With the next-gen consoles less than a week away, Sony and Microsoft are in high gear promoting their launch titles. Among the most prominent, Spider-Man: Miles Morales got a new trailer to herald its launch, and now several reviewers have had a crack at the title.
Many players had high hopes for Spider-Man: Miles Morales from its very first trailer for obvious reasons. Insomniac's Spider-Man was a huge success already thanks to fun sandbox gameplay and a good superhero story. Players were hoping that Miles Morales would expand on this, since the original was so good players really only needed more. At the same time, there was apprehension that an expansion to the main game might not have enough to it to make the price tag worth it.
Because of this, what players were mostly hunting for when learning about the game was how many new features there would be. While technical details like the leaked insanely fast load times were great, fans of the original and of Spider-Man in particular were eager to see how the game would utilize Miles Morales in all aspects: powers, plot points, and personality. To get a closer look at how the game handles, here are some reviewers' thoughts on what the game got right and wrong.
Game Rant (Anthony Taormina)
Spider-Man: Miles Morales is an exceptional follow-up to Marvel's Spider-Man, even if a lot of the formula feels familiar. On PS5, though, it is a must-play just to see the potential of the new hardware and what it will offer from both a visual and a performance standpoint. For many console gamers, this will be their first taste of steady 4K 60FPS or Ray-Tracing that adds meaningful improvements to the presentation. Insomniac's work on the game is stunning.
Score: 4.5/5
IGN (Jonathon Dornbush)
Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales may not be quite as packed with content as the original, but it stands out as an essential story in Insomniac’s Spidey Universe. It earns its spot as a fantastic follow-up, telling a wonderful Miles-specific story while improving upon the fundamentals of the first game with distinctive moves and enemies. And it’s an excellent way to break in your new PlayStation 5; it looks spectacular, loads fast, and makes fun use of the DualSense controller, the directional audio, and more. But regardless of which generation you play it on, it’s a worthy followup to one of the best superhero games ever made.
Score: 9/10
Metro (GameCentral)
We weren’t really looking forward to playing this game. It may be the highest profile PlayStation 5 launch title, but we didn’t like the first one nearly as much as some people and found the shady way in which Sony slowly revealed that this isn’t a full-blown sequel, and sowed confusion over the PlayStation 4 version and Ultimate Edition, very distasteful. But surprise! It’s actually a fantastic launch game: an effective demonstration of the PlayStation 5’s capabilities and a tighter, more focused gameplay experience with considerably better storytelling than the original.
Score: 8/10
Gameinformer (Andrew Reiner)
No load times. Beautiful raytracing. The PlayStation 5 version of Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales is a technical juggernaut that continually impresses. It is the ideal way to play the game if you can. Feeling the Venom flow through the controller is quite cool. That’s not to say the PlayStation 4 version is far behind, however. Marvel’s Spider-Man from 2018 remains one of the generation’s best-looking and playing games, and this game’s performance is in lockstep with it. Fast travel and restarts bring up short subway rides and loading screens (they are instant on PS5), and the visuals may not have that next-gen sheen, but the PS4 version is still a beautiful and worthy way to experience this excellent game.
Score: 9/10
Godisageek (Adam Cook)
There’s very little to dislike about Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales. It’s full of heart and warmth, with an interesting story, brilliant combat, and breathtaking visuals and audio. Yes, it feels like a slightly shorter game if you mainline it, but try as I might I couldn’t ignore the side-content, and wanted every upgrade and every mission cleared. This is another home-run for Insomniac, and for Sony it’s a brilliant reason to get a PS5. An improvement on the original in every way that matters. Bravo.
Score: 9.5/10
WCCFTech (Kai Powell)
Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales is a great graphical showcase for the launch of the PlayStation 5 as well as the power of the SSD. The length is significantly shorter than Peter Parker's previous adventure, but with the price and content comparable to that of Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, I was eager to check out an open-world title that isn't going to sap away dozens of hours to tell its story. Miles Morales offers a neat little package that can rekindle that joy of superheroes and even take you on an adventure through a side of New York City that games can rarely capture.
Source: 8.5/10
The Gamer (Kirk McKeand)
There’s barebones stealth where you are told via the UI when it’s safe to take an enemy down silently, there're mindless collectibles, and there’s even a boss that you have to lure into walls to stun them so you can whittle their health down with normal attacks. It’s one of those action games, but by god, it’s the best one. There’s something to be said for the importance of innovation in this medium, but you can’t overlook refinement, and Spider-Man: Miles Morales is more refined than the sugar in a New York bagel.
Score: 4.5/5
Scores are positive across the board. More than positive in fact; it's clear that this game was well enjoyed by nearly all the reviewers who played it. Any reviews that mention the PS5 and PS4 versions together, something very important to Miles Morales as a PS5 launch title, do mention the PS5 version is a bit better optimized. Overall though, most agree that the differences are so negligible as to make the PS4 version just as enjoyable. When it comes to the mechanics, the general feeling seems to be that there's not a ton of innovation, but what's there works for the most part and everything still feels great to play (especially movement), so more refinement/less innovation is totally fine.
Perhaps the most interesting points of comparison are when it comes to the game's length and story. Some reviews mention the length as a detriment, although not a huge one, because the game is shorter than its predecessor. Others actually praise the length of the story for knowing when to stop, rather than dragging on (again, like its predecessor). When it comes to story, many reviews are in agreement that it's actually better than the first, largely due to Miles Morales himself. Miles is a more compassionate, less quippy Spider-Man, who's heart is front and center rather than his sharp mind (which still gives Peter's a run for it's money). Overall it seems that despite being under a ton of pressure, Spider-Man: Miles Morales is going to be just fine.
Spider-Man: Miles Morales releases November 12 for PS4 and PS5.