnage. Same moveset. The double smash seems to work more often so that's cool. Different superheroes except for Captain America and they're a little more generous with them. You can now have more than 9 lives, which is nice (the display never goes above 9, but they are there). The thing is they redrew the sprites and added more frames of animation. This seems good on the surface but it makes you slower. Now your auto-grab is a bad thing, as you aren't quick enough to just throw a guy away before being hit. I thought I'd get new bosses too, but there's still lots of repeats (not as much as MC, but still). And while you fight the bosses as singles some times, they all kinda cheat, able to instantly react to your button presses. This in turn, just encourages you to cheese them. Also the levels kind of also repeat. Once you reach the last 2/3rd of the game you keep getting put back into this "trap chamber", which is just a couple of screens of enemies and then off to a new level (near the end it has a boss in some of them). It also lacks the distinctive soundtrack and comic panel level transitions. Instead we get the same couple of Mark Bagley drawings along with a bunch of text describing what you're doing next. I'm guessing this is due to the game not following the comic so strictly unlike Maximum Carnage. On the bright side, this does add in 2 player, which was a major bummer that MC lacked (and IIRC it said it HAD two player in some material which drove me crazy as a kid), but I'm playing these games alone. This would be the only reason to play this over Maximum Carnage. I suppose if you just couldn't' get enough MC this is the same gameplay but different levels, but it's slightly worse quality discourages that. This IS the third game in a row where Carnage is the last boss (not counting the fighting game), which I find amusing and fits in my brain. Not that the fight is as interesting as the last game. Honestly, not much to say here. It's a slightly worse Maximum Carnage, which makes it an ok game, just nothing special.





Next Up: Spider-Man (The Animated Series) (27 to go)

[Xenon]

Spider-Man
Platforms: Super Nintendo, Genesis
Year: 1995
Rating: 3/10
Notables: Fantastic Four appear as support characters, First Appearance of The Wrecker, The Owl, Maybe Jack O'Lantern?
Thoughts: Oh boy was this a disappointment. The 90s Animated series was my window into the world of Spider-Man. I was already a fan, somehow, but the 90s show was my favorite show on TV and how I learned about the world of Spider-Man...mostly. Of course I wanted this game, but the low quality of licensed games, limited budget, and time meant I never got it. And boy howdy was that a good thing because this game is BAAAAD. ON the bright side, it's beautiful. It adapts the 90s show style and is quite good. Spider-Man looks good, the villains look good. The game's story centers on four villains, Doc Ock, Green Goblin, Smythe, and the Alien Spider-Slayer (whose origin eludes me). But there are numerous other villains throughout the world. The Lizard, Mysterio, The Owl, Scorpion, Shocker, The Wrecker, Jack O'Lantern, and the Beetle all appaear, and Venom serves as the last boss. The problem here is the gameplay. controls are shady at best. Jump just not working sometimes if other buttons are pressed. Same with your use command. Sometimes it's webs, but you also have electro webs and two types of grenades. Why does Spider-Man have grenades as a primary weapon? No idea. The boss battles are cryptic. They don't give good feedback and take a lot of hits. Venom in particular sucks. He's just immune to all damage unless he's jumping. So again, cheese is the answer. If you stand on teh platform he jumps down from, he can't get back up there and will constantly jump at you. 20-30 hits later and he's done.

The wildest thing about this one is that after you beat venom the game gives you endings for all the villains, many of which are quite definitive. The Rhino gets sent to the zoo and is killed by a 'amorous female rhino'. Beetle goes crazy. Norman dies but his suit is preserved for the next Goblin. The alien Spider-slayer has an identity crisis and goes to a zen retreat. Shocker goes straight and starts working for the Edison power in Poughkeepsie. Just... a lot of crazy stuff.



Still, a bad game, not worth playing. Hard skip.

Next Up: Spider-Man: WEb of Fire (26 left)

[Alan2099]

and the Alien Spider-Slayer (whose origin eludes me)

Amazing Spider-man #368. Part 1 of the Invasion of the Spider-Slayers story.



