Insomniac’s follow-up to 2018’s Spider-Man was one of my favourite games of 2023. It’s a pure feast for the eyes that’s every bit as compelling as the first, complete with the best gameplay the team’s ever put together. I’ve been eagerly awaiting the game’s PC launch as I’ve been excited for a second run through the story. However, unlike its earlier entries on PC, Spider-Man 2’s port is a mixed bag.
Whether it’s constant hard crashes, textures popping in and out or the dreaded ‘black eyes’, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 on PC is currently plagued with significant issues. I had a bad feeling in the lead up to launch given the sheer lack of information from Nixxes and PlayStation until the day before release, and that feeling’s been validated. This port needed more time in the oven.
That said, when it works the game it’s undoubtedly spectacular. The vast suite of graphical options available to tinker with for PC players is excellent, and the inclusion of NVIDIA’s new transformer model DLSS upscaler is welcome. The game looks phenomenal across the board and the ray tracing implementation is stunning, especially during missions that use light to enhance the atmosphere and general mood. Those with ultrawide monitors will be happy to know the game also supports a variety of aspect ratios, including 48:9 for triple monitor setups.
While it comes equipped with all the bells and whistles a Spidey fan could want, I was surprised at the amount of tinkering that was required to get the game running at a stable framerate. Turning on ray reconstruction brought an increased volume of unwanted crashes, so I had to disable it. Even then, I still had numerous crashes in-game, during cutscenes and in the menus. I also faced countless issues with cutscenes glitching out, whether it was the ‘black eyes’ issue, character models not loading in fully or light incorrectly shimmering in the background. Every time this happened I was immediately taken out of the immersion of what is a fantastic Spidey story. Ultimately, I just put up with it as there’s been no real way to fix any of these issues.
It’s worth noting my computer’s no slouch, either. I have a 4090 and a 7800X3D, so I went in expecting a generally smooth experience at 4K (and the system requirements even specified that would be the case). However I noticed chugging every now and again, especially during cutscenes that cut to other areas or to another character. General traversal sometimes brought noticeable slowdown as well, while fights in smaller areas also had some issues. I had my texture settings maxed out with the ‘high’ ray tracing preset selected, which disables some graphically intensive features of the game I’d have liked to try out, and still couldn’t quite find the right groove. It just feels unoptimised and in dire need of a patch or three to iron out the issues.
Unfortunately I didn’t have too much luck getting the game to perform consistently on my Steam Deck either, with low settings at 720p leading to inconsistent visuals and gameplay at 30fps. Handheld PCs with some more juice under the bonnet may have better luck, but given the game’s struggles on high-end PCs you may be better served to wait for Nixxes to fix the port’s widespread issues.
It’s a shame, too, considering how much I adore Spider-Man 2 (you can read our full review here). It’s not quite as bad as The Last of Us Part 1’s launch on PC a couple of years ago, but it’s certainly not at the quality level of any of the recent PlayStation PC ports, which have been relatively polished on release.