Video Game / Marvel's Spider-Man 2

This page assumes that you've played Marvel's Spider-Man for the PlayStation 4 and Spider-Man: Miles Morales, and spoilers for both games’ main story and The City that Never Sleeps DLC for the first game will be left unmarked. You have been warned.

Be Greater. Together.

"The great hunt begins now."

— Kraven the Hunter

Marvel's Spider-Man 2 is a Wide-Open Sandbox Superhero Action-Adventure video game and the sequel to Marvel's Spider-Man and Spider-Man: Miles Morales, developed by Insomniac Games and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment under the PlayStation Studios imprint exclusively for the PlayStation 5 on October 20, 2023. It is the third entry in the Marvel's Spider-Man series.

Players will control both Peter Parker and Miles Morales as Spider-Man as the duo face off against Kraven the Hunter, who has begun a massive hunt for the superhumans of New York, both good and evil. At the same time, the duo must work to save the life of Harry Osborn and deal with the mysterious Venom symbiote.

Both Yuri Lowenthal and Nadji Jeter reprise their roles from the previous game as Peter Parker and Miles Morales respectively, in addition to Laura Bailey as Mary Jane Watson and Griffin Puatu as Ganke Lee; with Tony Todd joining the cast as the Venom symbiote, Graham Phillips taking over Harry Osborn and Jim Pirri as Kraven.

The next installment of this universe will be a Wolverine game that is tentatively supposed to release in 2025.

Not to be confused with the game adaptations of Spider-Man 2 and The Amazing Spider-Man 2, or the similarly-named game Spider-Man 2 – Enter: Electro.

Previews: Reveal Trailer, Gameplay Reveal, Story Trailer

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Marvel's Spider-Man 2 provides examples of:

• Absurdly Low Level Cap: The game caps out at level 60, which is achievable by the time Peter winds up with the Symbiote, which is a little under halfway into the game's story missions. After that, the main thing preventing skill progression is related skills not having been unlocked in the plot yet. New Game Plus adds nine Ultimate Levels, only obtainable after Level 60.
• Achievement Mockery: Hitting the ground while trying to perform an aerial trick will cause Spider-Man to face-plant and net you the Trophy "Splat!"
• Action Prologue: Much like how the first game opens up with Peter assisting Yuri and the NYPD in taking down Fisk, 2 starts with Peter starting his first day as a teacher, only for him and Miles to ditch school and deal with a rampaging Sandman.
• Adaptation Amalgamation:
  • The story is a combination of the legendary "Black Suit Saga" (Peter being bonded with the Venom symbiote and being made more aggressive by it resulting in the creation of what is by far Peter's single most personal enemy), Kraven's Last Hunt (Kraven coming to New York and hunting a black-suited Spider-Man as a final challenge while dying from cancer), and "Best Of Enemies" (Harry turns on Peter, becomes a supervillain, and dies (or near dies in this case) redeeming himself at the end), taking elements from all three arcs and mix-matching them. Additional details are lifted from Hunted (Kraven targets a lot of superhumans rather than just Peter and successfully dies in battle doing so), Brand New Day (Mr. Negative creating the Anti-Venom suit), "Big Time" (Yuri becoming the Wraith and Peter getting a job at a tech startup), Absolute Carnage, King in Black, and "Planet of the Symbiotes" (a symbiote invasion of Earth). Additionally, it takes a few ideas from two notable Elseworld stories — Life Story (Venom being someone other than Eddie Brock) and Renew Your Vows (Peter being forced to kill Venom and retiring (or stepping back in this case) in response).
  • Other than the comics, the game takes influences from various other Spider-Man media. These include Spider-Man: The Animated Series (Venom coming from a mysterious meteorite) The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (Harry Osborn suffering from a terminal illness and becoming a supervillain as a result of a rift with Peter), Ultimate Spider-Man (2012) (Harry Osborn becomes Venom instead of Eddie Brock, as well as featuring him using the symbiote as a spider hero in his own right before succumbing to Venom, albeit Agent Venom as opposed to Black Suit Spider Man), The Spectacular Spider-Man (Venom being a creepy Yandere for Peter and having to be purged from Peter through a Battle in the Center of the Mind), and Spider-Man: Web of Shadows (Venom intends to use the symbiotes to assimilate humanity and put them under his control).
• Adaptation Origin Connection:
  • Dr. Connors led the group that discovered the symbiote, and it attempting to bond with him resulted in his arm being amputated, connecting the origin of the Lizard to the Venom symbiote.
  • In the wider scope of the series, the symbiote being used as an attempt at curing Harry of the genetic disease that killed his mother ties Venom to the origins of Doctor Octopus, Mr. Negative and Devil's Breath from the previous game.
• Air-Dashing: The Venom Dash from Spider-Man: Miles Morales returns as an upgrade in this installment to let players rocket themselves forward through the air with the press of a button. Only not only can Miles blast himself around, but Peter can too through either his robotic spider-limbs or his Symbiote powers. The ability can be further upgraded to allow air tricks to lower the Dash's cooldown, allowing you to speed through New York as long as you're willing to do some flips along the way.
• Ambiguous Situation:
  • During the game, Black Cat steals the Wand of Watoom, a magical artifact that can create portals to anywhere on earth, from Doctor Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum. While Miles and MJ initially believe she's going to use it for nefarious reasons, she claims that she actually plans to use it to go to Paris to save her girlfriend from an unknown dangerous group. Miles helps her escape regardless, but whether or not she's actually telling the truth is ultimately left vague.
  • It's made clear by his final appearance that Martin Li knows Peter is the original Spider-Man. But it's not made clear when he learned this, or whether he knew back in the first game. Like in the previous games, there's scenes that easily be interpreted as Li knowing but remaining vague enough to maintain deniability. He purposefully goes to FEAST to get Peter's attention, and repeats to him May's saying "When you help someone, you help everyone". When he takes a look in Miles's mind, he has no reaction to Miles name-dropping Peter upon seeing a vision of the original Spider-Man (whereas in the same sequence he makes special note of hearing Miles's name). Later, when he dives in Peter's mind with Miles, he's unsurprised to see May's house feature in it, and also displays no reaction to seeing an unmasked Peter crying over May's deathbed. Similarly some of the dialogue he has with Miles where he mentions the other Spider-Man can be interpreted as implying he knows it's Peter.
• Ambiguous Syntax: Peter growls that Kraven "got away from us" seconds before Miles actually lands at his side, making it unclear whether he's talking to the fellow superhero, or it's another sign of the symbiote's corruption.
• Amusement Park: The world-famous Coney Island is fully-realized and explorable here, with an entire mission dedicated to Peter and friends hanging out for a night of carnival games and thrill rides.
• And Now for Someone Completely Different:
  • After the symbiote bonds to Harry, the player controls the newly-created Venom on a violent rampage and subsequent boss battle with Kraven.
  • Hailey is playable for one side mission. Befitting her as a deaf character, there is hardly any sound with what we can hear being very muffled, and instead of talking to herself to share her thoughts with the player, stylized icons appear above her head to represent ideas and emotions.
  • As in the first game, MJ is playable in some missions.
• "Anger Is Healthy" Aesop: During the game, Mary Jane has been struggling with her job (and new boss) at the Daily Bugle and started to feel neglected by Peter because he's been focusing too much on being a hero rather than actually doing anything to help with money or finding genuine work. MJ doesn't say any of these things to Peter because she knows he means well and he's not doing any of this maliciously. However, when when her and Peter get into a big fight, all these feelings of anger and inadequacy come forward and Peter genuinely feels awful about putting her last and does make an effort to improve the relationship between the two.
• Anger Montage: During the game's ending, Norman Osborn is so broken up by what's happened that he takes Harry's walking cane and smashes several things in the room with it. Peter and Mary Jane, who happened to be there, wordlessly excuse themselves while Norman does so.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • While tackling a Hunter base, Ganke will contact Spider-Man to let them know when they've cleared out the current section of the base, so the player knows to move on.
  • In the first game, MJ immediately failed her missions if she was spotted. This time around, she gets searched for if she's seen and has opportunities to fight back or escape to cover, even being able to take a few hits (which have cooldown time if not taken in rapid succession).
  • In order to fast travel to a district, you have to complete a certain amount of activities in said area to be able to do so. However, if the place you need to go on the map is just near the border to a district you can swing directly to, you can fast travel right to the edge to speed things up since you can freely select any part of the districts you want.
  • During stealth segments, there's a few seconds window when enemies go from "Safe" to "Danger" where if taken down they'll still not trigger an alert, to account for sometimes rather erratic sight lines between enemies.
  • Unless alerted or searching for missing comrades, enemies don't react to finding their comrades dangling from web lines, or perches, even if those are clearly within their eye sights due to varying elevation levels.
  • While none were exactly hard to unlock, certain suits in the first two games had somewhat steep equipment requirements to craft once they became available. Here, there are tech parts for crafting resources scattered in abundance, so unless you neglect side missions deliberately, there's no possible way you won't be able to afford any suit right away (or at least it's less likely).
  • The settings menu lets the player customize the game a good amount; even ignoring the massive amount of accessibility options, things such as game speed, enemy damage, health and detection speed can be adjusted. Naturally, this also allows players to avert or even invert this; the player can turn on Falling Damage and lower swinging assists to make swinging more physics-based, which when disabled completely removes the minimum swing height limit.
  • When Peter has the symbiote, he isn't really affected by loud noises caused by gameplay elements that normally hurt other symbiotes (like steel pipes the player pulls down) unless the plot calls for it. This prevents players from accidentally making themselves vulnerable in fights.
  • The upgrade that shows unopened crates on the minimap also shows nearby uncollected Spider-bots, which makes finding them significantly easier. Not that the game tells you this.
  • The bonus conditions for stopping crimes grant experience rather than upgrade tokens, so having some condition that you just can't pull off doesn't do anything but slightly slow up levelling rather than potentially making some upgrade impossible.
• Anyone Can Die: The game goes hatchet on the established Spider-Rogues. Three supervillains from last game are all Killed Offscreen by Kraven, Scorpion follows them early into the main story, Kraven is killed by Venom, and the Venom Symbiote itself is destroyed at the end of the game (though a fragment survives in Cletus Kasady's possession).
• Arc Number: 2. It's in the title, there are two playable Spider-Men, and this game serves as a sequel (i.e., 2nd game) to both of their solo games. The game heavily focuses on several partnerships including, but not limited to, Peter and Miles, Peter and MJ, Peter and Harry, and the Venom symbiote and its host. In addition, the open world has doubled in size with the addition of two new boroughs. Finally, "second chances" are an important Arc Word as shown below.
• Arc Words:
  • "Heal the world". This is the dream that Harry and Peter share, a goal that they've strived towards since high school. Through the innovative research projects of the Emily-May Foundation, the two plan on working together to ensure a cleaner, healthier future for the planet. Once Venom has Harry under his thumb, he convinces the young man that they can heal the world together, through total world domination.
