Spider-Man: Edge of Time Review

Spider-Man has been swinging his way to consoles for several decades now. Most of these efforts have fallen flat with a few exceptions along the way. I fondly remember some of the PS1 games and the early PS2 versions that introduced open-world play. More recent attempts on consoles have not lived up to expectations with tedious missions that emphasize collection and delivering over combat. Does that change in Spider-Man: Edge of Time?

Yes it does, surprisingly… at least to an extent. Gone is the open-world city where bad guys seemed to dominate nearly every block but the city still feels vacant and lonely. Spider-Man: Edge of Time follows closer to its PS1 cousins with its indoor gameplay that focuses on combat and platforming. A few combos are offered to start and as you gain experience you can unlock new ones. It works surprisingly well and keeps you engaged when past games did not.

The gimmick that Beenox introduced for this latest Spider-Man game is the introduction of time traveling mechanics, as the name suggests. You play as The Amazing Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2099, switching between characters and altering time as you go along. There really are not any decisions to be made other than how to spend your XP, but the idea of switching between two different Spider-Man universes is quite appealing and it works in execution.

One of the biggest problems you will have with the game is controlling Spider-Man. Combat is simple enough as button mashing, but trying to reach higher areas of the game requires you to web-sling which can be quite the chore to do what you want it to. Having to fight the camera and going the wrong direction half the time becomes quite frustrating. This should not be a problem at this point when the developer has literally been making these games for years.

The campaign is a pretty short affair. You could probably beat it in one sitting if you wanted to badly enough. The six or seven hours that it takes to beat it make this game more of a rental candidate than anything. There is the Web of Challenges for you to test out your grit, but ultimately they are mostly mundane repeats of what you already completed in the campaign.

If you have been longing for the Spider-Man franchise to ditch the open-world environments and re-connect with its classic game past, Spider-Man: Edge of Time is the game for you. It does a competent job switching the action between present and future, allowing players to experience different moves and enemies. Ultimately, though, it is far too short and hard to recommend with such little replay value to speak of. With better controls and more boss fights, Edge of Time could have been a winner.