Lowest price: $9.99 , PS+: $9.99 — Release date: Aug. 28, 2018
Marvel’s Spider-Man: The City That Never Sleeps is downloadable content for Marvel’s Spider-Man may be sold separately. Marvel’s Spider-Man required to play associated downloadable content.
Download Marvel’s Spider-Man: The City That Never Sleeps DLC to continue your adventure in Marvel’s New York. Get access to three story chapters that include additional missions and challenges, brand new factions of enemies from the Spider-Man universe, and additional suits to unlock. Purchasing The City That Never Sleeps DLC provides access to download all three story chapters when they release.
Content Overview:
Marvel’s Spider-Man: The Heist - Felicia Hardy aka Black Cat, is back in town and leaving mysterious clues around Marvel’s New York to toy with Spider-Man. Available for download October 23rd, 2018.
Marvel’s Spider-Man: Turf Wars – Spider-Man must put an end to the turf war erupting between the Maggia crime family and gang leader Hammerhead before Marvel’s New York becomes its greatest casualty. Available for download November 20, 2018.
Marvel’s Spider-Man: Silver Lining – In the tension-filled finale to Marvel’s Spider-Man: The City That Never Sleeps, the web-slinger must rely on unlikely allies to protect the city from calamity. Available for download December 21, 2018.
Information from the official PlayStation Store site. All Rights Reserved.
Sony Interactive Entertainment
Spider-Man on the PlayStation 4 didn't have to do much to impress, with its three-part DLC series dubbed "The City That Never Sleeps."
But fans of Insomniac Games know better.
After swatting away the high expectations that come with being given a free pass to pen a Spider-Man universe of their own, and a Sony Interactive Entertainment exclusive no less, the developers behind the amazing base game went all out with the triple dose of web-slinging action.
Flexing the narrative muscle and approval from Marvel to weave a story that cohesively links the first game to the inevitable sequel is only the tip of the iceberg with the trio of offerings, as Insomniac Games uses each to implement some fresh gameplay elements and events.
In all, The City That Never Sleeps provides notable gameplay and narrative refinements to spin a digestible web for one of this year's best overall games.
The Heist
The Heist won't blow veterans of the base game away as it doesn't deviate too far from the successful formula.
After all, it opens up in a museum with Spider-Man going all Batman on players by searching for fingerprints before the narrative really gets going.
But said narrative is a flash of superb storytelling once the ball gets rolling. Black Cat enters the scene after mere flirtations of her existence in the world during the base game. And speaking of flirtations, the typical Peter Parker love triangle comes into effect right away once Mary Jane finds out Felicia Hardy is in the mix.
Black Cat capitalizes on this in a typically manipulative way, which continues until a cliffhanger of a finish. In the process, Black Cat participates in what might be the best chase scene of the game, and one memorable mission involves her in an interesting gameplay twist players won't soon forget.
Gameplay-wise, the implementation of an objective within a massive brawl is a nice touch. Managing escaping thugs while trying to whittle down their overall numbers is a simplistic, though surprisingly effective, shakeup to the typical formula.
Those thugs are an extension of the Hammerhead army. Mafia-style enemies are a little disappointing after the juiced up supernatural enemies from the base game, but the Project Olympus modifications make for some interesting new battles.
This is an admittedly light DLC offering. It throws a collection-based objective at players scattered around the map, and Screwball is unfortunately back with more social-media based bomb-timer things with cameras sprinkled in to complete. Not that these aren't fun—the Screwball character itself for many might be akin to nails on the chalkboard.
While requiring Spider-Man to complete some objectives around the map before the story kicks on again can feel like padding, it is a forgivable offense given the amount of story here.
A dangerous villain, another love interest, the threat of Sable, gameplay refinements, J. Jonah Jameson ranting on his podcast, Miles calling with interesting conversations and a much-improved stealth sequence round out a solid, albeit quick, DLC offering fans will only smile about in hindsight.
Turf Wars
Call it a sophomore slump, all right?
The second DLC installment, Turf Wars, takes a darker tone but certainly feels like the second child of the equation. There is a big character hole in the second act for storytelling purposes, but it hurts after the first episode. This offering includes challenges such as the stealth missions.
Granted, we're talking about something with "war" in the title, so stealth wouldn't make sense. This is a tonally pitch-black story where the cops suffer robust casualties, including a rather staggering scene that, without spoiling, fans will want to check out. Spider-Man's wit takes a seat as well; his tone as gray as the persistent overcast sky throughout the experience.
Predictably, this drives a wedge into the Spider-Man-Captain Yuri Watanabe relationship, with some narrative plots being easy to see coming but executed well. The story itself won't surprise much, and comic-book readers know where this whole beat is headed soon, but that doesn't slight the execution overall. That said, it is a bit jarring to see some of the big events from the first episode simply go unaddressed.
Gameplay is crisp as usual, with the second act taking the objective within a fight idea a step further to solid, tense results. But the fights are even sloppier at times with a ton of different enemy types, lasers, rockets, kamikaze jetpacks and machine-gun wielding brutes to manage all at once.