  • "Second Chances". Numerous villains return as reformed criminals attempting to legitimately go straight after considering their life choices, especially Martin Li, who feels great regret for his past sins, but fully accepts that the victims of his terrorist actions won't forgive him regardless. Miles eventually affirms this to his face, but also states that he won't carry the hatred for Li killing his father any more either, allowing them to part on neutral terms. Harry re-introduces himself to Peter and MJ wanting a second chance to start up their own company like they planned to do in high school, before his mother's death and genetic illness waylaid that and Harry nearly lost his life during the treatment, wanting to make the most of his own second chance at life to try his best to "Heal the World" as his mother wished. MJ and Peter are trying their best to make their own second chance at a relationship work, despite a few rocky patches with Peter's issues with balancing his life as Spider-Man with a steady job. During the Boss Battle against Scream, the symbiote brings MJ's frustrations and insecurities with Peter to the forefront in a blistering "The Reason You Suck" Speech, leaving him devastated by how he's been unknowingly taking her for granted, but allowing them to reaffirm how much they mean to each other in the aftermath. It's implied this greatly contributed to Peter's decision to step back from the Spider-Man lifestyle in the epilogue to focus more on rebuilding the Emily-May foundation from scratch, focusing more on his domestic life to make sure their second chance counts.
  • This also becomes tragically inverted with Norman Osborn, who appears to have a second chance at life with his son Harry, due to how the symbiote seemingly improves his condition, but over time, the alien menace's true agenda, the escalating chaotic situation the city, and Norman's own actions end up accidentally torpedoing that. In the epilogue, Harry is now in worse condition than ever, left in a coma that he might not be able to wake up from and again in declining health from his genetic condition, leaving the likely possibility that Harry will pass away without getting the chance to say goodbye to his father, like he feared would happen with him, Peter and MJ before the treatment started. Likewise, despite his imprisonment, Otto Octavius has also squandered the chance to re-evaluate his life, his appearance in the epilogue making it clear he still holds fast to his hatred of Norman to a petty degree, and is furthermore planning some kind of Revenge, implied to be bad for everybody.
  • "Be Greater, Together". The game's tagline serves as both a double entendre referring to Miles and the symbiote, and a recurring motif that Peter and Miles are only capable of making headway in their personal and professional lives by relying on each other. When the black suit begins amplifying Peter's negative personality traits, the most immediate change is that he starts viewing everyone around him as incompetent and thus he needs to do everything himself. In the final act, where Peter and Miles each ended their solo outing by being unable to save someone they cared about, by working together they're able to save Harry's life.
• Art Evolution: Peter's Advanced Suit has seen several tweaks since the original PS4 game and Miles Morales. The suit has been given a deeper red color, the white spider doesn't extend out to the blue parts of the suit, the bottom incorporates more blue and the waist area has been modified. Miles' suit is also updated, though in comparatively smaller ways, such as the red going down his arms.
• Artificial Brilliance: Enemies can notice when you've webbed up their buddies on higher surfaces and they'll actually learn to look up and notice you crawling around up there.
• Artistic License – Geography:
  • Manhattan is similar to the first game, including the same alterations, missing neighborhoods such as Washington Heights, and use of Space Compression. The game adds parts of Brooklyn and Queens. Several changes are made. Roosevelt Island is missing, replaced by The Raft. The entire south end of Brooklyn is basically shifted north to be at the same latitude as Manhattan's southern end and the East River is made more straight, giving Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens straight, parallel coasts. Randalls and Wards Islands have two bridges heading into Queens. The southeastern corner of the map is also reminiscent of Jamaica Bay, but doesn't include any of the islands contained within^note oddly enough, there actually is a bunch of islands there in-game, but they are invisible until the player gets close (which is possible to do even inside the map borders) and there's nothing of note on them.
  • The North and South Brother islands appear (albeit out-of-bounds), and while surprisingly accurate recreations for the most part, they've been moved to be much closer to not only each other, but are within throwing distance of Astoria. In addition, while the real islands are illegal to enter without a permit^note the ruins are a hazard and the islands have been designated as bird sanctuaries for decades and haven't had any occupants since the 60's, South Brother regardless has a water tower and two apartment buildings that light up at nightime (especially impressive since unlike NB, SB has zero surviving buildings whatsoever in real life).
  • An abandoned hospital in northern Astoria (close to the aforementioned islands, in fact) is visually based on the ruins of the smallpox hospital in Roosevelt Island, albeit in much better condition. That's quite a jump, not to mention the fact that as mentioned above, Roosevelt Island doesn't even appear in the game.
  • The Cuban flag was mistakenly put in places where the Puerto Rican one should've been, which was likely overlooked due to the flags looking the same minus the red and blue parts being inverted. This was noticed and patched.
• Artistic License – Physics: Any Spider-Man media will have, by its very nature, a tenuous relationship with physics, but worth mentioning here are the new web wings, which allow the Spider-Men to glide. When catching an air current, Spider-Man will gain a boost of speed and basically stop losing altitude so long as he remains in the air current. This already strains credibility with how small the web wings are, but what makes it particularly ridiculous is that the air currents work the same in both directions; no matter the direction the wind is blowing, tailwind or headwind, it'll always boost Spider-Man forward. This is, of course, a deliberate choice so players don't have to hunt specific air currents going in the direction they want (and to not have New York crisscrossed by air currents that somehow go opposite of one another).
• Art Shift: As is Spider-Verse tradition, multiversal characters are presented in a different art style to the main universe. In this instance, Delilah adopts PS1-style graphics, modeled after Spider-Man (2000), no less!
• Awesome, but Impractical: There's a reason Venom is restricted to "Don't Be Scared" as a playable character. If Venom is played outside of the mission, he can free-roam the entire map, fight criminals, symbiotes, and hunters. However random crimes such as burning tankers and buildings require webs to stop them from exploding/burning up the building, he's too slow for chases (and gets glitched if you happen to catch up and press the triangle button), and Hunter hideouts involve entering rooms. He can't do basic movements such as wall-crawling or web-slinging, since he can't use webs, and his health will always be at 100 with a single focus bar.
• Back for the Dead: Scorpion bites it on screen after he ambushes Kraven, who tanks Scorpion's tail and stabs him with it.
• Back Stab:
  • You can finish every enemy in one hit, no matter how mighty, with a stealth takedown. Whether you're behind them or above them, as long as they're in reach of your arms or your webbing, they're done with a press of a button.
  • Your reward for finding all of the Prowler's stashes is a massive damage bonus to the first attack you make after each use of Miles' Camouflage.
• The Bad Guy Wins:
  • Kraven ultimately gets exactly what he wants, which is to Face Death with Dignity by dying to a Worthy Opponent. Though considering the game has a Big Bad Ensemble, Kraven's death is merely the start of the third act, with Venom taking over as the Final Boss.
  • For side plots, The Flame successfully tricks Peter into giving him what he wants and escapes to cause more... carnage.
• Bag of Spilling: Peter and Miles both start the game at level 1, without the skills or gadgets they had by the end of the last two games. Zig-zagged a bit, at least for Peter, as their level 1 kits contain a lot of moves that Peter had to earn through his level-up skill tree in the first game, including some late-game moves (Miles started his solo game with a similar kit to this game).
• Bait-and-Switch:
  • After the game's Action Prologue, we get a cutscene featuring a mercenary who looks like a modernized take on Kraven the Hunter^note Specifically, a fusion of his 616 and Ultimate versions stalking and ambushing someone in the jungle... only for the real Kraven to show up behind the mercenary, sneering at his weak skills and breaking his neck. That same scene was featured in the game's trailer for the PlayStation Showcase 2023 event. Since it doesn't seem like a Spider-Man trailer until Kraven shows up, intentionally or not, this tricked a few people when the trailer was first broadcast.
  • After getting the full tour of the Emily-May Foundation and being shown where he'd be working, Peter says the place is amazing, but that there's one thing he has to say first. Harry (and likely the players) initially assume that Peter is going to give some reason that he can't work for the Foundation in spite of it being his dream job, only for Peter to state that he prefers his desk to be facing a different direction.
  • When Harry re-bonds with the escaped symbiote and finally assumes Venom's iconic appearance, the framing of him and Spider-Man facing each other across the lab looks like the initial moment before an opening boss fight...only for Norman Osborn to put himself between them and interrupt the face-off! As Norman begs Peter not to hurt his son, Venom seizes the distraction to charge at Spider-Man and toss him away through multiple walls. Venom turns towards the Oscorp security, with Norman ordering them to tear the symbiote off his son, leaving the player in control of Venom instead during the brutal rampage.
• Bait-and-Switch Compassion: After Martin Li gets his hands on Miles during their fight, his powers cause Miles to suffer through illusions of his closest friends and family berating him. A hope spot appears in the form of his deceased father, Jefferson Davis. It's initially akin to similar situations with Peter, where a comforting vision of their loved ones reminds them of their worth. Only for "Jefferson" to reaffirm how Miles is ultimately a failure in his eyes...
• Battle in the Center of the Mind: Twice. First when Martin Li fights Miles in Kraven's arena, then when they team up to save Peter from the remnants of the symbiote.
• Beat the Curse Out of Him: Not a literal curse, but the spirit of the trope applies. After Miles stops Peter from killing Kraven, he has to get the symbiote off of him with words, fists, and a bell that exploits the symbiote's weakness to sound. Many civilians will get subject to this too after Harry becomes Venom and forcibly mutates people with symbiotes in a twisted effort to "heal the world".
• Be Careful What You Wish For: Norman Osborn wanted to save his son from illness and see him become strong and healthy. Thanks to the symbiote, his chosen method for saving Harry, Norman's dream comes true... at the cost of creating Venom.
• Berate and Switch: The "Photo Help" mission, which features a young Peter Parker racing to meet J. Jonah Jameson for the first time, concludes with JJJ harshly criticizing Peter's only good Spider-Man photo. However, he ultimately thinks it's good enough for his front page, hiring Peter to the Bugle.
• Bittersweet Ending: Venom and the Symbiotes are destroyed, but Harry has been forced into a coma as a result of Venom's possession with little chance of survival. MJ quits working at the Bugle to start her own podcast and moves in with Peter. Peter decides to rebuild the Emily-May foundation and leaves full Spider-Man duties to Miles in the meantime, with consideration for retirement one day. Osborn, on the other hand, furious at what happened to Harry, decides to fully devote his time to getting revenge on the Spider-Men.
• Bland-Name Product: A few pop up, most notably Big City Bank, which is foreclosing on Aunt May's house since Peter hasn't been able to keep up with the mortgage May took out to finance F.E.A.S.T.
• Blood Knight:
  • Kraven's Motive Rant exposits that he's spent his whole life searching for a Worthy Opponent and found himself continually disappointed, questioning if the Spider-Men will be able to give him the challenge he seeks.
  • Peter himself becomes this after acquiring the symbiote, pursuing Kraven with a fierceness not previously seen in this incarnation of the character.
    Peter: [Lizard's] mine.
    Miles: You sure? He's got big teeth...
    Peter: So do I.
• Bookends:
  • The game opens up with Sandman going on a rampage. When Miles asks for help, Peter asks him if he can't handle things on his own, but Miles insists that he needs Peter's help, which ends up costing Peter his new job as a teacher. At the end of the game, a notification on FNSM pops up and calls the Spider-Men to action. Miles assures Peter he can handle the crisis on his own while Peter goes about rebuilding the Emily-May Foundation.
