SPIDER-MAN REMASTERED REVIEW FOR PC.
The origin story of Insomniac’s Spider-Man game is now almost four years old. It started out on PS4 and impressed with its incredible scale but lacked detail, smoothness, and was limited to 30 FPS. Then it hit PS5, where ray-tracing started to enter the mix alongside 60 FPS and, eventually, VRR and 120 FPS support. Now the Amazing Spider-Man has leveled up again for the PC, and this is certainly the most Spectacular version of the game.
Souped-up Spidey!
Spider-Man Remastered for the PC includes the main game and all of its story DLC, making for around 30 hours of gameplay in total. Most of this game time will be spent in the open world of New York City which can be experienced in ways like never before, with support for ultra-wide monitor support spanning 21:9, 32:9, and 48:9.
In this rebooted Spider-Man game, players skip right past the tired origin story and are placed into the well-worn suit of a veteran Peter Parker who is in the prime of his superpowered life. Sure, there is still room for upgrades as players level up their web and gadget abilities for melee engagements that are reminiscent of the Batman: Arkham series, but this is the story of a Spider-Man who has put a lot of bad guys away and learned many lessons.
The main story missions follow Peter as he struggles to balance his hero and personal lives, with the former starting to overwhelm the latter. As more and more villains start to appear in NYC, the odds are stacked against him, and it’s a pressure that is wonderfully conveyed through a sequence of well-acted cutscenes and memorable set-pieces. This is a blockbuster title with all of the spectacle of a big-screen Marvel movie and it shines brightest when powered by a high-end PC.
When swinging around as Spider-Man, the high frame rate support makes movement and animations the smoothest they have ever been. Stand still for a moment, however, and you’ll be able to take in the ray-traced reflections displayed in the many windows and other reflective surfaces.
It’s all well and good having these options available, but surely all but the most powerful of PCs will struggle to enable all of these graphical upgrades at the same time? Actually, no. Thanks to Nvidia’s DLSS tech, supported graphics cards can handle a lot more than you might think, rendering at lower resolutions and using AI to upscale with little to no perceivable downgrade in visual quality.
With great power
If you do have one of those aforementioned “most powerful of PCs,” then Nvidia’s DLAA (Deep Learning Anti-Aliasing) is always available here for those who can spare the GPU power. If you’re more susceptible to noticing jagged edges from a lack of quality AA, or hate the fuzziness that less-demanding AA often results in, then DLAA is a great solution.
I’m something of a PC gamer myself
While there are the usual presets available to those PC gamers who just want to set and forget, others like myself will appreciate the comprehensive list of advanced options that allow us to fine-tune graphical aspects until we’re totally satisfied with the balance of performance and visual quality. This PC version goes above and beyond, to the point where the devs are still rolling out more graphical options as I type.
Prepare for launch
During my playthrough, I’m sad to say that I experienced a number of unexpected issues. Initially, my CPU was struggling with keeping up at higher frame rates. Ray-traced reflections, even with DLSS enabled, severely crippled my system and forced me to turn them off for the first five hours or so. And last, but certainly not least as it could be a real pain, the game audio would often judder.
Thankfully, all of these issues have been addressed with multiple pre-launch patches. It’s clear that the devs have been pushing hard to squash every bug, glitch, and other nasty ready for the August 12 launch date. I’m happy to say that the final seven hours I spent clearing up side content have been flawlessly smooth and free of any hiccups.
Also worthy of note is how the DualSense controller (when plugged in with a cable) provides the haptic feedback and trigger effects that were previously only available on PS5. Additionally, this game is now Steam Deck Verified, meaning owners of that portable system can play it on the go.
Spider-Man Remastered PC Review: The final verdict
With the Spider-Man Remastered PC version, gamers are getting the smoothest edition of the web-slinger complete with a comprehensive suite of graphical settings. This is exactly what we need from PlayStation games making their way to PC!
Spider-Man Remastered PC was reviewed on PC with code provided by the publisher. Test system: 3700X, 32 GB RAM, 3080 Ti.
