2018’s Marvel’s Spider-Man was one of the finest games on PS4. It played like a dream, looked stunning, was full of awesome little touches and had a story that managed to both hit all the iconic Spidey beats and do new stuff (and pack an emotional wallop).
Its subsequent DLC episodes didn’t reinvent the wheel, but more of a good thing is hard to complain about. This philosophy continues in Spider-Man: Miles Morales, which takes the core game, sands away the rougher edges and polishes the rest to a mirror sheen.
And boy oh boy oh boy that sheen is especially sparkly on PlayStation 5. I’ve always thought of myself as fairly frame-rate agnostic. Sure, 60fps is nice, but I’ve always thought of a steady 30fps as perfectly acceptable. After all, I came up in the early years of jankety-jerky 3D and still play the occasional PS2 or Xbox game that lurks in the 20-30fps zone.
With all that in mind I started Miles Morales on the ‘Quality’ 30fps mode, which uses ray-traced lighting and a couple of other baubles. Then, just to check the contrast, I tried out the 60fps ‘Performance’ option. It’s silky, it’s smooth and dazzlingly beautiful. I tried switching back to ‘Quality’ and suddenly it felt like a slideshow. Dammit, I guess now that I’m used to silk sheets I can’t go back to cotton.
Other than that, I was extremely surprised how much use I got out of the PS5’s new ‘Activities’ cards. Say you want to play a quick combat challenge, you just select the mission from the system menu and within a few seconds you’re playing it. This felt faintly like witchcraft – jumping to a section of a game shouldn’t be as easy as selecting a chapter from a DVD menu… right?
And then there’s the story. I really enjoyed Marvel’s Spider-Man‘s tour through his rogue’s gallery, but Miles Morales benefits from a smaller cast, personal stakes and a focused narrative. I’ve read criticisms that this could be considered more of a DLC pack than a full game – but I can’t grumble after being entertained for about twenty hours working my way through the campaign and mopping up the various side missions.
As to the game itself? Well, Miles Morales is great fun to inhabit, taking the core Spidey philosophy of a ‘regular’ (spider-powered) person being emotionally and physically pulled in all directions with a lot on the line and adding the twist of living in the another Spider-Man’s shadow. He’s also nicely differentiated from Peter Parker through his animations, with his web-swinging in particular brimming with personality.
The way Miles starts out as a Spider-trainee in a cheapish looking suit and goes on to carvs out his own superhero identity and techniques is also very uplifting. Compounding that is the focus on the “neighbourhood” part of “Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man”, with most of his side-missions devoted to helping out his Harlem neighbours and building a sense of urban identity as he swings through the streets.
This being a big-budget Marvel video game they mostly shy away from taking a firm political stance, but it’s still nice to play a superhero game that’s ultimately about gentrification and exploitation of inner-city communities.
Plus they do eventually go the whole hog of giving Miles a Black Lives Matter-themed outfit and him proudly posing in front of a giant BLM mural. Sure, it’s performative corporate wokeness, but I’d rather it be present than not.
So what’s next? Insomniac’s Manhattan is a work of beauty and has now sustained a lengthy main game, three DLC episodes and a mid-length spinoff. With Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 teased in the closing credits I don’t envy their choices in moving forward with either another remix of the existing map or the Sisyphean job of creating yet another note-perfect and beautiful stylised New York City.
But hey, if they can nail Miles Morales this well then I’ll be there day one for whatever they come up for their symbiote-swingin’ sequel.
Pixel Hunted 