WhileThe Amazing Spider-Man,Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions, and other Spider-Man-related games have offered exciting mechanics and designs for the wall-crawler, Insomniac Games’Marvel’s Spider-Manhas delivered on what many fans believe to be the definitive and untouchable Spider-Man iteration in games.
Marvel’s Spider-Man’s fluid traversaland dynamic combat mechanics are designed appropriately for the environment that he exists within and make New York City feel like an open-world jungle gym as a result. However, there is at least one mechanic that Insomniac’s iteration currently lacks that players wish was featured inMarvel’s Spider-Man.
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Twitter user Yassin’s admiration forFortnite’s iteration of Spider-Manhas presented the knowledge of a unique maneuver that is only capable withFortnite’s Web-Shooter item. Instead of pendulum-based or physics-based swinging from multiple consecutive perch points,Fortnite’s web-swinging launches a web-line to a single grapple point that the player then arcs widely around before the player launches back into the air to fire the next web-line. The most interesting part of this web-swinging traversal, however, is found as players web-surf behind vehicles inFortnite.
Fortnite’s web-swinging functions mechanically with moving vehicles, where Yassin shows that Spider-Man can hitch a ride behind a vehicle with a web-line and begin web-surfing through the island’s snowy neighborhood streets. Yassin references Sam Raimi’sSpider-Man 3when they cite this maneuver as “websurfing from sm3,” from when Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man attempts to catch up to an armored car that Thomas Haden Church’s Sandman is attacking. Fans have since shared their appreciation for the maneuver and want it featured inMarvel’s Spider-Man.
While Insomniac has not debuted web-surfing to the same degree, there are cinematic QTEs duringstolen vehicle pursuits inMarvel’s Spider-Manthat effectively emulate a similar web-surf animation on a much smaller scale. These brief animations have Spider-Man skid along the road behind a car with webbing attached to it and keels the car to a stop after enough exertion from the player’s button-mashing.
Insomniac’s regular vehicles move too slowly to adaptFortnite’s traversal maneuver, but it would be difficult to have openly swaying web-surfing in scripted car chase sequences as well due to the claustrophobic nature of New York City traffic and the rigidity of different streets. WithMarvel’s Spider-Man 2planned to release sometime in 2023, it is possible that new mechanics and traversal maneuvers such as this may find practical application, though only time will tell if it is eventually considered.
Fortniteis free-to-play on PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.Marvel’s Spider-Manis available now on PS4 and PS5.