  • When Peter first obtains the black suit, the following fight automatically activates symbiote surge and keeps it on for the entire fight as A Taste of Power. At the end of the arc, Peter assaults one of Kraven's hideouts to find Miles, and the player is once again given infinite symbiote surge for one last (non-boss) combat encounter; this time to act as a brutal Mook Horror Show to show how much the suit is influencing Peter.
• Both Sides Have a Point: The conflict between Peter and Yuri during the Flame missions has neither one being completely wrong in their arguments against the other's approach to criminals. On one side, Peter is absolutely correct that Yuri is taking her Judge, Jury, and Executioner approach too far, being obsessed with killing criminals when clear alternatives are available and being unconcerned with the civilians getting caught up in the crossfire. On the other hand, Yuri is right that the Flame is legitimately too dangerous and psychotic to be treated with Peter's usual brand of mercy. Not only is his body count horrifying, but he's used Peter's mercy to escape already. The horrifying implications get cranked to 11 by the quest chain's end with one Wham Line after another: the Flame declares his intent to continue his reign of terror and spreading carnage while escaping with the container holding a red-colored symbiote, afterward Peter learns that one of several alias he goes by is Cletus Kasady.
• Bragging Rights Reward: The Ultimate Level unlockables in New Game Plus. While the alternate styles for Peter's symbiote suits are a cool addition, you only unlock one per level out of 9 and they take such a gargantuan amount of experience to rank up that there's no way you would get them all before the story ends unless you deliberately take your time so you can go out of your way to grind. On top of that, the Golden Gadgets and new Suit Mods require a huge amount of supplies to craft, and you likely won't even need them if you're good enough.
• Call-Back: An easy-to-miss one is Peter being a teacher at Miles' high school. Miles suggested Peter could take up a teaching job in the DLC of the first game after Octavius Industries was shut down.
• Call-Forward:
  • While sneaking around Midtown High as teen Peter Parker in the mission "Roll Like We Used To", he stumbles upon a webbed-up backpack in the vents. He remembers that it belongs to him, and makes a note to keep track of them. In the first game, finding the young adult Peter's old backpacks around Manhattan is a dedicated side mission.
  • When the Spider-Men are setting up the FRND network after the Sandman battle near the start of the game, the boxes bear the logo of the Emily-May Foundation.
• The Cameo: In Little Odessa, you can find two bickering "bodega cat" mascots with several minutes worth of comedic banter; they are voiced by Nathan Fillion (Teo's Mascot) and Alan Tudyk (Copycat Mascot).
• Casting Gag:
  • Yuri Lowenthal and Graham Philips, who voice Peter Parker and Harry Osborn, have both played different incarnations of Ben Tennyson in the past. Yuri was the teenage Ben from Ben 10: Alien Force onwards, while Graham played 10-year-old Ben in Ben 10: Race Against Time.
  • Clifford Chapin once again voices characters who favor firey explosions - in this case, it's the Followers of the Flame.
• Central Theme:
  • Balance. Multiple times throughout the game the question of whether Peter and Miles’ lives are truly balanced is called into question. Their responsibilities as the Spider-Men put tremendous strain on both their personal and professional lives, lending credence to the idea that whilst great responsibility comes with great power, it should not come at the expense of your happiness or quality of life. The symbiote accentuates these problems for Peter and he focuses entirely on his goals as Spider-Man, neglecting MJ, Miles and almost destroying his prior friendships. Venom offers a dark solution to these problems by linking everyone in the world to a hive mind, so there will be no more individual pain or suffering. No more need for balance.
  • Inner Darkness being reflected by outward transformations. Peter is the most obvious example, with his inner darkness and the frustrations he’s endured in the decade of being Spider-Man brought to the forefront by the symbiote, which drives him down a dark path. Curt Connors has his transformation as the Lizard, which cause his family to strain to the point of breaking. Miles’ turmoil at Li’s escape causes a development in his Venom powers, which become significantly more powerful, at the cost of extreme volatility. Venom is the most powerful example of this, as Harry’s desire to make his mother proud, coupled with his perceived inadequacies and the fear of death allows the symbiote to corrupt him into fulfilling its own agenda.
  • Second Chances. A great number of villains are discovered to have reformed and are making honest and successful attempts to atone and move on from their past (as described below under Reformed Criminal), such as Dr. Connors having a stable job at the Emily-May Foundation. It's most clearly expressed with Martin Li, who renounces his past and, through his actions, convinces Miles to let go of his hatred for him so he can have a second chance in the first place. Peter also goes through this process in rebuilding his friendships after having destroyed them under the influence of the symbiote. Predictably JJJ has trouble wrapping his head around this and thinks they'll always be criminals and should remain behind bars, making a critique on the US penitentiary system in the process.
• Changing Clothes Is a Free Action: Peter and Miles sometimes change into their costumes unrealistically fast, from Miles changing while running past an air conditioning unit (about half a second) to Peter putting on his mask in a millisecond while being thrown through the air by Scream and colliding with a truck.
• Character Select Forcing:
  • While the player can usually switch between Peter and Miles at will, there are times when only one can start main and side content. That said, the main story usually justifies it, and some side content only makes sense with a specific Spidey. Currently, only Miles can be used in Mysterium challenges, leaving Peter without a fighting arena. Likewise, Peter, being the one with the access card that unlocks the holographic research boards, is the only one who can do the EMF experiments, occasionally switching into his civilian guise to perform field work. Both of these reflect on the ending, with Peter stepping back more from Spider-Man to focus on his civilian life whilst Miles steps up to handle the crime-fighting more confidently on his own.
  • On a regular playthrough, this also applies to suits; for narrative purposes, both Miles and Peter will be occasionally forced into specific suits and the player is blocked from changing them. However, during mission replays and New Game Plus, all previous restrictions seem to be lifted, and even scripted events that previously changed Spidey's suit (like obtaining the black suit, and even Peter's symbiote surge ability) won't switch out of whatever the player was wearing. That said, Peter will still be forced into the symbiote suit for his boss fight.
• Chekhov's Skill: Early in the game, Mary Jane mentions that she's been trying to utilize her new Symkarian knowledge from her trip during Miles Morales. This comes ahead in the mission "Good Men", where she needs to use her Symkarian language skills to mimic Vika.
• Clothing Damage: Done in a way similar to Miles Morales, where the lower Spidey's health is, the more damage it will show. Healing instantly fixes the suit.
• Collection Sidequest: Like in the first game and Miles Morales, one sidequest sees you gathering a series of collectibles scattered throughout New York. The collectibles in question are Spider-Bots, who are themed not only around Spider-Men and -Women across different media, but also certain members of the webhead's rogues gallery. After collecting them all, you'll receive a set of coordinates in the hopes of meeting the person who made them, only to have your Spider-Bots taken from you by Delilah.
• Convenient Weakness Placement:
  • You'll barely find any water pipes to break in New York unless some Sandman remants are nearby. In which case there's pipes galore to melt the Sandmen away with.
  • Of all places for the Lizard to fight you, he settles for an arena with giant exhaust ports that can knock him off walls and incapacitate him.
  • The greater the threat Venom or the Symbiote poses, the greater the odds are of piles of metal pipes and sonic bombs being within webbing distance of you.
• Corralling Vacuum: The Web-Grabber is a little drone that fires off web-lines into every nearby enemy and pulls them right next to it. The items descriptions is explicit that its purpose is to group enemies together to make them vulnerable to Spider-Man's big area-of-effect attacks. In this way, it functions as a more thematic replacement for the gravity bombs from Miles Morales, except it can also be upgraded to pull in loose objects and crush your enemies too.
• Combat Pragmatist: Both Peter and Miles are just as much this as they were in the previous games, utilising anything and everything they can find to gain an edge against the veritable hordes of enemies they go up against. Their enemies fight dirty, so they do as well
• Combat Tentacles: The Black Suit sprouts these from its arms in combat, often being used to whip Mooks around.
• Conservation of Ninjutsu: When Venom infects Mary Jane, she is much stronger than the symbiote Mooks you've been facing up to this point, even though there seems to be no difference between Mary Jane and other infected, beyond having a proper name.
• Continuity Nod:
  • A flashback during Peter and Harry's high school days has Peter using his mark 1 web shooters that can be found in one of the first game's backpacks. Peter needs to take a detour to make new web fluid because, as mentioned in the original game, the capacity for his old shooters sucks.
  • MJ is now sporting a Symkarian pistol for her sections, which is explained as training for the visit she took to Symkaria to write her book during Miles Morales. The book she wrote is also noted to have failed, putting more pressure on her job at the Daily Bugle.
  • A side quest "The Message" reveals that The Cameo of Insomniac Spider-Man in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse is canon to the games and not just simply a Shout-Out. The Spider-Bots here are making first contact with a future acquaintance of the Spider Society, and Miguel O'Hara is alluded to by Delilah.
  • In the final Flame mission "It Was Meant For Me", Yuri asks Peter if he's stopped runaway trains before. Peter sheepishly says "yeah". While this is naturally a recurring Mythology Gag to Spider-Man 2, Yuri is recalling Peter successfully derailing a runaway subway train in the first game, after taking down Mr. Negative.
• Continuity Snarl:
  • In the first game, one of the backpack collectibles you could find had a vial of sand that supposedly contained the Sandman. This game opens with a massive fight against him, and he is mentioned to have been living an ordinary life for years until this point. For their part, Insomniac Games' Bryan Intihar admitted the team completely forgot about this.
  • A very minor example, but the social feed in the first game mentioned that SterlingGrape, real name Starla, died in the city hall bombing attack. There is a memorial at city hall that contains the names of people who died in the attack, but her name is nowhere to be found.
• Contractual Boss Immunity: Venom isn't affected at all by standard webbing (although webbing him still builds Focus, given the right upgrade).
• Cosmetic Award: The Golden Gadgets you can unlock on New Game Plus are purely skins and don't affect their in-game stats or functions.
• Counter-Attack: The biggest innovation to the previous' games combat loop is the ability to block enemy attacks. Time it right and you'll parry them, knocking them off-balance enough for Peter or Miles to wind up a massive blow or super-sized web blast in retaliation.
• Cut Lex Luthor a Check: Mysterio has begun using his powers of illusion to create theme park attractions rather than to assist in his crimes. And despite initially being led to believe otherwise, Miles finds out Mysterio's redemption is genuine. Tombstone is also putting his condition to use in a legitimate career, as having rock-hard skin and immunity to pain makes him uniquely suited to aiding drivers that crash at the go-kart track he works at.
• Damage-Increasing Debuff: Enemies hit with Miles' Venom attacks can take extra damage by default or recharge his abilities faster, but only if you purchase that upgrade in Miles' skill tree.
• Darker and Edgier: The first game certainly had its moments of bleakness, but this game goes to some much darker places. Both heroes find themselves in a very bleak emotional place, with Peter suffering from the Black Suit and Miles dealing with his vengeful anger towards Martin Li. The villains are also even more dangerous, with Kraven killing off four of Spidey's longtime foes and fatally stabbing Peter in their first fight (with only the symbiote saving Peter) and Venom being a one-man Assimilation Plot who threatens the entire world and brutally kills many people in his rampage - the scene where he bites Kraven's head off is also undoubtedly the goriest scene in any Spider-Man game to date to the point that it could've easily earned the game an M rating if it wasn't for the camera blurring a few shots. The ending is also significantly more downbeat than the first game's already bittersweet conclusion.
