Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions is an upcoming video game featuring Spider-Man. Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions blends together the many alternate universes of the world-famous webslinger with four unique takes on Spider-Man’s history in comics.
The suit itself isn’t just for show; all of Ultimate Spidey’s attacks revolve around its alien abilities. That means lots of ranged attacks with gooey arms reaching out to smack enemies around, the ability to withstand more punishment than the alternate dimension Spider-Men, and a rage attack that charges up based on successful strikes on enemies, and which can last as long as you’re able to chain together combos. Our demo level with the symbiote Ultimate Spider-Man takes place at a S.H.I.E.L.D. base that contains a piece of the Tablet of Order and Chaos. S.H.I.E.L.D. also happens to have, er, had, Carnage contained in a high security prison. Somehow Carnage escapes, wrecks havoc on the base, and Ultimate Spider-Man comes to the rescue.
The mode itself is pretty cool, and works more like an interactive cut-scene (think the Poseidon beat-down in God of War 3) than giving you absolute control of Spidey. Really, the only movements I make are using the analog sticks to punch Carnage in the face. After a few successful hits, he breaks free of Spidey’s grip, and the boss battle shifts back to a third-person perspective. So, I’m glad to see early on that this new feature looks to be limited to only boss battle introductions, and isn’t forcing the player to be guided through an entire level from this viewpoint (I think we’d all get motion-sickness from the constant swinging). From there, it just becomes a matter of learning Carnage’s attack patterns and staying alive long enough before my demo session with Ultimate Spidey concludes.
As Spider-Man Noir, you have a few tools at your disposal, such as being able to latch to the top of light posts and cranes to quickly avoid detection, use Spider-Sense to see enemy locations through walls, as well as leaving a “last known location” marker (done as a spider symbol). For Noir, it’s about using these sneaking skills, rather than absolute force, to defeat your enemies. And it is imperative to take quiet steps while moving in and around these enemies, because Noir Spidey can’t handle much damage from enemies in this dimension. From the little that I play (and how much I love sneaking around), this is the dimension I am most looking forward to playing once the game is released. Hell, I wouldn’t mind if they just make a Spider-Man Noir videogame.
With Comic-Con underway, there are set to be a number of other announcements this weekend, such as extra villains as well as some of the voice talent. A few of which have been revealed so far through IMDB are both cartoon voice acting veterans. Dan Gilvezan will be voicing Spider-Man 2099; Gilvezan voiced the original Bumblebee in Transformers and Spider-Man in Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends. Additionally, I notice that Steve Blum is being credited as the Green Goblin, so it looks like this classic villain will appear at some point in the game as well. From what I’ve seen so far of Shattered Dimensions, and seeing the amount of work being put into the game, my hopes are riding pretty high to bring Spider-Man back to the world of relevancy in videogames and to let all of us forget the travesty of Web of Shadows and Spider-Man 3. We only have until September to find out what this game is truly capable of.