It lasted a few paged before being destroyed but apparently it made an impression on whoever was doing the Spider-man cartoon of the 90s. It was featured on a lot of the early promotional material and even got it's own action figure. However it never actually appeared on the show. They had planned to make an episode with it, but for some reason never did.

The videogame seems to treat it like an actual person instead of a robot like in the comics, since it was being held in Ravencroft and (and if I remember correctly) is sent back to prison after being defeated. Maybe that's what they planned to do with it in the cartoon but never got around to.

[Xenon]

Amazing Spider-man #368. Part 1 of the Invasion of the Spider-Slayers story.



It lasted a few paged before being destroyed but apparently it made an impression on whoever was doing the Spider-man cartoon of the 90s. It was featured on a lot of the early promotional material and even got it's own action figure. However it never actually appeared on the show. They had planned to make an episode with it, but for some reason never did.

The videogame seems to treat it like an actual person instead of a robot like in the comics, since it was being held in Ravencroft and (and if I remember correctly) is sent back to prison after being defeated. Maybe that's what they planned to do with it in the cartoon but never got around to.

Ah ok see the way the ending treated it where they said it was having an identity crisis (it doesn't go back to prison it goes to like, Nepal or something for meditation) I was confused as to whether it was just a spider-slayer or something else that was like, mistaken for a spider-slayer. Random villain to get so much attention. He's also the first boss in the Game Boy Spider-Man 3!

[Xenon]

Spider-Man: Web of Fire
Platforms: 32X
Year: 1996
Rating: 4/10
Notables: Strains the definition but first appearance of Dragon Man, The Eel, Thermite, Bltiz, Tangle, Super-Adaptoid
Thoughts: The last pure Spider-Man game of the 2-D era, this one is notorious amongst game collectors for bein the last 32X game ever released and in a small print run at that. This has made it very expensive on the after market. It's also notoriously bad. So...oof. Not a good note to go out on, exactly. Being a 32X game, Web of Fire uses pre-rendered sprites and backgrounds, similar to Donkey Kong Country, only ugly instead of good looking. It's a fairly standard action platformer. Web Swinging finally works well, being just tied to his jump button, press it again in the air and Spidey will web swing. Only took us how many games to get here? Your other two buttons are attack and web shot. Spidey has a three hit combo, a running jump kick, a duck kick, and uh, that's kinda it. Your have limited web fluid which is used for both swinging and shooting. The web shot is pretty basic, and will damage enemeis as well as tie up humanoid enemies for a short amount of time. This leads to the besic strategy against all bosses. Hit twice, shoot web, repeat. The enemy will break out of the web fairly quickly, but it's fast enough in that cycle. More annoying is the basic enemy, which takes four hits to kill, which is super annoying, since your combo is three hits and Spidey will pause after that, allowing the enemy to hit you. You can summon Daredevil if you have one of his icons, and he'll act as a shooter "bomb" for lack of a better term. Spidey can also stick to walls adn the ceiing, and can move and attack from this position. THis is, in some ways, the best execution of this ability so far. However, Spidey is VERY EAGER to stick to the wall. So if the wall is a flaming barrel that will damage you...yeah he still sticks to it. HYPER annoying in the aforemention level that's on fire, but also in the final segment, where you have 60 seconds after beating the super adaptoid to reach the end of the level. THe timing is tight and it took me 10-20 attempts to reach the end (it didn't help I was out of web fluid and had to find some mid escape), largely because Spidey would stick to the wall and slow me down. Beyond that it's just not very engaging. It isn't the worst Spider-Man game I've played, but it's not good and not worth the effort, let alone the money for a real copy.




Story wise there's very little here but it's fairly unique. Hydra has put up a laser grid all around NYC, trapping the city in a "Web of Fire" and demanding 1 billion dollars to free it. Unfortunately for them, Spider-Man and Daredevil are still in town, and though Daredevil starts kidnapped, they'll make them pay. So you're going through destroying the generators for the web of fire and then pursuing hydra before they get away. That's...kinda it. This does lead to Spider-Man fighting a different set of enemies. In fact none of his normal rogue's gallery appears here. That's...something. But it's not enough. No need to play this one either.




