Spiderman and his Amazing Selves

Activision has once again put out a Spiderman video game, but this time it will be on a bigger scale as players will get to play four different spider men.  

One from the Amazing Universe, which is based off of the main MARVEL timeline.  

Another from the Noir universe, which is based off of the series Spiderman: Noir series set in the 1930‘s.  

The third from the 2099 universe, which is a possible future in the MARVEL universe.  

The last there is the Spiderman from the Ultimate Comics universe.  This particular Spiderman is bonded to a symbiote.

The story begins where Spiderman is stopping Mysterio from robbing a museum.  During their fight, Spiderman shatters an artifact called the Tablet of Order and Chaos.  The wall crawler is contacted by Madam Webb, who informs him that he and three other spider men from other dimensions to bring the tablets back together.

As with any Spiderman game, players get a chance to web swing and crawl walls as if they were the wall crawler.  A new feature is the first-person combat sequences are reminiscent of God of War III, yet they are a little shaky at first. 

Other than the first-person combat, the  style for each Spiderman is different.  The Amazing Universe focuses on webbing attacks, Noir focuses on stealth and ambushing, 2099 is centered on close combat, and the Ultimate centers on using the symbiote’s powers in addition to webbing technique.  

Players can also upgrade their maneuvers and obtain new abilities as they progress through the game.

The level progression is linear, which means no free roaming around the city.  While this does not take anything away from the game, this may be a drawback to some players who were fans of the free roaming.  

Unlike most games where the player meets the boss at the end of the level, players will encounter the boss throughout the level, partaking in various fights at different points.

Like all Spiderman games, Shattered Dimensions features some notable figures from the web slinger’s rogues gallery, although some villains have been modified for the universe they appear in. 

As with previous Spiderman games, there are also un-lockables such as alternate costumes for each hero and trophies for accomplishing certain tasks.

The best thing about Shattered Dimensions is the production that went into the game.  Each voice actor who voices a Spiderman has voiced the web slinger at some point in their career. 

The actors who are lending their voice to play Spiderman include Emmy Award winner Neil Patrick Harris (Spiderman: The New Animated Series) who voices the Amazing Spiderman, Josh Keaton (Spectacular Spiderman) who plays Ultimate Spidey, Christopher Daniel Barnes (Spiderman: The Animated Series) who will play The Spider Man in the Noir universe, and Dan Gilevan (Spiderman and his Amazing Friends) will play Miguel O‘ Hara, the Spiderman of 2009.  

Other voice credits include Jim Cummings, David Kaye, Nolan North, and Stan Lee.

Where each Spiderman is different, the look and feel of each universe is also different and actually looks reminiscent to the villain the player is going up against.  

One example is the Noir universe where a player faces the gangster  Hammerhead, it is an entirely dark setting filled with shadows for players to hide in from Hammerhead and his henchmen,

The story for Shattered Dimensions was written by comic book writer Dan Slott (She-Hulk, Amazing Spider-man).

This is a game, not just for comic book fans, but for also gamers who enjoy  fast-paced action, but also enjoy a good laugh. 

Spiderman: Shattered Dimensions is available for the Playstation 3, Wii, X-Box 360, and Nintendo DS. 


Overall: A-

Question: What video game of a comic book character would you like to see?