Spider-Man (2000)

This title is a landmark superhero game that perfectly captured the essence of Marvel’s iconic hero at the turn of the millennium. Built on the same engine as Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, it delivers smooth, responsive movement and a surprising sense of vertical freedom for its time. Swinging between rooftops, crawling along walls, and taking down enemies with webs felt exciting and fresh in an era when superhero games were often clunky or uninspired.

The story, narrated by the legendary Stan Lee, unfolds like a living comic book, filled with colorful dialogue, dynamic cutscenes, and a host of familiar faces from the Spider-Man universe, Venom, Carnage, Scorpion, Rhino, and Doctor Octopus all make memorable appearances. The tone balances humor, action, and classic comic book drama in a way that appeals to both kids and longtime fans.

Though the city is covered in a mysterious fog that hides the lack of a ground-level world, and the graphics now show their age, the gameplay remains surprisingly engaging. The mix of combat, puzzles, stealth, and boss battles keeps things varied across its short but replayable campaign. Overall, this game stands as a nostalgic gem, an ambitious, charming, and faithful adaptation that laid the groundwork for the superhero games that followed. It is one of the best games of it's platform, I highly recommend trying to 100% this one, you can unlock a variety of upgrades and costumes, similar to what happens on modern Spider-Man titles.

Been doing achievement hunting for the game with Retroachievements since yesterday on DuckStation, and while doing so, I felt like I'm enjoying the game Like an 8 year-old all over again.

Let me tell you I played this game a lot of times through my teenage years all way growing up fully adult. my last time playing this game before the recent playthrough was during the pandemic in 2020. I drained this game to the point that I stopped enjoying it entirely and could quote everything while simultaneously knowing every nook and cranny in the game's world.

The fact that Achievement tested my skills with this game brought back the enjoyment I missed about it. I discovered new secret locations after 15 years of playing it for the first time! I had fun beefing with the Lizardmen on the train. It was satisfying beating the shit out of Mysterio without taking any damage. and I still have to yet do the "What If" contest. I enjoyed this game a lot for the first time in years.

I love how effective, simple, and powerful the combat system is, and how it tries to give multiple combat ideas mixed with the web usage, and then hop on someone's head and give them the headache of their life. couple all of this with the good sound engineering that gives every hit and slam its own crunch punch.

The music and voice acting is so damn good as well. the tunes that plays during the Bank heist level feels like you're stealth mission while not trying to stay in the dark very long to beat the goons. similar with Scorpion race level giving you the "I better hurry" vibe. Venom tunes are annoying on purpose with what venom is doing being a waste of time for Spidy and we have to hurry up and solve the current problem.

The Music just has a lot of personalty in the game, it gives every level its distinctive feel and can tell you what Spidy is mostly feeling about this level without giving indication of what he feels by words.

Voice Acting gives an even bigger draw to how good the characters laid out to be. Spidy can crack a joke every once in while even when's in the midst of danger, can also keep up with a serious attitude, and fear sometimes. Pete's VA gives him the extra spice of life in his character that would make any player invested more in the Spidy's story. Black Cat and Venom are very charismatic. especially Venom's VA.

The Writing was outstanding. I loved JJ's reaction to Spidy saving him from Scorpion, and I started to get a lot of the one liners that I didn't understand until recently.

I enjoyed the training side missions and races. I loved taking break getting frustrated that I mistakenly shoot for normal web instead of the impact web while fighting Venom for the second time, and just racing around the city multiple time to get the shortest time possible and master my "short, simple" traversal.

While I'm writing this, I'm still in a "work in progress" phase collecting everything in the game from comics, to unlocking suits. and I'm still not burned out from the game like I usually do.

Seriously, I can't recommend this enough. Go and play this game with Retroachievemnts. It adds a whole new experience to the game that makes it fun to play.

20 Year old game and it's still Fun.

the story is simple and very good, the combat is basic Punch and kick, the Level design and going as far to create a Super Villain specifically for this game, it's just Amazing.

looking back at it, this game is a blueprint for almost every Superhero games that came after It, going from a Beat'em Up to it's own Action-Adventure and it's own style.

"What are we gonna do, surf the WEB?"

Fairly short 3d action game with linear and short maps (some are simple boss battles which are okay). The controls are okay and not too clunky compared to 3D games of the day and its not terribly hard (although a few spots are trouble or annoying) The PSX may not be as nice looking but it has a rather nice recorded rock/industrial/techno soundtrack as well as voice overs and cutscenes that more than make up for the N64 version. It even has narration and comments by Stan Lee. All versions (I believe) have a lot of nice extras including unlockable collectible comics, costumes, trivia etc. All in all a nice game if you can overlook the age. The voice overs of the characters and stan lee and videos are really the best bits of the game though, as they are quite humorous and amusing. The ending is also great.

All in all this isn’t a bad game if you’re looking for some nostalgia and want to do some PSX gaming but I feel the more that time goes on the worse this game gets. Really cool additional game mode called what if mode unlocked through cheats which change a slight detail / Easter egg in every level. I'd give it a 3.5 but rounding to 4 because of What If? Mode.

Gameplay: 7

• first glimpse of limited open world spidey game
• multiple web moves makes for a decent variety
• although a shortish game (5 hour playthrough) has some replay-ability with collectibles and a complete separate What If?
  Mode which unlocks Easter Eggs in the regular story mode.
• Camera is biggest let down here and can be very frustrating not being able to control it, as well as a close up view most of the time

Graphics: 7

• holds up well for a PSX game although can notice some issues here and there

• does get hectic on screen when a lot of effects are going on (doc oc lvl)

Story: 5

• it’s alright for nostalgia but it really only deals with the main plot for the first episode and last episode, other then that you feel like you’re just jumping from comic issue to comic issue which I guess isn’t bad, but not a lot of meaningful story.

• game does give you a cannon reason why you’re not on the ground though and can’t roam the streets which is kinda cool

Soundtrack: 8

• one of the best parts of the game, lots of tracks are heavy grungish rock that really amp up the action gameplay and don’t get old quick so when you die and replay a lvl you’re fine to listen to it again.