Next Up: Marvel Super Heroes: War of the Gems (25 to go)

[Lukmendes]

Spider-Man fought Graviton twice during Acts of Vengeance. Once without the powers of Captain Universe (a battle Peter lost) and once with the powers of Captain Universe (which resulted in Peter owning Graviton so hard that he though he'd been hit by Galactus).

I'm pretty sure that a bunch of the villains Spidey beat up as Cap U came back for revenge later, and that'd include Graviton.

Fighting Game this time. War of the Gems is a '96 release so it's IIRC 4 games away still. '95 was a busy Spider-year.

1995 is also the same year Maximum Clonage happened lol.

I'm sure it's also quite broken from a balance perspective.

Old fighters didn't really care that much about balance anyways, it's what helped in making them fun, 'cause if you picked a good character, they may have have a lot of options, though there are top tiers who just have a strong tool or two.

Ultimately what a fighter really needs to be good is mechanics, which Capcom generally did a decent job at.

Basically no one plays this one anymore.

You can find some matches in I think fightcade, Justin Wong, who's a fighting game top player, has played this game a few times.

Amazing Spider-man #368. Part 1 of the Invasion of the Spider-Slayers story.

https://i.imgur.com/q58Olbzl.jpg

It lasted a few paged before being destroyed but apparently it made an impression on whoever was doing the Spider-man cartoon of the 90s. It was featured on a lot of the early promotional material and even got it's own action figure. However it never actually appeared on the show. They had planned to make an episode with it, but for some reason never did.

Reminds me that Scorpion had a brief costume change in the 90's, and that same costume is what got used in the PSX Spidey game lol.

[CaptainUniverse]

I'm pretty sure that a bunch of the villains Spidey beat up as Cap U came back for revenge later, and that'd include Graviton.

Oh, that's right. I think it was an Annual.

[Xenon]

I'm pretty sure that a bunch of the villains Spidey beat up as Cap U came back for revenge later, and that'd include Graviton.[

When I first saw him I just had to look him up. Kind of wild how much I can forget. Happy though. I look forward to re-reading them.

1995 is also the same year Maximum Clonage happened lol.

I said it was busy not good lol.

Old fighters didn't really care that much about balance anyways, it's what helped in making them fun, 'cause if you picked a good character, they may have have a lot of options, though there are top tiers who just have a strong tool or two.

Ultimately what a fighter really needs to be good is mechanics, which Capcom generally did a decent job at.



You can find some matches in I think fightcade, Justin Wong, who's a fighting game top player, has played this game a few times.

Good Ol' JWong. Makes sense considering how much eh loves MvC that he'd like the original. Balance is a tricky thing,It's way less important when you're just know nothings screwing around with the game but as soon as someone figures out an infinite it loses all fun lol.

Reminds me that Scorpion had a brief costume change in the 90's, and that same costume is what got used in the PSX Spidey game lol.

I.....vaguely remember that. It was purple and showed his hair I think? Scorpion is a cool underused villain. He kinda falls in the Electro tier of villains.

[Lukmendes]

Oh, that's right. I think it was an Annual.

When I first saw him I just had to look him up. Kind of wild how much I can forget. Happy though. I look forward to re-reading them.

I remember Busiek commenting that Graviton has the motivation of a jobber despite being so powerful, something about impressing his girlfriend I think? Lol.

Good Ol' JWong. Makes sense considering how much eh loves MvC that he'd like the original. Balance is a tricky thing,It's way less important when you're just know nothings screwing around with the game but as soon as someone figures out an infinite it loses all fun lol.

It depends on the infinite, 'cause there are infinites that can only happen from a specific combo starter, one that may not be practical to use, and infinites that kill faster at least won't waste too much time.

There's this infamous Dante infinite in Marvel 3:



(4:18)

Infinites like that are bad less so because it kills, but more so because they waste so much damn time.

And honestly, infinites, aren't necessarily bad when it comes to balance, because ultimate in a fighting game, you want to defeat your opponent while not letting them use their tools too much, infinites give lower tiers a better matchup against top tiers, because the more combos you have to do on your opponent, the higher their chances to recover and defeat you, stuff like that is why the gods of Marvel 3 are not as dominant as the gods of Marvel 2, 'cause you have to do more combos in general in Marvel 2 (Unless you're using an Iron Man team I guess, then you can kill entire teams with his combos and unblockable setups), and that gives the gods more of a fighting chance.