• Demoted to Extra:
  • Yuri Watanabe/Wraith played a huge role in the first game and its DLC. Here, she isn't involved in the main plot even slightly, only showing up in a series of side missions, meaning that some players may go through the entire story not even realizing she was in the game.
  • While Aaron Davis briefly appears in the main quest line to meet with Miles, he has a significantly smaller role than in the last game, as he hangs up the Prowler mantle and leaves behind caches for Miles to find.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • Although you gain the Black Suit after the symbiote latches onto Peter, he can still wear different suits. However, there are segments of the game where wearing the Black Suit is mandatory. When the Hunters come looking for Connors in a mid-game story mission, Peter will bust out of the basement to confront them. If he's wearing a different suit than the Black Suit, the symbiote will cover Peter's suit in favor of the Black Suit just as it does in the first gameplay trailer.
    • Additionally, when replaying any mission when Peter still canonically had the black suit, you can still use Anti Symbiote. At times however, you revert back to the regular black symbiote due to the plot.
  • If you start gathering the Prowler stashes after the Kraven boss fight, Miles will comment on how the hunters stayed behind when he's ambushed by them. Other side missions involving him done later also have similar slight dialogue changes to reflect this.
  • Although Venom is only playable in one mission that has very little room for downtime, you can use Photo Mode as him if you wish, which is something that easily could've been overlooked.
  • When playing as Peter during the game's second act while wearing the Black Suit (and later the Symbiote Suit) or any variation of the black suit such as the Classic Black Suit or Black Webbed Suit, his webbing will be ink-black. This still applies after you've separated Peter from the symbiote and in the postgame where he has the Anti-Venom symbiote. This does not apply to the Anti-Venom suit style for the Classic Black Suit, however, as the webs will still be ink-black. The black webbing carries over into New Game Plus if you wear the Symbiote Suit or any variation of the Black Suit. It's also worth noting that the black webbing also appears in cutscenes as well.
  • Like the first game, Peter's mechanical spider legs will change shape and color to match the respective appearances of the MCU Iron Spider, comic Iron Spider, and Superior Spider-Man suits. They also sometimes change color to reflect different styles of other suits.
  • If you're wearing any variation of the black symbiote suit or the Anti-Venom Symbiote Suit, Peter's traversal skills will change accordingly; instead of using the mechanical spider legs for Spider-Dash and Spider-Jump, Peter will instead use his symbiote tendrils to give him an extra boost.
  • Similar to Grand Theft Auto V, the Spider-Men can encounter each other in free-roam, assisting each other in fights and even having a little Friendship Moment afterwards. After the reintroduction of Yuri Watanabe as Wraith, they can also start periodically finding her beating criminals or backing them up, complete with her own unique interactions with either Spider-Man, being rather unamused by their attempts at camaraderie. Taking it even further is that if either Spider-Man responds to crimes between the "Hunt to Live, Live to Hunt" and "Good Men" missions, Harry Osborn can be encountered in the same manner, complete with his own interactions with Peter and Miles.
  • Just like in the first two games, the Spider-Men will have different audio takes for when they're standing or jogging, or more strained when they're web-slinging. This can sometimes have an impact on the storytelling: Peter will have more emotionally open lines to Sandman at the end of the Marko's Memories activity if he's standing still compared to when he's swinging or gliding. Compounding on that...
  • Certain side missions can also be done as either Peter or Miles, and though they often play out similarly, many of them have slight differences depending on who you play as. For example, in Howard's FNSM request, Peter has a noticeably stronger emotional reaction when he is revealed to have peacefully died, as he was friends with him for years and even had a quest in the first game dedicated to helping him.
  • Some collectible sets can be reviewed in the Collections menu and have responses from Spider-Man, which will differ between Peter and Miles, with Photo Ops having the largest differences. For example, Miles will simply comment on the excess of having a rooftop tennis court, while Peter will comment that he once played a few games with Harry there.
  • And if that weren't enough, every Mission will have a post-completion description written by either Peter or Miles, depending on who you were playing as when you hit Pause.
  • Even though you're not supposed to be able to free roam as Venom, if you break his mission to make him do so, he has (albeit mostly awkward and unfinished) animations for actions he normally can't do, such as swimming, riding a bike, and even the Wakanda salute.
  • If Spider-Man runs into Symbiote Hives or Crime Events relating to the Symbiotes themselves after completing the game (where they are supposed to be vanquished), they will acknowledge their presence and express surprise that they're still there. Avoiding a case of Gameplay and Story Segregation.
  • If you visit Aunt May and Uncle Ben's grave as Peter or Jefferson Davis's as Miles, the dialogue is different depending on what point in the story you're at. Peter's dialogue becomes arrogant and aggressive with the black suit on, and regretful at its influence after it leaves him.
  • Like in Miles Morales, each suit's Clothing Damage is unique to that suit. In addition, none of the symbiote costumes (even Miles's purely cosmetic ones) ever shows any visual damage.
  • When taking down Kraven's Hunter Blinds with Ganke, Peter will respond differently to his comments about Kraven's family depending on whether he's wearing the Black Suit or not. They'll be friendly and quippy when he's normal, and dark and aggressive if he's under the symbiote's influence.
  • If you do the Homecoming mission after Harry becomes Venom, Miles makes a comment about being happy that love is in the air even with the Symbiote infestation.
• Diegetic Soundtrack Usage: Also during the Coney Island level, Miles plays a club remix of his main theme in the Mysterium's expression of his life dreams.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?:
  • Much like in the comics, Venom is portrayed and written in a manner very evocative of an emotionally abusive and manipulative partner/stalker. It also has shades of violent alcoholism/substance abuse, particularly Peter's aftermath where he earnestly has to repair all the emotional damage he caused while under the influence of the symbiote.
  • After the Coney Island attack, J. Jonah Jameson is furious that characters like Tombstone and Mysterio are out of prison living honest lives, chalking it up to a clerical error before saying that people never change and they should be locked behind bars for good. This is very similar to critiques of the penitentiary system, where the focus is more on incarceration rather than rehabilitation.
• Dramatic Irony:
  • A case which also includes characters in-universe knowing what happened that another doesn't: When Principal Evans fires Peter after the Sandman fight, one of her reasons was him not protecting people. However, Peter technically did EXACTLY that, but as Spider-Man, with Ganke and Hailey knowing what he and Miles are doing. Only problem was that Peter has a hard time trying to explain the situation without revealing his superhero persona, to the point Ganke talks about how difficult it is to balance being Spider-Man and a regular person.
  • Peter spends much of his encounter with the Lizard attempting an "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight, only to eventually abandon his efforts and instead start insulting Connors for being too weak to hold the Lizard in check, and saying his wife and son abandoned him because they're afraid of him. Of course, he says all this while wearing the Black Suit, which is infamous for feeding off of the worst parts of its hosts while causing them to engage in the type of behavior Peter is describing.
  • A visibly overworked and exhausted Norman, trying in vain to work up a cure for Harry's illness, embraces Peter as a second son and praises him for having been Harry's friend, unaware that Peter had, moments prior, refused to return the symbiote to Harry, deeply souring their friendship. An eavesdropping Harry is understandably seething with rage at hearing this.
  • In his first episode on Wraith, Jameson notes that if the hero wanted to do things the right way, they'd join the police department. He's unaware that Wraith is Yuri Watanabe, a former police Captain who precisely left the force because she couldn't do things the right way.
• Drone of Dread:
  • Kraven's leitmotif incorporates this, sounding almost like a nightmarishly distorted hunting call.
  • Venom’s theme includes a warbling, alien drone that grows more cacophonous and sinister.
• Dueling Player Characters: After he prevents Peter from killing Kraven the Hunter, Miles has to fight Peter as he's all but possessed by the symbiote.
• Early-Bird Cameo: The "startup" company that owns the rooftop drone launchers that Peter and Miles use when setting up the new FNSM App network have the EMF logo on them, foreshadowing both the company itself and their remote workstations for fieldwork that becomes a side activity later in the game. The EMF building itself is also free to be visited at any time before the actual mission that takes you there.
• Early Game Hell: Downplayed, as this only applies to Peter, and even then isn't really noticeable unless playing on harder difficulty levels; Miles' invisibility lets him escape combat easier, his abilities lean more on Area of Effect attacks than Peters', he obtains abilities faster than Peter does, and certain early sidequests are easier to complete with him (such as Marko's Memories, where the enemies are weak to electricity). But as the game goes on, he loses these advantages as hunter dogs can counter his invisibility, Peter gains extra abilities that balance things out a bit, and sand-based enemies disappear after Sandman's sidequest is complete; and by the third act, Peter eventually gains a significant advantage over Miles once symbiotes start appearing around the city, as they are immune to Miles' stealth while Peter's anti-venom abilities deal extra damage to them.
• Easter Egg:
  • There's nothing in the game directing you to see that Fisk Tower is now the Baxter Building, it's just something included for you to find.
  • If you run around the bases in the baseball stadium as either Spider-Man, both have their own unique dialogue.
  • Miles can do the "Wakanda Forever" salute outside of the Wakandan Embassy.
  • There's an unmarked encounter where Spidey can help a fisherman on a beach in southwest Brooklyn. He doesn't always spawn, however.
• Escort Mission: After finishing some random crimes, an NPC will cry for help and Spider-Man will have to swing them over to the nearest hospital or ambulance. Thankfully, no other enemies or crimes will spawn and the nearest destination is always within 1000 meters, so the escort mission mainly consists in the NPC being grateful and kind to you.
• Evil Is Bigger: Easily one of the most physically massive versions of Venom ever in a Spider-Man story. Scream is likewise far taller than Spider-Man, even without the hair.
• Evil Is Petty: In The Stinger, a broken Norman desiring retribution upon the Spider-Men for Harry's coma, comes to Octavius' cell to try and beg him for information on their true identities. Otto gets him to admit the loss of his child, and then expresses nothing but spiteful satisfaction at the news, saying that everybody has to know loss, especially Norman. He still withholds the information from the grieving father, further emphasizing his separation from the kindly scientist he once was and the villain he has now become.
• Evil Sounds Deep: Wouldn't be Venom without it. As is tradition for Tony Todd's villain roles, Venom speaks like a demon from the bowels of Hell. Peter's voice also sounds noticeably deeper during his time wearing the symbiote.
• Evil Versus Evil: Venom vs. Kraven at the story's halfway mark. After a prolonged fight, Venom emerges the victor and kills off Kraven to solidify his role as the game's new Big Bad.
• Fauxshadowing: Early in the game, Peter has to crawl inside the particle accelerator in EMF, and tells Harry that he should try it someday. When the accelerator becomes relevant again in the finale, one could reasonably assume that Venom ends up crawling inside, possibly as a plan to destroy him. While the collider is used to destroy the MacGuffin, Venom never crawls inside.
