Available on: PS3, Xbox 360, PC
Price: varies online
I played on: PS3
Notes: There are versions of this game for the Nintendo Wii, DS and 3DS but they are a little different due to the less powerful hardware so this review is only for platforms listed above.
We start with the Amazing Spider-man fighting Eddie Brock as Anti-Venom. I love that we get to see more than just Venom and/or Carnage here but sadly for plot reasons Anti-Venom is no different from Venom. This is a shame as I would love to see more of the Symbiote family. Spidey ends up losing this fight with Anti-Venom and dies which causes the future to change. We then move over to Miguel O'Hara in the year 2099 to find that a scientist from his time has gone back in time in order to change the future. It’s then up to both the Amazing Spider-man and Spider-man 2099 to save the past and future as well as Peter Parker himself.
This story does have a few plot holes but for the most part, it’s very interesting and has a few twists that made me do a double take, sadly they are never fleshed out or explained enough. My other issue with the story is that all the main players are men and the only two women to show up are both romantically linked to Peter and very sexualised. We have so many interesting women in the Spider-man comics such as Spider-Gwen, Silk, Madame Web and more so why do all these games only ever have the white cisgender heterosexual male characters? It’s not even that I don’t like these male characters it’s just I feel I have seen too much of them and want some variety. Just give us a Miles Morales or Gwen Stacy Spider-man for once. I mean the last game had 4 Spider-men and all 4 were white, heterosexual, cisgender and male, how dull is that?
The gameplay is very similar to Shattered Dimensions with basic beat-them-up combos and special modes. The Amazing Spider-man can use his super reflexes to enter a kind of Spider-man bullet time which helps him dodge attacks and hit harder and faster. 2099 Spider-man can create a decoy of himself and move around unseen for a short about of time which helps move the attention away from you during a fight. By collecting little purple orbs or hidden spiders you will be able to upgrade your Spider-men and this makes things a lot more enjoyable in combat. During the second half of the game, I found I was being tested and really started to enjoy the challenge.
My issues with gameplay come from the stupid amount of padding this game has. If you have to do a task you can pretty much guarantee that it will go wrong and there will be 3 McGuffins you have to find in order to get it to work. This gets so annoying and I found myself audibly groaning when sent on yet another lengthy fetch quest.
The graphics are amazing, I can’t believe how good this game looks for a PS3 title. The art design is also impressive with the Amazing Spider-man’s suit standing out for me with the uneven webbing pattern and big bold eyes. Although the music is not bad it doesn’t really grab me but the voice acting is astounding with Christopher Daniel Barnes stealing the show as 2099 Spider-man.
This game has flaws but not enough to make me call it a bad game, it’s better than Shattered Dimensions and I enjoyed that a lot. I hate the way it treats women and having nothing but white dudes really is boring but this is a problem with both comic books and video games in general. If you’re after a new interesting Spider-man story then Edge of Time will be worth playing for you, the combat will also entertain those into beat-them-ups. Not a bad a game at all but not groundbreaking in any sense.
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