So yeah, basically, it's not as black and white as "Infinites are always bad", it depends on the game and the kind of infinite, since sometimes, infinites can help balance a game, though, they can also completely ruin it lol.

I.....vaguely remember that. It was purple and showed his hair I think?

This one:



(ASM#1 vol 2).

Funnily enough, despite this costume being used on the PSX again, this is the only time it was used in the comics, 'cause after this Scorpion didn't show up for a while, and when he did, he went back to the classic green costume.

Scorpion is a cool underused villain. He kinda falls in the Electro tier of villains.

Someone on 4chan once described him as a villain who doesn't excell at anything, and some of his traits, other villains do better.

The villain stronger than Spidey? Scorpion himself isn't that much stronger (If at all), and Rhino does it better.

A villain who's a match to Spidey's powers? Venom does it better.

A villain who hunts Spidey? Spider Slayer and Venom do that better too.

I think those were the points brought up...

It doesn't help that, Gargan struggles to be particularly dangerous, even on his debut back in Ditko's run in ASM#20 (Though he actually debutted in #19, but became Scorpion on the next issue), he does overwhelm Spidey with his strength, but the victory wasn't because he did anything impressive, it's because Spidey was a dumbass who decided to tank Gargan's attacks, and that failed, and then, Spidey's genius solution to defeating him is just "What I dodge his attacks?".

His return in ASM#29, while it makes him be a pretty strong opponent, doesn't make him look that much more dangerous than Spidey's usual villains.

So yeah, while Scorpion has in theory those three traits I listed, he hardly uses them, and other villains do them better anyways, Scorpion is just not that impressive, and while he has cool potential, it doesn't get used.

Modern comic book writing also doesn't do him any favors, since a villain like Scorpion is better for episodic stories, but modern writing prefers long arcs, so that screws up his potential too...

[Xenon]

Marvel Super Heroes: War of the Gems
Platforms: Super Nintendo
Year: 1996
Rating: 7/10
Notables: N/A
Thoughts: Like the fighting game and X-Men and Spider-Man in Arcade's revenge this is not strictly a Spider-Man game. In fact you can play through the whole game and never touch Spider-Man if you wanted. But you could also play through the whole thing as Spidey. I didn't do quite that but I came pretty close. This is another standard Action platformer. You have five characters, Spider-Man, Captain America, Wolverine, Hulk, and Iron Man. Choice is what this game is about though, you can pick any of the heroes for any level, and you also have a choice in what order you play the stages in. somewhat. Like Megaman 7 or 8, there are four stages, then a mid stage, then four more stages. The twist that you don't have lives but rather each hero is a life. You must complete each stage with the one character life, and if a character is defeated, that's it, they're gone until you can use a Revival item on them (i only found one so.....yeah). Further encouraging multiple characer usage, there are no health refills between levels. Heroes retain their health and are only healed from health items. All found in stages, with seom actiating immediately while the others being usable from the character select screen. Your goal is to find the Infinity Gems, and as you find them you can equip them for additional powers. Of course there are more stages than there are gems (9 in total with only 5 gems before the last level), so where those gems are are randomized. Each character, beyond their basic attack and jump, also have special moves that are activated in the same manner as fighting game moves. Spidey has a web ball and a web swing attack. Cap has his charging star and shield throw. The moves are clearly insperied by their fighting game versions, though the commands to use them are not always the same. It's also worht pointing out each character has their own stats along withi special moves. So Hulk is slow but hits very hard, while Spider-Man is the other half, the weakest individual hits but he's fast and can do a six hit combo. This allows some strategy when equipping the infinity gems. Hulk gets much better with the Time gem since it doubles his movement speed. Spider-Man, meanwhile becomes basically the best character in the game with the power gem. He still is fast and has a six hit combo, but now each hit is significant, and later bosses could be wiped out in just three combos. The level design here kinda sucks though. You're basically just moving right and hitting walls to break them and progress. I did find one alternative path in Alaska, which allows you to skip a mid-boss if you're Spider-Man or Wolverine.



