This article contains spoilers for Marvel’s Spider-Man 2.
Spider-Man 2is all about twos. It’s the second mainline game in Insomniac’s superhero series. It has twoSpider-Men. And, between Kraven andVenom, it has two major villains. It makes sense that one of its coolest ideas takes those two villains and pits their minions against each other.
There aren’t many things as rad as being able to sic one kind of enemy against another. I was impressed by this feature back when I playedThe Last of Us: Left Behindand saw that Ellie could use sound from thrown bottles to draw infected to attack human enemies, thinning the herd without ever unsheathing her knife.Monster Hunter: Worlddid something similar, as monsters would often fight each other if they stumbled into the same area (or if you lured them there on purpose).
I love that Spider-Man 2 has events that spring from the same idea. Once Peter inadvertently unleashes Venom on the city, the most ‘90s villain Marvel introduced in the ‘80s begins making gooey acolytes, encasing regular people in Symbiote shells. Naturally, the many Hunters that followed Kraven to NYC are looking for something to do after the death of their leader, and it makes sense that they would see the Symbiote monsters as perfect prey. Given that the Hunters are starter enemies and the Symbiote monsters are late-game foes, it makes a lot of sense that the Hunters would push their luck by taking them on.
The only issue with these events is that they don’t occur systematically. It’s not like the Symbiote monsters and Kraven’s Hunters are both roving the city in packs and occasionally run into each other, creating a unique event. That’s what gives those moments in Monster Hunter and The Last of Us their electric thrill. It’s two of the game’s systems meeting and, instead of nothing happening, the game designers ensured that it would work how you would expect given what you know about each colliding element.
Horizon Zero Dawnhad a similar mechanic which allowed Aloy to take over robot dinosaurs and make them fight other enemies.
That isn’t what’s happening here. In Spider-Man 2, you never see Hunters and Symbiote monsters traveling around the world. They only show up at prescribed locations. When you see them fighting each other, it’s because Insomniac placed them there for your benefit.
It’s still interesting, and it makes great narrative sense. But I would love to see an evolution of this in Spider-Man 3. Imagine a version of the goon system where the Green Goblin and Electro both control parts of the city, and have their henchmen attempting to commit various crimes in and outside the sectors they control. If they overlap with each other’s routes, it could start a unique event where the two groups begin fighting each other.
That would be cool, and there would be other emergent moments that could come from the different goon squads having routes instead of prescribed placements. Imagine if you were playing Spider-Man 2, swinging around the city, headed for a mission, when you turn around and notice that a Hunter (or a pack of Hunters) is tracking you across the rooftops. Or, imagine that they were smart enough that they could initiate crimes on their own, interacting with people and objects around NYC to instigate bespoke kidnappings, muggings, robberies and more.
Spider-Man 2 is such a major improvement on the games that came before it, that I hope Insomniac makes a similarly big leap in its sequel. Give me Vulture and Rhino goons fighting for territory. Give me the Nemesis System, with baddies you beat coming back for another crack. Give me procedurally generated arson. This friendly neighborhood Spider-Man is up to the challenge.
