Launch Station: The Amazing Spider-Man

A week after Lego Batman 2 hit the scene, Marvel's web crawler hits the consoles.  Just one week before the corresponding movie releases in theatres, The Amazing Spider-Man hits game consoles.  While there has been a steady stream of quality superhero games in the past few years, gamers are still very cautious with superhero games because they end up as bad as the last Spider-Man game, Edge of Time, more often than not.  With the stinker that Edge of Time was, Beenox has to prove to the gaming world they are not one-hit wonders.  Beenox has to prove that they can make quality Spider-Man games each and every year or Activision will run them out the door and not look back.

Much different than other movie tie-ins, The Amazing Spider-Man game will serve as an epilogue to the movie.  So be warned to those planning to buy it during the first week of release because there will be spoilers.  During the opening mission of The Amazing Spider-Man, cross-species experiments from Oscorp escape into New York City.  In order to combat the cross-species that are running amok in New York City, expert in nano-technology and newest executive at Oscorp Alistair Smythe creates a bunch of robots to hunt them down.  It is up to Spider-Man, which is also a cross-species, from both the escaped Oscorp experiments and Alistair Smythe's army of killer robots.  While Alistair Smythe may be the main villain in The Amazing Spider-Man, the game also includes classic Spider-Man villains such as Rhino, Felicia Hardy, Scorpion and The Lizard.  The Amazing Spider-Man sees the return of the open world gameplay that was made popular in Spider-Man 2 (possibly one of the best movie tie-in games of all-time).  As Spider-Man, you are able to explore New York City to your hearts content.  Swing around, complete side missions and challenges, fight random thugs or take part in multiple different mini-games in addition to the game's main story.  The two major changes to the Spider-Man open world formula are found in the combat and new Web Rush mechanic.  First, the combat has been retooled to be more fast-paced and free-flowing.  The combat in The Amazing Spider-Man is very similar to Rocksteady's Batman games.  Next the Web Rush mechanic makes travelling across New York a little easier.  When you activate Web Rush and highlight the place where you want to go, Spider-Man smoothly transitions to said location.  When Web Rush is activated, control is taken away from the player, but you can break from the animation and go off in another direction altogether.

Personally, it has been hard to tell if The Amazing Spider-Man will any good.  I have not really cared for a Spider-Man game since the last generation of consoles.  I do want to pick up Shattered Dimensions sometime because I have heard many good things about it.  Other than that I am not that interested in The Amazing Spider-Man game.  I do hope Beenox has made a good enough game in The Amazing Spider-Man to get Activision to possibly give them more time to develop future Spider-Man games instead of pumping one out every year.

Off the Newsstand: Game Informer Issue 230

This past month or so I have had a steady of stream of magazines to read.  Whenever I would finish reading one, another would show up in the mail.  It was very nice as I always had something to read and keep me occupied.  Also when I do not have anything in particular to read, I get kind of stir crazy.  While I wait on the newest issues of EGM and Nintendo Power, I read Issue 230 of Game Informer, which I just finished a few days ago.  Without any further ado, here are my thoughts on this issue.

The Elder Scrolls series graces the cover of Game Informer once again as Bethesda and Zenimax Online announce The Elder Scrolls Online in Issue 230 of Game Informer.  While I am not a fan of the Elder Scrolls series and MMOs, this cover story was fairly enjoyable and very informative.  It goes into full detail how Bethesda and Zenimax Online are going to tackle the MMO genre while keeping Elder Scrolls' identify in tack.  I do think how Bethesda and Zenimax are handling the story with the multiple heroes, player choice and the PvP endgame is all very interesting and great hooks.  I still need to see and read more before I am convinced that The Elder Scrolls Online can compete with the likes of World of Warcraft, Star Wars: The Old Republic and the upcoming Guild Wars II.  While not as good the Halo 4 cover story from last issue, The Elder Scrolls Online cover story is an enjoyable read nonetheless.  Honestly, I was more impressed with all the articles in Issue 230's Connect section like the evolution of the ESA, the current state of adventure games, the many different ways game makers are making money in this day and age and interviews with the curator of the Smithsonian's Video Game Exhibit and the filmmakers behind Indie Game: The Movie.  They were all amazing articles that kept me engaged and glued to the page as they dived right into some of the biggest trends and stories in the video game industry today.  Issue 230 is also packed with the brim with previews from big blockbuster games like the Amazing Spider Man and Resident Evil 6 all the way to some great games under the radar of most gamers like Epic Mikey: Power of Illusion and Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch.  The review section this issue is fairly small, but looks at the biggest games from this spring such as Fez, Dragon's Dogma, Prototype 2 and Kinect Star Wars.

As a whole, Issue 230 of Game Informer is a great issue.  While the cover story on The Elder Scrolls Online is a must read for all fans of The Elder Scrolls series, it is still an enjoyable read for the average reader.  The best content is found in the Connect and Preview sections of Issue 230 and make this issue of Game Informer a must-read for all gamers.