I beat The Aquarium with Hulk, the Amazon with Spidey, then Wolverine for Alaska and did the rest of the stages except for Egypt as Spidey (Cap got to go to Egypt). I had gathered enough out of stage healing items that I went in with full or near full health every stage, and once I got the Power gem from Magus in the mid point stage Peter was just shredding dudes. Presentation wise the game is also quite good. The sprites are not ripped straight from the fighting game but are heavily based on them. Each character gets a winning phrase when they beat a level, and The bosses are not easy but aren't cheap an unfair either. I did of course use Save States because I got places to be, but had I owned this as a kid a few weeks or months of practice would have got me the skills I needed, and I think that's teh first one of these games i think that's true of. So not QUITE a spidey game, but a much better sending off point for the 2-D Era.





And that's teh line in the sand i'm going to draw. Of course, there ARE more 2-D games, with a GBC and GBA game coming right after the Playstation/N64/DC game, but I think it's interesting to look at the world of Spider-Man video games both before and after that first 3-d game that I think made such a big difference in the license as far as Video games go. So I thought I'd do a little ranking of all the 2-D era games, excluding Marvel Super Heroes, because Fighting games are their own thing.



Worth Playing Tier

1. Maximum Carnage
2. Marvel Super Heroes: War of the Gems
3. Separation Anxiety
4. Spider-Man: The Video Game (the arcade)
5. Spider-Man vs. The Kingpin

Flawed but still interesting tier

6. Spider-Man: Lethal Foes
7. Spider-Man and the X-Men in Arcade's Revenge
8. The Amazing Spider-Man (Game Boy)
9. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (Game Boy)

Probably not worth it tier

10. Spider-Man: Web of Fire
11. The Amazing Spider-Man (Amiga)
12. Spider-Man Return of the Sinister Six (NES)
13. Spider-Man (Atari 2600)
14. Questprobe featuring Spider-Man

Definitely not worth it tier

15. Spider-Man (The Animated Series)
16. Amazing Spider-Man 3 (Game Boy)

Next Up; Spider-Man Playstation/N64/DC (Platform undecided right now) (24 to go....)*

*: MAME and my computer don't get along, but I'm going to hit a local arcade soonish to do run through of MvC 1 and 2. MSH v. SF is hte rough one. I actually own a copy of it on Playstation, but that's a bad version of that game so I'd prefer not to resort to that. I will if I have to though. In any case, they might be out of chronological order as a result.

[Xenon]

I remember Busiek commenting that Graviton has the motivation of a jobber despite being so powerful, something about impressing his girlfriend I think? Lol.



It depends on the infinite, 'cause there are infinites that can only happen from a specific combo starter, one that may not be practical to use, and infinites that kill faster at least won't waste too much time.

There's this infamous Dante infinite in Marvel 3:



(4:18)

Infinites like that are bad less so because it kills, but more so because they waste so much damn time.

And honestly, infinites, aren't necessarily bad when it comes to balance, because ultimate in a fighting game, you want to defeat your opponent while not letting them use their tools too much, infinites give lower tiers a better matchup against top tiers, because the more combos you have to do on your opponent, the higher their chances to recover and defeat you, stuff like that is why the gods of Marvel 3 are not as dominant as the gods of Marvel 2, 'cause you have to do more combos in general in Marvel 2 (Unless you're using an Iron Man team I guess, then you can kill entire teams with his combos and unblockable setups), and that gives the gods more of a fighting chance.

So yeah, basically, it's not as black and white as "Infinites are always bad", it depends on the game and the kind of infinite, since sometimes, infinites can help balance a game, though, they can also completely ruin it lol.

I like fighting games, but I can't talk fighting games lol. I'm just too bad. I'm better than all my friends and so I never grew.

This one:

(ASM#1 vol 2).

Funnily enough, despite this costume being used on the PSX again, this is the only time it was used in the comics, 'cause after this Scorpion didn't show up for a while, and when he did, he went back to the classic green costume.

Nope, don't remember that at all, lol.