• Fight Clubbing: At Kraven's party, one of the rooms features a female hunter beating up a male one, with a loose circle of other hunters watching.
• Fighting Your Friend:
  • In a side story, Peter and Yuri, aka Wraith, duke it out after he stops her from killing the Flame.
  • In the main story, Miles has to fight a symbiote-possessed Peter gone out of control.
  • Later on, MJ is infected with the Scream symbiote, forcing Peter to Beat the Curse Out of Her.
• Five-Second Foreshadowing:
  • Harry at the Muscle Up attraction on Coney Island hits the hammer so hard it breaks the bell off the top. This is a few minutes before it's revealed he's wearing a symbiote that enhances his strength.
  • When Peter enters the Steele Foundry to rescue Tombstone, he gets a call from Harry asking about his whereabouts. Harry sounds like he is breathing heavily while talking, though he claims he's just exercising. This is a quick clue that Harry's on his way to the place, against Peter's orders, as he's mimicking Peter's short-winded talking style whenever he's web-swinging. The next moment Spidey is confronted with Hunters, Harry's arrived in his symbiote hero persona.
  • When Peter first encounters Wraith, she pulls out a lighter with the PDNY crest on it, which foreshadows the reveal of her identity immediately after.
• Flashback B-Plot: "Roll Like We Used To" flashes back to Peter and Harry sneaking into school at night to recover some homework in between scenes in the present day.
• Flunky Boss: Kraven will call upon other hunters and his robotic drones in his boss fight.
• Foregone Conclusion: Kraven's fight against Scorpion may have some tension towards the final result, but if you explored that base thoroughly, you'll have discovered that Kraven developed an antidote to Scorpion's toxin. Thus it'll come as little surprise that Kraven resists getting stabbed by the stinger, allowing him to quickly win the fight.
• Foreshadowing:
  • The tagline itself, "Be Greater. Together" is of course directly referring to the teamwork of Peter and Miles, but it also alludes to other plot points. The general theme of emotional support groups and the building Spider-Family are most obvious, but symbolically the tagline doesn't appear until the screen has already been consumed by the symbiote, and "Together" has black tentacles on it, foreshadowing that the word can also refer to Venom co-opting its hosts goals for its own ends (like making Peter a better Spider-Man). To cap it off, the symbiote remnant on "Together" is then banished by blue lightning, foreshadowing Miles being the one to save Peter from the symbiote's corruption.
  • In the first trailer, Kraven's narration asks if he can be given what he truly wants, which is answered by Venom. In the game proper, it's Venom who gives Kraven what he's wanted for the entire game: a good death.
  • Mary Jane dons a yellow sweater partway through the story. This, combined with her red hair, evokes the appearance of the yellow symbiote Scream, whom she transforms into during the third act.
  • When Mary Jane, having just left Peter's house, sees Harry for the first time, she screams in delight. Peter immediately rushes outside, assuming the scream was elicited by an attacking villain. By the end of the game Harry, having succumbed to the symbiote and become Venom, has indeed become a villain, including attacking Peter and MJ at the house. And bonding MJ to a symbiote named "Scream."
  • In the first mission where Harry returns he talks to Peter about how he couldn't have passed math without Peter's help. Later he is unable to put even a single ball into the basketball hoop. These things foreshadow that, despite being a bright kid with great ambitions, he really can't do anything without the help of others. This also foreshadows Harry depending on the symbiote to survive, being unable even to live unassisted.
  • When Doctor Connors assesses Harry at the Emily-May Foundation, one of his questions is if Harry has had any aches, pains or "impulsive thoughts". The latter is a standout trait of the symbiotes, which Harry is currently wearing, and impulsive thoughts become a bit problem later on in the story.
  • Also at EMF is a display of an asteroid, with the voice-over talking about organic molecules being found on them, foreshadowing the origins of the symbiotes, which Doctor Connors has direct experience with.
  • At the Muscle Up attraction on Coney Island, Harry swings the hammer so hard it breaks the bell off the top. This foreshadows that he's wearing the symbiote that enhances his strength well above Peter's, which is one of Venom's primary talents. Further, the park worker is visibly annoyed at Harry for breaking the attraction and shoos him away, alluding to Harry becoming a much bigger problem later.
  • The Spider-Bots emit a purple, glitchy pulse, with some that are suspended in the air even being enveloped in a purple light, evocative of the aesthetics of the Spider-Verse films. This, combined with the fact that the each Spider-Bot is a Mythology Gag to other Spider-Man continuities, foreshadows that the bots are extra-dimensional in origin, with ties to the Spider-Verse movies. It's also foreshadowed by the very first Spider-Bot you find: Miguel O'Hara.
  • During MJ’s rescue attempt of Dr. Connors in “Good Men”, a recording can be found where Kraven laments his killing of Electro and that the villain was a waste of his remaining days. This specific wording hints that Kraven is dying before Peter finds his chemotherapy drugs in “The Flames Have Been Lit”.
  • When Martin Li is aided by Miles to escape Kraven's clutches at the cost of the younger Spider-Man getting left behind, he gets Peter's attention near the old FEAST building using his Mr. Negative abilities. When the symbiote attempts to lash out at Li with its Combat Tentacles, the negative energy Li produces blocks the attack as he protests that he's just there to aid the Spider-Men. Though Li doesn't notice, the energy also seems to strongly hurt the symbiote in a manner not unlike extreme sound vibrations have done so before, making it cease any further attacks on him despite pushing Peter into darker and more extremely violent mindsets. This ties into the reveal during the 3rd act, that Symbiotes being fuelled by negative emotions means that Li's powers uniquely counter them, making him a Man of Kryptonite towards them.
  • The Flame cultists' logo has a notable spiral shape in the center. Later on, symbiote enemies also have a spiral symbol on their heads, so it should be no surprise The Flame's endgame is to acquire a symbiote sample of his own. For that matter, this can also help an inexperienced viewer figure out the Flame's identity, Cletus Kasady.
  • After Kraven fatally stabs Peter, Harry angrily declares he'll kill him while he fights with him shortly before Peter gets the symbiote. Surely enough, he does exactly that when he bonds with it, finishing the fight he started by decapitating him with his teeth.
  • In a more immediate case, immediately after stabbing Peter Kraven quips "Not so venomous after all", just before Peter obtains the symbiote, which indeed starts to corrupt Peter into becoming more "venomous" before getting ripped away from him to become Venom in his entirety.
  • As Mary Jane wanders through one of Kraven's hideouts in "Good Men", the player can spot study sketches of The Lizard. They make note of his mouth and gums being weak spots, along with his "possible limb regeneration". These factors come into play during his boss fight, where the former traits are figured out by Peter to administer the cure.
  • In a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment, while discussing with Angela about closing down a museum, after Miles only managed to stop one truck containing one of the museum pieces, Darren will briefly smirk while facing away from Angela. He later turns out to be the mastermind behind the heist, and is using it as an excuse to have the heritage museum closed down.
• The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You: When activating the Symbiote Surge ability, you can hear the growls of the symbiote coming out of the DualSense's speaker as you slaughter everyone. Certain phrases it suggests to Peter will also come out of the controller that can often freak the player out.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: Kraven's digital overview of New York in the gameplay reveal trailer shows that Yuri Watanabe/Wraith has become active in the time between this game and the previous one. Also shown are Taskmaster, Prowler, Black Cat, Tombstone, Kingpin, Shocker, Vulture, Rhino^note Rhino's inclusion confirms that he survived Phin stabbing him in Miles Morales, which was his last on-screen appearance, Doctor Octopus, and Electro.
• Funny Background Event: When Peter apathetically flings the rescued civilian to the ground, Miles noticeably freezes and gives a double take before following him. Also a Meaningful Background Event given why Peter is acting so aggressively...
• Fun with Subtitles: Since Peter and Miles both answer to "Spider-Man", the captions have a built-in accessibility feature for deaf and HOH players to easily distinguish who's speaking at a glance — while out-of-costume they use their names, in-costume little emojis of their respective masks appear before the colon.
• Gameplay and Story Integration:
  • All of the post-completion descriptions for the FNSM App missions are the positive reviews of the people who sent the request in the first place. With one exception—the end of Howard's quest is written by Peter.
  • While playing as Hailey for a side mission, the audio is lowered and muffled, and no subtitles are shown to reflect her hearing disability. Instead, emojis are used to indicate what people are saying to her, as well as how she herself is feeling throughout the level.
  • When Peter goes after Kraven after Miles is kidnapped, his Symbiote Surge ability is automatically triggered and doesn't stop until the enemies are wiped out, which coincides with how volatile and pissed off he is.
  • When Peter Takes A Level In Jerkass thanks to the Symbiote, his web-slinging is much less flashy. Normally he does lots of flips and twirls in midair, even when not specifically doing tricks. But while using the Symbiote, it's mostly just swing and release.
  • When Peter activates the Symbiote Surge, voices from the symbiote will come through the controller, as if it's trying to corrupt the player as well. After he gets the Anti-Venom Suit, the voices won't be there, since he still has the power but not the connection to the symbiote hivemind.
  • Peter's swinging is far more acrobatic and flashy than it was in the first game and is comparable to Miles' animations in his solo game, subtly but noticeably showing how they've learned from each other since becoming a duo.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • The end of the game suggests Peter is temporarily retiring—or at least stepping back—from Spider-Man duties and leaving the city to Miles. However, you can still free roam as him plus do any of his side missions you missed, and Miles can still run into him while stopping crimes. This is at least explained In-Universe, as when you first switch to Peter post-game, he says his break is over.
  • The Classic and Spider-Man 3 Black Suits do not function like the symbiote even if you unlock them at a point in the story where Peter has it.
  • If you gather all the Spider-Bots as Peter while wearing the 2099 suit, Delilah won't react any differently when he wonders who Miguel is even though he's wearing his outfit.
  • Venom is a Nigh-Invulnerable juggernaut in the story that requires a protracted battle to defeat. However, when temporarily playing as him, he can be defeated by Oscorp security carrying stun batons and regular firearms. He also comes with only 100 HP and one focus bar due to suit upgrades from the Spider-Men not transferring over to him.
  • If you switch out of the suit you get during the penultimate mission, Hailey still comments on Spider-Man having a new outfit when he speaks to her.
  • Both Spider-Men can be used to clear out the symbiote nests. While a late-game upgrade explicitly makes these easier with Pete, only Miles will receive a suit reward, making it seem like he's the "canon" option.
  • While the storyline makes multiple people exploit the symbiotes' weakness to loud noises while fighting Peter, in regular gameplay Spidey's symbiote powers aren't affected by the same loud noises that stun enemy symbiotes. For example, pulling down a pile of steel girders will stun Venom but won't affect the black suit in the slightest.
  • Although the black suit's influence starts making Peter noticeably more angry and no-nosense in free roam by altering his swinging animations and quips, during side content Peter still acts like his usual self.
  • In gameplay none of the symbiote outfits shows any Clothing Damage, but the anti-venom suit is visibly damaged during the latter half of the Final Boss.
