I might've been one of the guys talking it up...

The two Spider-troids are easily my favorite Spider-Man games. Sure, they have weaknesses, but they're fun, playable, and they absolutely NAIL the feeling of controlling Spider-Man due of the ultra-zoomed out perspective. I never even thought that was possible.

Spider-Man 2 had fun swinging, sure, but the combat and missions were still shitty. And the more recent action-based Spider-Man titles don't do much for me. I had high hopes for the new DS game, but the reviews were middling.

Top 4 Spidey games!

Web of Shadows DS
Shattered Dimensions DS
Spider-Man 2 (for swinging only)
Atari 2600 Spider-Man
the first Neversoft game, maybe?

@Anand I was a big Spider-Man 2 (GCN) fan. I loved the combat against scrubs and thugs, swinging them around like a morning star chain and smacking their pals, then tossing them off a building lol. Unfortunately Spidey games then decide you have to fight giant robots and bulky symbiotes that just soak up Spidey's super-punches like they're nothing. I get it, the challenge has to scale somehow, but mechs and monsters aren't the right way. I guess it just always bothered me that Spidey can bench press a bus but needs to hit a mugger eight times before he goes down. JUST PUNCH HIS HEAD CLEAN OFF SPIDEY.

And Web of Shadows PS3 was a buggy mess, but it had the swinging fun plus cool, zippy combat all over the place. Symbiote Spidey's God of War style was a little lame, but I had tons of fun just swinging through Manhattan, swooping down to ground level, kicking up a half-dozen symbiote zombies from the ground and just going to town on them in mid-air. And then you had the Goblin and Vulture battles in mid-air, and surprisingly fast fights while scaling buildings, and Spidey's hilarious tough guy act thanks to the moral choice system...man, I need to find that game for cheap. I guess it's kind of rare because it's still going for $25+ in most places, even used.

I think Web of Shadows DS would be greatly improved with just some more creative, engaging enemies. Getting from Spidey Clone boss to Spidey Clone boss gets kind of repetitive when you're fighting the same three or four types of enemies all game. And most of them aren't even interesting or actually difficult, just punching bags with the occasional annoying attack. Goddamn symbiote wolves...

Yeah, I agree with your Web of Shadows criticisms. I was just so impressed that someone actually nailed the sensation of Spider-Man's movement in a game. I never thought it was possible (and no, Web Zip is not an adequate solution). I still don't think that it's really possible in 3D. Close 3D, anyway. The problem is that he moves faster than you should be able to control him. Maybe a Arkham Asylum-esque system? But it wouldn't really feel like you were in control.

Web of Shadows DS is pretty rare, too. I actually don't own it. I've been meaning to pick up a copy to keep.

Yeah I found it at Gamestop, and it was still $12 used. I figured that was as good a price as I'll find, though, so I went for it.

As for movement, gotta disagree there. There's plenty of control in 3D and the swing/zip/wallrun mechanics get the Spidey feel perfectly for me, though it could get kind of complicated at times with all those functions overlapping and such. I love that swinging and zipping is so quick and easy in Web of Shadows DS, but the small screen size makes swinging feel haphazard, not that you get a lot of opportunity to do so with the enclosed areas. Still fun to do, just nowhere near the fluid, expansive, dynamic skyscraper parkour of 3D Spidey.

Ultimate Spiderman is one of the greatest Spiderman games ever conceived.

@GelatinousEncore You mean the 3D one, right? I remember it getting great reviews after Spidey 2. Every now and then I see it at a game shop and think about grabbing it.

Yeah the one from last generation. It's like Spiderman 2 but with more stuff to do and beautiful art.

@Anand If you're still looking for a copy of the game, I could be persuaded to swap mine now that I've finished it...though since I got it used from Gamestop, it's boxless and has a big ugly sticker on it. And one corner of it looks like it got chewed up a little. Plays fine, though.

@nate38
Yeah, I guess I should've specified the combat. I did think that Spider-Man 2 did a great job with the general mobility. And 3D Spider-Man NEEDS an open world for fun mobility. Anything else is just confusing and disorienting. I do think that wallzip is kind of a cheat, though. I mean, Spider-Man doesn't really do that very often.

There weren't many places to swing freely in Web of Shadows DS, but I did like the mechanics and animations quite a bit. So I guess I agree that the Spider-Man 2-type games are better for web-swingin' fun, but that's the only reason that I'd pop one of those games in. WoS DS is a more solid overall game to me.

@GelatinousEncore
I still haven't opened my copy... I was even pumped about it because Bendis did the story.

@nate38
Thanks, man! But I'm kind of obsessive-compulsive about that stuff. It's a sickness.

@Anand Yeah, the developers did a great job with the Spidey flow in Web DS. The animations really are cool, especially since there's so many of them to account for transitioning between so many moves. There's even like three or four different swing-release animations. Spidey controls in Web DS are some of the most fun of any 2D action game.

It's just too bad the rest of the game is barely mediocre, even awful at times that I can only imagine were intentional decisions. I mean seriously, that last symbiote-ooze area? All the enemies are dark blue and black...and thus impossible to see among all the oozing black walls. Just atrocious.