Someone on 4chan once described him as a villain who doesn't excell at anything, and some of his traits, other villains do better.

The villain stronger than Spidey? Scorpion himself isn't that much stronger (If at all), and Rhino does it better.

A villain who's a match to Spidey's powers? Venom does it better.

A villain who hunts Spidey? Spider Slayer and Venom do that better too.

I think those were the points brought up...

It doesn't help that, Gargan struggles to be particularly dangerous, even on his debut back in Ditko's run in ASM#20 (Though he actually debutted in #19, but became Scorpion on the next issue), he does overwhelm Spidey with his strength, but the victory wasn't because he did anything impressive, it's because Spidey was a dumbass who decided to tank Gargan's attacks, and that failed, and then, Spidey's genius solution to defeating him is just "What I dodge his attacks?".

His return in ASM#29, while it makes him be a pretty strong opponent, doesn't make him look that much more dangerous than Spidey's usual villains.

So yeah, while Scorpion has in theory those three traits I listed, he hardly uses them, and other villains do them better anyways, Scorpion is just not that impressive, and while he has cool potential, it doesn't get used.

Modern comic book writing also doesn't do him any favors, since a villain like Scorpion is better for episodic stories, but modern writing prefers long arcs, so that screws up his potential too...

The thing I like about Scorpion is that he is kinda just Slightly better Spider-Man, but not really, and yeah Venom kinda eats that role (though, not anymore really with where Venom has been taken). The episodic point is a good one too. Gargan is not going to come up with some master plan. He's there to smash stuff. his old stuff where he's stuck in the costume and resents Jameson was probably his best, but he may be a villain that is best left retired. Then again, a writer without much decompression could use him with a compromised Spidey to make a dangerous situation, and its not like Gargan has better aspirations so....Still, he makes for a great Video game villain. Honestly surprised I haven't seen him more than I have.

[Xenon]

Spider-Man
Platform: Playstation, N64, Dreamcast
Released: 2000
Rating: 8/10
Notables: First 3-D Spider-Man Game
Thoughts: Not including his appearances in the versus series there was a four year gap between Spider-Man titles, which, for the 90s was huge. But he came back with a vengence and one of hte most well beloved titles of all time, the simply stated "Spider-Man" for PlayStation. well, that's what it's usually referred to as, even though it was on the N64 a couple months later and the Dreamcast the next year. This was one that was on my Christmas and Birthday lists but I could never scrounge up the money to buy it myself, so I never got to play it at the time. Since then, however, I've gotten all three versions at various thrift stores and half-price bookstores. But I still hadn't played it until today. Simply the result of all those other titles not being hooked up by the time I got it (my N64 is on the other side of the country even, lol). So this had a lot of hype going into it and it....mostly delivers? The story opens with Peter Parker and Eddie Brock in the crowd as they watch a Presentation by Otto Octavius. Some VO implies this is not Peter's first rodeo with Otto, but he may be reformed. Suddenly from backstage, Spider-Man comes out, knocks Otto away, and steals his equipment. Peter, after bumping into Eddie (who has a meltdown about his camera being destroyed by Spider-Man), goes off to pursue the thief. And that's the start of the game, kinda. When you gain control you're on the top of a roof and Felicia drops by to tell you that "The Bank" is being robbed and so Spider-Man is distracted from his initial goal. What's interesting here is that, obviously, being the first 3-D Spider-Man game and early in 3-D gaming in general, they didn't have city web swinging, but they still wanted to include some of it, so you have this intro section among others where you have to follow a radar and swing from building to building to reach your destination. It's...kinda lame, honestly, lol. The swinging always causes you to descend, so you can't keep it up for very long, it's really most ly a giant jump extension. And ther are enemies on each roof, keeping the focus on the combat. After you reach "the Bank" (seriously that's what its' called) Spidey goes throught the roof into the building to take on the "Jade Consortium" IIRC. Trying to vary the game up, there are hostages here, who you have to make sure you don't get shot or you fail the mission. It's not too bad except for in one part. Basically, once the enemy is aware of your presence, they may hold up a hostage, at which point they will shoot and kill them after a few seconds. You can crawl along to ceiling to delay detection but for the most part once you engage they'll be too busy losing to you to worry about the hostages. There was one part where I had to do it a few times, but as we've moved into the "modern" era of gaming when developers wanted you beat the game instead of seeing you as an antagonist, there was a retry option that made it nice and quick. The section ends with a bomb that you have to put in the bank vault to let it blow up safely. I thought this part was pretty cool. It doesn't tell you what to do only that you have to get rid of a bomb and you have limited options to do it. But it's a good sign that they were trying to vary up some of their goals beyond just "punch the bad guys". At the end of the stage Daredevil shows up to interrogate Spider-Man, but once he's satisfied he says he'll spread the word and mentions Jameson is in trouble.