  • In New Game Plus, all skills, abilities, and costumes from your first playthrough are carried over. That means you can have Peter use the symbiote or Anti-Venom suit abilities, and Miles can use all of his electric abilities. This does add some oddities, meaning if Peter gets stabbed by Kraven wearing the black suit, suddenly, the symbiote wants to save him, and turns into the exact same suit you're wearing. However, it does mean you aren't forced to use the Anti-Venom or Miles' Evolved suit at the endgame.
  • If you keep the Symbiote Suit on before Peter's boss fight on New Game Plus, he will still have it on underneath during the sequence when he rips it off for some reason.
  • Although you can only run into Harry as Agent Venom during crimes after he gets the white logo embroidered on his chest, it isn't visible when you fight alongside him.
  • If you do all the Unidentified Target quests before fighting Kraven, Chameleon's dialogue at the end remains unchanged and he still talks about Kraven's defeat as if it already happened.
• Geographic Flexibility: While present in Miles Morales, 2 ramps it up to a whole new level by including many buildings and properties inside the city that simply didn't exist before, such as the abandoned school and mansion Hunter Base locations, or the asian food market building where Peter learns who Kraven is. Most egregious is the Queens and Brooklyn areas across the river, which look incredibly different compared to the more vague and conservative appearance in the previous two games. And of course, several landmarks have been replaced or redesigned with no in-universe explaination, like the Empire State and Chrysler buildings.
• Guide Dang It!: A collectible set of Spider-bots doesn't show up on the map, and your main way of locating them is by seeing them regularly creating a pulse. They in themselves are an example (although the map menu does show how many there left in an area), but there's also a hidden way to make finding them easier; the same suit upgrade that reveals unopened crates on the minimap (which is otherwise of limited use by the point you can get the upgrade) also shows the spider-bots on the minimap when you're close.
• Hard Truth Aesop: As demonstrated by Venom's clinginess towards Peter and entitlement to bond with him to the point Peter nearly gets choked to death when he doesn't want to "heal the world" with Venom because of all the bad things it's done, it serves as a lesson that just because you're doing things for your best friends doesn't mean they'll be happy about it, especially when said things are irreparably awful.
• Heel–Face Turn:
  • Tombstone has been released on parole and is now working an honest job at Coney Island. Peter seems genuinely proud of him.
  • Martin Li has come to regret his actions in the first game. When Kraven's actions free him from prison, he chooses to help the Spider-Men rather than resume his campaign of revenge against Norman. After creating Peter's Anti-Venom suit, he willingly surrenders to the police on neutral terms with the Spider-Men.
  • This happened with Mysterio off-screen, who's decided to use his illusion technology for hyper-realistic funhouse attractions instead. He seems to have relapsed by the time of the game, but it turns out to be a Frame-Up and he's genuinely turned straight for good.
• Hold the Line: The game's last sidequest tasks you with planting some tech down and fighting off innumerable waves of enemies trying to destroy your tech. After about a minute and a half, the waves ends and you win.
• Hunting the Most Dangerous Game: Kraven's introduction shows a mercenary attempting to ambush him, only to be grabbed from behind and have his neck broken by Kraven, who is disappointed at the lack of a challenge. One of his thugs then informs him of a new hunting ground — New York City — where Kraven can test his mettle and skill against the various costumed superhumans.
• "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight: The symbiotes provide a lot of this dynamic, due to their nature as parasites.
  • For Peter, Harry uses the Venom symbiote to transform Mary Jane into Scream, necessitating a boss fight against her until she can rip the symbiote off.
  • For Miles, he has to fight his fellow Spider-Man when the symbiote takes control of Peter's mind. Thanks to this, Peter manages to rip the symbiote away and come back to his senses.
  • Even the Final Boss gets some of this. With the Anti-Venom Suit, Peter fights against Harry, who has been taken over as Venom. Only after a thorough beatdown do Harry and the symbiote get weak enough that Peter can zap away that symbiote.
  • The other side of this dynamic also provides a subversion: A Black-Suited Peter's fight agains the Lizard starts as this, but eventually devolves into him mocking and insulting Connors for his apparent weakness and driving his family away, showcasing how the Symbiote is making Peter more aggressive and robbing him of his empathy.
• Informed Ability: A great many of Kraven's hand-picked master hunters get ambushed and taken down by a journalist with a tazer.
• Instant Sedation: One of the steps to infiltrating Kraven's manor is to get past his pet tiger, Dima. To do this, Peter needs to feed it a chunk of meat laced with a sedative. The instant Dima finishes chewing on the steak, the cat slumps over, out cold, in spite of oral sedation taking much longer to take effect than injection or inhalation.
• Interface Spoiler:
  • Even after Peter ditches the Symbiote suit, the Skill Tree still shows his Symbiote powers indicating that he'll regain them at some point in the story. He later gets the Anti-Venom suit, which provides upgraded "Anti-Venom" versions of the Symbiote powers that are especially strong against Symbiote enemies.
  • A very minor example; while the suits menu hides locked outfits by only showing their silhouettes, some of those silhouettes are so recognizable that you can easily tell what they'll be^note Spider-verse noir being a particularly notable example; most Spider-Men don't wear exaggerated longcoats and fedoras. You can also tell which suits will be from movies since they don't have any alternate color palettes, and thus don't have 4 small dots in the corner of the thumbnail.
  • Another minor example; During the first Mysterium challenge, Miles wears an unique outfit. If you open the suits menu, Miles will be wearing the same suit, but with spider emblems added, which makes it obvious it can be unlocked later.
• I Reject Your Reality: Jameson's response to the Spider-Men saving his life from Sandman, proving that he is so oblivious to reality that none of the Spider-Men or the paramedics even bother to shut him up/correct him when they reach the hospital.
• Ironic Echo: "Heal the World", Harry's dream to invent environmentally friendly technologies. It becomes a nightmare when he's influenced by Venom's idea of what a "healed" world looks like.
• Irony: The FNSM mission "Photo Help" heavily implies that JJJ was unwittingly responsible for a good deal of Spider-Man's You Fight Like a Cow tendencies in a fight, as he encouraged him (in his own brash way) to use it as a means to stop being so timid and easily cowed when the New York traffic was threatening to make a young Peter late for their first meeting, and Peter's demonstrated attempts to use such in a fight with some thugs showed....poor technique.
  Young Peter: Hey, what are you, a tourist slackmouth? Kidding!...Do you want some dirt in... your face? Like, both eyes, that would really hurt!... This is gonna hurt! But not, like, permanently!
  Criminal: Now I gotta hit you harder for being so BAD at that!
• "It" Is Dehumanizing: This trope is what ultimately turns the conversation sour between Harry and Peter at his house in Act 3: Peter refers to the symbiote as a "thing".
• Killed Offscreen: Vulture, Electro and Shocker are all revealed to have been killed by Kraven, who's seeking a good death.
• Kung Fu-Proof Mook: The green symbiote monster that pop up in the last third of the game can't be damaged by punches or kicks, only be your special abilities or web gadgets. Thankfully, even being grazed by a web or electric zap is enough to KO these pests.
  • Returning from the first 2 games
    • Enemies with melee weapons (Crowbar thugs, dual wielding hunters, branding iron flame followers) block all direct attacks and must be air-launched to punch directly
    • Brutes, who must be webbed or otherwise stunned before you can attack them
    • Both varieties of hunter brutes in particular block all gadgets and attacks, so must be parried or opened up with a special ability
• Launcher Move: There are tons of ways to knock baddies into the air to start an air combo.
  • Both Spider-Men can hold the attack button to uppercut an enemy directly above them.
  • The Web-Thrower gadget shoots electrical blasts at every enemy around that shoots them straight into the air.
  • Most abilitie tied to the X button (Venom Jump, Spider Whiplash, Galvanize) involve knocking a whole bunch of enemies into the air.
  • One multi-Spider-Man upgrade allows you to grab enemies by a webline, pick them up, slam them into the ground, and then bounce them up into the air for you to follow up with a mid-air beatdown.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall:
  • The "Photo Help" side quest has Peter help Mina with getting a good photo of himself, and she's inspired by his very first photo of himself (as Spider-Man) on the Daily Bugle. Peter reminisces of his very first meeting with J. Jonah Jameson, which translates as a playable flashback. At the end of the flashback, when it cuts back to the present, Mina the photographer notes Peter's been staring at the photo for five minutes, which is around the average playtime for the flashback.
  • "The Message" ends with an appearance from a character who, unless you're familiar with the Across the Spider-Verse artbook, has never shown up in Spider-Man media, referring to some unknown plot that not even people who watched Across might know. Ganke asks Spidey (and, by extension, the player) if they know who that was, and Spidey will affirm that, nope, he doesn't.
• Lightning Reveal: At the end of the reveal trailer, Venom is shown emerging from the darkness of an alley, his eyespots and fanged jaws briefly illuminated by a flash of lightning, thunder crashing in the background.
• Logical Weakness: Sandman and his sand clones are weak to electric attacks, as they superheat and crystalize the sand instantly. This includes all of Miles's venom powers, some of Peter's spider-arm attacks, and various shared gadgets and throwable objects. They can also be instantly melted by water, opening them up to some environmental attacks.
• Magical Defibrillator: In the finale, after the Venom symbiote has been destroyed for good, Harry initially appears dead due to the loss of its life-supporting qualities. Then Miles hits on the idea of using his Venom electricity as an impromptu defibrillator to try to bring the victim back... which works. Well, kind of - Harry starts breathing again, but still ends up in a coma after all he's been through.
• Make Way for the New Villains: Kraven is on both ends of the trope. Shortly after his debut, he manages to kill no less than four longtime members of Spider-Man's Rogues Gallery (Scorpion, Vulture, Electro, and Shocker). However, as soon as Venom is on the scene Kraven finds himself on the receiving end as the symbiote tears his way through Kraven's Hunters and savagely decapitates Kraven himself, firmly establishing Venom as the game's new Big Bad.
• Modular Difficulty: In the options menu, you can tweak various aspects including enemy stats, simplifying puzzles, more generous parry timing, and more. One of the more notable aspects is the "Swing Assists," which let you slow down the game while turning corners, toggle the bending of webs as you crawl on them, and a steering assist that changes how much physics applies to swinging compared to your direct control.
• Money for Nothing: There are four types of "currency" in the game, Tech Tokens, Rare Tech Tokens, City Tokens, and Hero Tokens. These are used to unlock upgrades, gadgets, and new suits, and the game provides enough of each (even the extremely rare Hero Tokens) that unless you purposefully skip side missions you will have more than enough to purchase every single unlockable in the game while still having plenty leftover.
• Mood Whiplash: The Midtown High flashback is a funny, low stakes misadventure for teenage Spider-Man and his buddy, but it ends with Norman arriving to tell Harry that his mother just passed away.
• Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Peter's suit generates Spider Limbs when fighting, much like his Iron Spider suits from the first game and Miles's Programmable Matter suit from Spider-Man: Miles Morales. To a lesser extent, the Black Suit (and, by extension, Anti-Venom) also does this, spawning tentacles during combat and movement that closely resemble Slender Man's.
• Multi-Stage Battle: Nearly every boss in the game has two or three phases, each with their own health bars. There's an indicator by the health bar of how many phases are left in the fight and the game auto-saves at the beginning of each one.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • Peter has this reaction regarding his time with the symbiote once freed from its influence, especially about Venom.