Veteran players who haven't put the game down will see it as a fun end-game test of skill, but those returning to the game might have to retry more than a handful of fights.
The side content is hit or miss, with some of the new open-world missions worthwhile, but one Screwball mission type featuring an instant-fail camera is tedious.
Clearly, the game had a set tone in mind going in and a story to advance in a way it saw fit. It executes this well, but the rather workmanlike unfolding of events in a short package makes it the most forgettable chapter of the three, which is a bit odd given some of the big story elements that unfold.
Silver Lining
The third and final act, Silver Lining, saves some of the best for last. New York remains violent, but it returns to its vibrant and colorful tones as Spider-Man moves through an unfolding narrative at a blinding pace a day removed from the events of Turf Wars.
A lot happens in a short amount of time, with almost everyone glossed over in the story so far. MJ shares some game-altering news, a consistent presence swaps out for another big name, and some story threads featuring others in Peter Parker's life get a nice tug.
Silver Sable has some context filled into her backstory that explains details from the base game and beyond, and she plays a role in what might be the best moment from all three quick stories.
In fact, Silver Lining feels fresher than Turf Wars for a multitude of reasons, as Parker even plays a role in the events this time. Granted, the main story is still shepherding the player from fight to fight, but the developing story remains engaging and doesn't skip anything from the prior two episodes. A deviation into an enemy base for some story explanation is handled extremely well, too.
Those fights are again chaotic, with the reaction from players likely to vary. It can be a difficult mess at times, especially now that the jetpack mafia goons (really) can fire globs of web-canceling fields into the air to ground the spider.
One battle, at least, weaves in an ally in a fun way, and it is an absolute blast to pair Spider-Man with someone as powerful as himself—and it offers a hint of what might be to come in sequels given some of the storylines developing.
The big payoff with the finale doesn't have much to do with Hammerhead himself, who is now juiced beyond the point of return. The whole villain-becomes-robot-to-compete-with-superhero thing is tired, but the old skull noggin was never the point of these stories anyway.
Coming out of the DLC, the focal point will be on the impressive angles set up for future games.
Speedrunning Tips
Sony Interactive Entertainment
These are quick episodes, but just how quick players can speedrun through them should make for a good viewing time.
Like the base game, the sheer skill of traversal through the world, and quick-twitch thought with a vast array of gadgets at their disposal in combat, should make speedruns of the DLC episodes thrilling. With most player's characters presumably maxed already, the number of options in all areas will let the creativity flow nicely alongside a big skill ceiling.
Actually speedrunning the episodes shouldn't prove too difficult. A fully-equipped Spider-Man at this point should make traversal simple, as the zips and launch recoveries compensate for mistakes. When all else fails and an objective is quite far, fast travel at police stations is still available throughout.
An interesting wrinkle here is those mandatory breaks in the story so the player can do some open-world activities. The catch is, prioritizing which activity a player tackles will produce a better time.
Those who haven't collected all the backpacks yet are in for a treat—going to a point and grabbing those one or two times advances the story rapidly as opposed to, say, going to clear out a lengthy base battle or deal with a stealth mission from Screwball.
On the combat front, Spider-Sense is as critical as ever, as a properly timed dodge can result in webbing automatically being applied to the enemy Spider-Man is dodging. This sets up critical combos, especially as building the focus meter to earn instant takedowns is more important than ever.
Now would be the time to mention target priority, which should probably focus on the goons hanging on the edges of a battle taking potshots with lasers and rockets, then collapse inside to the jet-pack enemies.
Realistically, certain gadgets will be better than others, but all come into play given the scope of most fights. Electric Web is absolute money against the new type of bigger brute enemies, who are arguably the most dangerous given their ability to ruin a player's timing and flow of combat—repeatedly. Contrast that with, say, attaching a trip mine to him, which won't kill him but will simply distract.
Area-of-effect gadgets and the environment itself is the get-out-of-jail-free card when things get too messy. Popping an enemy with a stasis field and watching Oscorp's project send all the enemies in the vicinity into the air offers a nice breather and a few free knockouts.
By prioritizing a few smart traversal techniques when the game throws out a roadblock, and smooth gadget and enemy management, it shouldn't take long for speedrunners to dissect these three acts and post some superb times.
Conclusion
Sony Interactive Entertainment
The City That Never Sleeps was never going to surprise in the same way the base game did. However, compared to lots of DLC offerings on the market these days, it is a robust experience that takes a few risks tonally and actually uses the opportunity to advance a handful of series-long storylines in a meaningful way.
It is difficult to complain about how drab Hammerhead and his thugs are coming out of a base game with so many supervillains poised so prominently. This is more about the people around Parker and Spider-Man this time, and each thread will leave fans hungry for more by the time they see the last post-credits scene, a classic Marvel technique that Insomniac Games was happy to borrow here.
If this is the end for the first game in the series, it is a proper sendoff. Completionists have plenty of new tasks to keep them busy in one of the best open worlds to date, not to mention the best Spider-Man experience to date.
Speedrunners have new challenges to clear that should make for exciting techniques and viewing. Most importantly, casual and hardcore fans alike can get something worthwhile from the stage-setting throughout a strong three-part expansion.