Moving on to stage 2, this starts with us web swinging over to the Daily Bugle before Scorpion can kill Jonah, a classic little tale. Once you arrive,, you have to fight the Scorpion while protecting Jonah. This caused me some concern at first, given how "protecting" NPCs can go in a lot of games, but honestly Jonah gets out of the way and Scorpion is easily focused on you. This first boss fight wasn't too bad, but the combat is....a little questionable. Spidey can punch, kick (these are separate buttons) or web, as well and move around and jump. By holding different directions you can change your web shot to be an impact webbing shot that does a lot of damage, a web gloves that will enhance your punches, a web dome which will shield you before exploding for area damage, or you can pull an enemy your webbing up. you can also just hold the web button to tie people up temporarily. Unfortunately what you won't see there is any kind of defensive option. No guard, no dodge roll, you kinda just have to move, and you're not fast enough. Sure enough later boss fights seem to recognize this problem and give you respawning health and web pickups, but scorpion is easy enough I didn't notice any. He tends to attack too far forward, so if you're in his face you can kick him to death pretty quickly (I hadn't learned yet about the gloves that really increase your attack power or the value of Impact Webbing). However, you get it done, defeatng Jameson leads to the cops chasing you out of there (ungrateful....) and you have to web swing away from a helicopter shooting missiles and a machine gun.



The distractions aren't over yet, though. Felicia will find you once you ditch the cops and tell you Venom is on the jumbotron in Times Square and Rhino is attacking some science facility. You stop by times square to find Venom bragging that he's kidnapped Mary Jane Parker and he'll kill her in 24 hours. Felicia tells Peter to go ahead, but Peter refuses and says they'll deal with the Rhino first and then he'll find Mary Jane. When you arrive at the science facility, you're too late, the heist is complete, but Rhino is still breaking stuff. He sneak attacks BC and knocks her out, leading to you fighting him alone. In what is certainly the most common way to beat a character like the Rhino now, you need to let him run by you and hit the exploding barrels or electric machinery to cause him big damage. simple boss, and the entire level. After Felicia is taken away by a fake ambulance (Peter doesn't notice because he's a moron), we cut to Peter telling Johnny Storm he has no idea where to find MJ, to which Johnny nonchalantly replies that Venom will find him and flies away (jerk).

Indeed Venom does find you, and so begins the longest level in the game. First you gotta chase Venom, then fight Venom in probably the hardest fight in the game?. Then you gotta chase venom into the sewers. Ride a subway car without falling off, chase him through the swers again, and eventually after like 10 sections (twice as many as any other level) you finally find MJ dangling over a water pit screaming for help (fun fact: Jennifer Hale voices both Black Cat AND Mary Jane). Now you gotta fight Venom while webbing switches off as Venom tuns them on or MJ will drown in a scene very reminiscent of the end of Spider--Man vs. the Kingpin. Venom can go invisible here, and will just fade in and out at various points in the level. He does give you an audio cue. If he's going for one of the four switches, he'll make a crack about Mary Jane being able to hold her breath or her yelling for someone to save her. If he's somewhere else, he'll say...other things. There respawning health and ammo token here, though there are little difficult to reach. Venom is tough, probably the toughest boss in the game, but Impact webbin is key. When he's in range fire off two blasts and he'll be knocked back with each one and fade out. You can just repeat that several times to win. MJ saved, Venom says he's sorry when Peter explains it couldn't have been him, because Eddie saw him in the crowd at the same time. Venom, here portrayed like a total idiot, finally understands and apologizes, even saving MJ when the chain breaks (idiot).