  • While he was already just fighting for survival, it is realizing the reason why Miles hates him so much that prompts Martin Li's full Heel–Face Turn.
• Mythology Gag: Has its own page.
• Nerf:
  • In the previous games, you could heal with any amount of focus, but in this game, healing now requires a full bar of focus.
  • Changing the mod system to a separate Suit Tech tree and removing Suit Powers means players no longer have access to some of the extremely strong mods or powers from Spider-Man (PS4), like Threat Sensors which slowed time on each Perfect Dodge or Web Blossom.
  • Miles' Camouflage can no longer be upgraded through the Skill Tree to last longer or grant him any bonuses in stealth or combat.
  • There are much less gadgets, and they aren't too useful in stealth^note Miles Morales already did a similar nerf, but also included a gadget specifically designed for stealth takedowns; while some do have some stealth utility, the gadgets are much more combat oriented likely to prevent the player from cheesing their way through stealth encounters by webbing everyone to a wall from a distance, and thus requiring them to use the updated stealth mechanics. That said, some previous gadget effects are still present but integrated into other things, such as the webshooters gaining functionality from impact web (webbing an enemy from close range or after a parry launches them backwards) and web bomb (sometimes webbing an enemy spreads the effect to nearby enemies).
• Never Trust a Trailer:
  • The trailers featured a scene of Rio and Peter having a conversation about Miles while the latter is in his usual Spider-Man costume. In the game proper, Peter is wearing the Black Suit and the conversation about Miles is far more serious, as Miles is missing.
  • One trailer had Norman Osborn yelling at his security to "get it off him", seemingly referring to the symbiote and Spider-Man. In the game, he is talking about the symbiote, but he wants it off of Harry, who has become Venom.
  • The proof of concept scene in the trailers where Peter and Miles are fighting Venom in the streets during the day is not based on anything in the game. While they do both fight Venom, it's at night and each of them face him in separate playable phases instead of at once.
  • The trailer sequence where Peter visits Aunt May and Uncle Ben's grave in the rain also isn't in the game.
• New York Is Only Manhattan:
  • Averted, as both Queens and Brooklyn are included in the playable area alongside Manhattan. While Queens being playable isn't new (although used only once previously, in Ultimate Spider-Man (2005), Brooklyn has never been available to explore in an open-world Spider-Man game before.
  • In addition, there's also the surprising inclusion of both North Brother and South Brother islands^note though both are massively inflated in size and moved within throwing distance of Astoria, but as of this writing they're both blocked off with an invisible wall and thus cannot be explored without glitches.
• Ninja Prop: During the Coney Island level, the button prompts for Miles' DJ rhythm game in the Mysterium can be used as throwable objects for the fight after it ends.
• No-Gear Level: One sidequest has Peter reflect on when he first started out as Spider-Man and as a Daily Bugle photographer, where he runs into a bunch of thugs beating up a civilian on the way. Since he's just starting out, he doesn't have any gadgets or suit upgrades to help him out in the fight.
• Non-Standard Game Over: In the mission "Wake Up", Mary Jane is trying to outrun a supervillain in the underground tunnel. While the player isn't punished for failing the quicktime events to defend themselves, they can wait around the baddie to catch up. When the possesed Peter does get ahead, a final cutscene plays where he lunges at the helpless MJ, enveloping her in Symbiote goo as the screen goes black.
• No Ontological Inertia: Destroying the meteorite that the symbiotes arrived in instantly vaporizes all the symbiote goo that's carpeted New York City and restores everyone that's been assimilated by the hivemind. Though, you can still run into symbiotes in the open world and any hives that you haven't yet destroyed will still be there, warranting a comment from Spider-Man wondering why they're still standing.
• Not His Sled:
  • The game quickly reveals that its incarnation of Venom is not Eddie Brock — instead, it's Harry Osborn.
  • Kraven's last hunt doesn't end with his suicide, but his brutal demise at Venom's hands (or rather, teeth).
• Not Quite Flight: Miles' and Peter's suits now feature under-arm webs that they can use for gliding a la Spider-Man 2099.
• Not the Fall That Kills You…: In full effect, as in the first game. Anyone falling who is caught by either Spider-Men is fine, even if how they were caught would cause more damage than just being allowed to continue. A notable example is when Venom tosses Norman, and Peter intercepts his fall by flinging Norman back on the ground, breaking Norman's momentum entirely and then tossing him to the ground.
• Offscreen Moment of Awesome: Kraven's battles with Vulture, Electro, and Shocker all go unseen, but Kraven defeated and killed all three villains, with Shocker apparently giving him the hardest fight.
• One Hero, Hold the Weaksauce: Late-game, Peter gets an upgrade that allows him to bypass a problem which applied to everyone else. Thanks to Miles and Martin Li performing a Battle in the Center of the Mind, Peter gets the Anti-Venom Suit, which gives him all of the same powers as a symbiote suit did but without making him insane. On top of that, its attacks also make symbiotes take more damage.
• Only a Flesh Wound: A rather horrifying example that illustrates how alien the symbiote is making its hosts. Peter gets mortally wounded by Kraven stabbing him and breaking off the large knife blade inside him, requiring Harry to transfer the symbiote over to him to save his life. After going on an absolute rampage with his new abilities against Kraven's hunters and fleeing the scene with Harry and MJ, Peter swiftly tries to will the symbiote back to Harry, only for MJ to notice something sticking out of his side as he does so. The Symbiote pulls out the knife blade, which was inside Peter the whole time, and he never felt it nor had it impair his gymnastic performance, showcasing how powerful the Symbiote's Healing Factor is.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Peter Parker acts noticeably far more aggressive, aloof, and angry thanks to both Harry's terminal condition and the influence of the Black Suit. He is much angrier and more violent when fighting Kraven's Mooks, remains single-minded in finding Connors to the point that he briefly hesitates to save civilians from a crashing helicopter (even carelessly throwing one away and requiring Miles to save them), berates Miles for his quips and mistakes, and rushes off as soon as Miles gives him the tracker. Miles and MJ both notice the radical change in their loved one's personality, but Peter is oblivious to it until Miles beats the suit off of him.
• Out-of-Genre Experience:
  • One mission involves Miles retrieving an actual magic wand from Black Cat, who stole it from the Sanctum Sanctorum. This is the only part of the game that actually focuses on outright mystics instead of being loosely sci-fi.
  • The last MJ section has the game briefly turn into a Third-Person Shooter.
• Pass Through the Rings:
  • New York is filled with wind currents marked by floating white rings that give Spider-Man a speed boost when he flies through them with his wings.
  • The "Unidentified Targets" involve tailing a flying drone by flying inside the massive cylinder of light that trails behind it. Staying inside the circle causes a meter to rise measuring how much data you've collected from it and once that's full, you get the satisfaction of finishing it off.
• Pinball Projectile: The Ricohet web is a ball of webbing which will hit one enemy and then bounce into what feels like every other enemy on the planet without losing any mass. When fully upgraded, it can bounce through a dozen enemies on the floor and tie them down, instantly ending most minor fights the game has to offer.
• Platonic Declaration of Love: Peter gives one to Harry as the latter lays dying from the Symbiote being destroyed.
• Play as a Boss: After the game teases the final boss fight against Venom early, you get to play as him as he tears dozens of armed guards and beats down Kraven like he's nothing.
• Police Are Useless: Despite Kraven's hunters attacking American citizens and taking over parts of the city, the PDNY or the National Guard never directly intervene (the latter, more-so, as it is done by a foreign adversary with access to military hardware and vehicles). When the cops do get involved, they aren't very effective. Pete is more annoyed than relieved when they join the chase for The Lizard and J. Jonah Jameson chastises Spider-Man for the police officers reportedly injured during the chase.
• Power Nullifier: Kraven's robot dogs can generate a field of yellow light that prevent the player from using their superpowered abilities.
• Press X to Not Die: Cutscene quick-time events return, but unlike previous Spider-Man games, don't punish the player for wrong inputs or slow reaction time. Either a different scene plays leading to the intended solution, or the game slows down to a standstill until the player presses something. QTEs that involve enemy grabs, in a gameplay fight, still punish the player for not mashing the right button enough.
• Race Against the Clock: Peter and Miles are hastily tracking down the Lizard because Peter's best friend, Harry Osborn, is dying and Curt Connors is the only one who can treat him.
• Recollection Sidequest: A variant; the first sidequest tasks you with collecting crystals that contain the Sandman's memories. With each crystal you get, the more you learn about why Sandman goes rogue and the more coherent he becomes in custody.
• Redemption Earns Life: Of the six supervillains kidnapped by Kraven, Vulture, Shocker, Scorpion, Electro, Tombstone, and Mr. Negative, only the latter two survive the events of the game. Perhaps not coincidentally, these are the only two who pulled a Heel–Face Turn (although for Tombstone it occurred off-screen between games).
• Red Herring: Rio is revealed to be seeing someone, but the person's identity is left unknown for most of the game, making it clear the game is building up to something. His identity is finally revealed at the end... and he's a completely normal person. His daughter, on the other hand...
• Reformed Criminal: Occurs so often that it's practically a Central Theme of the game.
  • Prowler, Tombstone, and Mysterio are all mentioned to be on parole and making an earnest attempt to lead an honest life. Prowler asks Miles to clear out his illegal stashes so that he can keep his equipment off the streets while also abiding by his parole, Tombstone works as a go-cart mechanic at Coney Island and takes advantage of his invulnerability to protect crashed drivers, and Mysterio has begun using his illusion technology to create legitimate entertainment products (though they have been known to dangerously malfunction).
  • Flint Marko is too, the reason he disappeared for years is because he gave up the Sandman life to focus on raising his daughter, and was only pushed into the game's opening rampage thanks to the Hunters. When Peter contacts him at the end of the Marko's Memories side quest, he hopes he can get him back with his daughter someday and is genuinely thankful for their change (as is the case with Tombstone).
  • Curt Conners has been reformed from being the Lizard for years (working for Oscorp researching Harry's medical condition), at least until the Hunters force him to revert.
  • Black Cat claims that she's planning to settle down after making it to Paris but given how often she manipulated Spidey in the previous game, that could just as easily be another lie.
  • By the end of the game, Mr Negative is at least trying to go down this path.
• Relationship Upgrade: During the third act, Miles and Hailey, who had some Ship Tease in Miles Morales and even more in this game, admit that they like each other and start dating, with Miles even having Hailey over to meet his mother's new boyfriend.
• Rewatch Bonus: Right after the fight with Sandman at the beginning of the game, Ganke asks Peter to fix connection issues with the NYSM app and sends him to some equipment that belongs to a "small startup company". Peter asks him if the company is fine with their tinkering, and is told that the owner is more than happy to work with Spider-Man. The logo on the equipment belongs to the Emily-May Foundation, which not only plays a large role in the game, it was started by Harry Osborn and eventually employs/is led by Peter as well.