[Xenon]

Now teamed up with Venom (nominally), we're finally dealing with the science heists. Research is done at the daily bugle, but it's attacked by pink "symbiotes". Venom immediately runs off because he smells carnage, leaving you to deal with these ones, some of the toughest enemies in the game. Fortunately you usually don't have to fight them much, you usually have other goals. Here it's rescuing hostages, then getting to the basement, then destroying some generators that are creating the symbiottes (the "generators" look like metal detectors, lol). The symbiotes are a major pain but a new power up, magnesium webbing, makes them easy. Once you have that one Impact webbing shot will kill them by setting them on fire, so that's nice. But again, you're really after the generators. Destroying all of these in both basements will give you a radar and lead you to your imposter Spidey, who is none other than....Mysterio. Exposed, he turns into a giant and leads into another boss battle. This one is a little different and probably the best one. His big size means you can actually avaoid his attacks, and his varied weak points mean you're doing more than just wailing on him. You've got six points to destory, then two, then just his helmet, and then he shrinks down and gives you directions to the final level.



At a warehouse on the docks, Spidey must destroy more generators before finding a secret underwater base. There he finds the source of the mist that has covered the city (and made you die if you fall in the web swinging sections) and finds Black Cat held hostage for some reason Once quick round of sabotage and the mist is gone and Felicia is freed. Spidey tells her to go get help, and he goes to find the ultimate mastermind....Doc Ock! And Carnage. Working together to turn the whole country into symbiotes for...some reason. Whatever. Venom arrives and take carnage away to fight, so you're left to deal with Otto. After beating him Carnage comes back and you have a neat idea, poor execution fight wher you must push Carnage into the middle of the stage where a sonic field has been set up. Then finally the carnage symbiote will merge with Otto and you jut have to escape from teh bottom of the lab in a not great section.

Presentation is great. They got Stan Lee to narrate parts of it, and of course there is full voice acting, even if they cheaped out on the female parts, lol. The setting is kind of its own thing, largely taking inspiration from the 90 TAS, it seems, but several things are established here that weren't there (like MJ being married to Peter or Carnage existing). But Spider-Man is so popular that works fine here. I'm actually surprised how few villains actually appear. There is no boss to level one, then you get Scorpion in level 2, Rhino in 3, Venom in 4 with a cameo by the Lizard, Mysterio in 5, and then Doc Ock and Carnage is the last level. Each level has a mock up comic cover made for it which is also cool to see. Story isn't amazing but it's fun and works. Spider-Man is funny enough and it's just a wild and crazy day. Venom's idiocy was quite funny to me as well. It falls short on a couple of areas. Combat is, as I mentioned earlier, a bit limited. The biggest problem though, and this affects combat as well, is the camera. This game was made for the old digital only PS1 controller, so the game will be controlling the camera for you. This isn't horrible. It generally just looks where Spidey is looking, but it can be slow and it can fail completely. it's really the only frustration with the game. If I had full camera control with my second analog stick even the combat would get a big boost as I could see things coming and be able to find enemies without moving around. But alas, the era it was made in is what it is.



Does this hold up? I'll say kinda. There are definitely parts that have aged very poorly and will be frustrating. But one of the big changes between 1996 and 2000 is developer philosophy, as a imentioned before. Old 8 and 16 bit games didn't want you to beat them. They were actively working against you to extend their otherwise paltry game lengths. Things like limited lives and continues ruled the day and made you have to practice and get good at something while also maintaining your skills about everything else. But there was a definite shift was we got into 3-D where developers now WANTED you to finish their game and they made changes to reflect that. So you can save! and you can retry an unlmited amount of times and yes, they drops respawning health and web tokens in boss battles when they realize their combat isnt' up to snuff. It makes it easier, yes, but it also makes it more fun. And so yeah, there are still problems here that will take some adjusting too. But it' a fun little three to five hour romp through a Spider-Man world. Worth it.

Next up: Spider-Man 2: The sinister Six (23 to go....)