• Roaring Rampage of Rescue: Emphasis on Rampage. When Peter finds out that Miles has been kidnapped by Kraven, he makes a beeline for his hideout and starts absolutely wrecking shop on the Hunters outside while screaming "WHERE IS SPIDER-MAN?!" Notably, the Symbiote Surge is activated immediately, and does not expire until the fight with Kraven.
• Rule of Cool: Insomniac's Creative Director Brian Intihar admitted that the team completely forgot about the lore of the Sandman vial from the first game, which suggested that Sandman was trapped in there for years. Considering how awesome the Sandman opening of this game is (as well as the emotional resonance of the Marko's Memories activity which directly contradicts the vial lore), many fans are willing to ignore this discrepancy.
• Rule of Symbolism:
  • When showing the tagline at the end of the trailer, ("Be Greater, Together") "Together" is slowly overcome by the symbiote before lightning, alluding to Miles' Venom Strike, flashes across the screen. This foreshadows how the symbiote gradually starts corrupting Peter's relationships and isolating him from his loved ones until it's just him and the symbiote "together", as well as Miles' role in stopping that via a emotion-driven beatdown.
  • The game's box art above showcases this, along with Foreshadowing, regarding the new abilities each Spider-Man has over the course of the game. Miles' new blue lighting is curled around his fist as he's striking out with it,as the power changes from from his underlying anger towards Martin Li, buffing his ability to attack as he unlocks new variations of it. Despite the volatility of his new electricity, it's still ultimately Miles' power, and he's able to control it to suit his needs. In contrast, the symbiote is focused around Peter's web-shooter on his wrist, assisting him with his movement, but is steadily spreading up his arm beyond where it needs to be. This represents how the Symbiote is initially a benefit to Peter, saving his life and giving him a massive power boost, but is ultimately too corruptive and possessive of its host, requiring them to be separated for Peter's own good.
  • Even when separated from Peter, the remnant symbiote traces in his system continue to feed off of his emotional turmoil related to May's death and continue trying to corrupt him back into the Symbiote Hive Mind. Once Martin Li uses his own powers, which uniquely counteract the Symbiote matter due to being so similar, to save Peter from this, it morphs the residual symbiote matter into the Anti-Venom suit, which burns normal symbiote matter on touch. This symbolises how ignoring negative emotions doesn't make them go away, and it's only through confronting and accepting them that one can turn a negative into a positive, with Peter then able to use the strength of a Symbiote in a fight for good going forwards, as well as starting to take steps to move on from May's death in his domestic life in the aftermath.
• Running Gag: After it's introduced, the Emily-May Foundation goes through ever-escalating damage each time it appears; usually because of Peter and Harry.
• Scaled Up: Dr. Curt Connors is forcibly mutated back into the Lizard by Kraven and promptly rampages through the city while being pursued by Kraven's hunters and both Spider-Men.
• Secret A.I. Moves: Subverted in one case; during his boss fight, Peter suddenly has the ability to toss balls of explosive symbiote biomass, which he didn't have when the he was playable earlier (in the same mission no less). However, once Peter gets the Anti-Venom suit, the player is instantly given access to this move.
• Self-Disposing Villain: The Hunter Blinds sidequest chain involves attempting to dispose of the bases Kraven has set up throughout the city while also learning of his children, who are set up as potential successors to him that the Spider-Men want to make sure have as few of Kraven's resources as possible left for them if they come to New York in search of revenge. By the end of the sidequest, it’s revealed the entire family had killed each other, putting an end to the threat of the Kravinoffs. It's then subverted in another sidequest where it turns out there is one surviving member of the family out for revenge against the Spider-Men: Kraven's brother, the Chameleon.
• Sequel Hook:
  • In the Flame side-quest, Cletus Kasady escapes with a vial sample of the symbiote (which turns from black to red in his hands), intending to use it to spread "carnage" in the future.
  • In another side-quest, Peter or Miles discovers that the Chameleon is back in New York and is Kraven's brother. Chameleon watches Spider-Man with the ominous promise to Kraven to "do what you could not".
  • In two ending scenes, Norman, grieving over Harry being put into a coma, calls an associate to get the "G-Serum" ready for use. Later, he visits Otto in prison to get his help in revenge against the Spider-Men. While Otto is less than sympathetic towards Norman, he ominously says that he's writing "the final chapter".
  • A post-credits scene has Miles and his girlfriend meeting his mother's new boyfriend, Albert Moon, and his daughter, Cindy Moon.
  • This is double subverted with the Hunter Den missions and another sidequest. The Spider-Men learn that Kraven has children in his homeland that are all looking to succeed him, and they proceed to take down the dens as a precaution to their arrival should they come to New York to avenge their father. However, after taking down the last den, it is revealed that they all killed one another, with his daughter apparently been gunned down as the last of her siblings, effectively ending the bloodline. But there's one last member of the bloodline left: Kraven's brother, the Chameleon.
• Shout-Out:
  • Jameson reveals that, in a previous battle with Mysterio, Spider-Man was made to chase "imaginary flying bus of schoolchildren".
  • After Miles collects one Prowler cache on top of a radio station building, Aaron tells him that the station was a major force back in the day for making hip-hop artists' careers. He and Jefferson almost got their demo tape on the air once, but were suddenly edged out by "this next-level group out of Staten Island", and the rest was history.
  • The hydra painting on the arcade game at Coney Island looks a lot like a red-painted version of Grim Matchstick from Cuphead. Grim even has multiple heads in the final phase of his boss fight in that game.
  • When Peter and the Lizard burst out from under the museum, the Lizard destroys a T. Rex skeleton in the process and a thin wide banner falls down behind it, evoking the famous shot from Jurassic Park.
  • The code that MJ finds to get Dr. Connors/The Lizard out of his cage in the Hunter's Base in the zoo is 0451, the latest in a long line of references to the classic code from Looking Glass Studios.
  • The white and gold variant of Miles's Smoke and Mirrors Suit bares a strong resemblance to that of the original White Power Ranger, as worn by Tommy Oliver in Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers and Kou/Kibaranger in Gosei Sentai Dairanger.
  • When first confronted with the Hunter's robotic hounds he quips "Ruh-roh"
  • As MJ rides to into an abanodned subway track, she does the AKIRA slide; only she fumbles it and falls off.
  • The high-pitched screeches some symbiotes make are identical to the roars of wendigos in Until Dawn.
  • The Final Boss ends with the player needing to perform a Mercy Kill on the protagonist's loved one, who knows it's the only option to prevent a much worse event; giving off some Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater vibes. Granted, the outcome is slightly less bleak this time.
  • One of the EMS sidequests requires Peter to find and collect a rare plant stolen by some thugs. Upon picking up the container, Peter asks the plant if it's named Audrey.^note That said, in the source material the plant is named "Audrey II" after Seymour's love interest, Audrey.
• Smashing Survival: The game has reduced the need to mash the same button in the game by no longer requiring you to do so to lift or stop speeding cars. There are a few times in story cutscenes where you need to rapidly press the buttons to beat up a baddy grabbing you, but that's about it.
• Songs in the Key of Lock: The digital passcode to Dr. Connors' home lab is the first notes of "Old MacDonald", his little boy's favorite song.
• Stealth Prequel: Collecting all 42 Spider-Bots reveals that the game takes place before this version of Peter joined the Spider-Society, as seen in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.
• The Stinger: Two of these after the credits.
  • Norman Osborn visits Otto Octavius in prison and tries to recruit him to help get revenge on Peter and Miles, while Otto writes in his journal what he calls "the final chapter."
  • Miles and Hailey are introduced to Rio's new boyfriend Albert and his daughter Cindy.
• Strike Me Down with All of Your Hatred!: Once Kraven sees the symbiote's strength and effects on Peter's personality, he believes he's finally found his ultimate prey, and in his boss fight, he makes several attempts to get it to overide Peter's Thou Shalt Not Kill rule. He has much greater success after the symbiote takes Harry as its host.
• Superman Stays Out of Gotham: Present in the first game as well, but even more evident here due to Serial Escalation. Over the course of the story, Sandman turns into a deranged colossus that levels a significant portion of Brooklyn; Kraven is leading an army of heavily militarized fanatics to turn New York City into their human hunting ground. Most significantly, an alien Blob Monster blankets much of Manhattan and quickly assimilates a large portion of the populace, with plans to do the same thing with the rest of the planet. One would think any of these three events, never mind all three in rapid succession, would be enough for the Avengers or some other New York heroes to get involved, but at no point do any other superheroes show up to help the Spider-Men; the total acknowledgment they receive is a thank-you note to Miles from Wong for retrieving the Wand of Watoomb while he and Doctor Strange were occupied in Nepal.
  • Interestingly enough though is that this is zigzagged in regards to the heroes who are featured in the main story of the game (Peter, Miles, and Wraith/Yuri). Peter and Miles actively aid each other in the main story and in crime alerts Yuri also helps both of them out during and after The Flame side missions though she never gets involved in the main story proper due to still tracking down Cletus Cassidy.
• Superpowered Mooks: The symbiotes that you face in the last stage of the game, being that they have powers similar to Venom but at a lower level.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • Peter's excuses to slip out of school to perform Super-hero work were only barely tolerated in part because of his young age at the time, and they're even less viable now that an older Peter is trying to take on a position of authority as a teacher in said school. When Peter and Miles have to team up to stop Sandman's destructive rampage throughout the city, Peter's absence from supervising his students during a citywide crisis is noted and he is promptly fired once he reassumes his civilian attire. From an outside perspective, this is a gross violation of conduct from somebody who is supposed to be protecting the students from harm during such an event — which Peter technically was, but not in a manner he can convincingly explain to the principal, who isn't as tolerant of Peter's disappearances and absences as Octavius was last game.
  • Peter had 8 years or longer to come to terms with Uncle Ben’s death. Despite enough time passing from the first game for Miles to have become an Experienced Protagonist of his own, May's more recent death still haunts Peter and he struggles to move on from it, such as letting her old items be donated to charity. Finding a necklace of hers containing portraits of a younger him and Ben around her house has Peter audibly chocking back a sob and commenting how the sadness "hits you like a rogue wave sometimes". It's this lingering negativity that forms the core of the emotional turmoil that the symbiote feeds off of and helps attract it to Peter in the first place.
  • Peter is a superhuman who has gotten used to pushing through a lot of damage over his years of crimefighting, particularly in the 3rd act of the first game. However, even with enhanced durability and a downplayed Healing Factor, there are some wounds you simply cannot ignore or overcome with willpower. When Kraven stabs Peter in the gut with a large knife and breaks the blade off to keep the wound open, Peter is greatly incapacitated and swiftly bleeds out within minutes just like a normal human would, requiring the Symbiote's aid to not succumb to such an injury.
  • J Jonah Jameson's Bad Boss tendencies are played for laughs with his assistant Jared, but it makes him a terrible man to work for. Thus, it's not exactly surprising when MJ has enough with his pushing for negative stories on Spider-Man and general crappiness as a boss and flat out quits.
  • Despite Miles managing to resuscitate Harry, the damage that Harry's body took during Venom's fight with the Spider-Men is still very much in effect, and Harry quickly lapses into a coma.
• Switching P.O.V.: The player can freely switch between Peter and Miles while free roaming.
• The Symbiote: The Venom symbiote is featured prominently in the game, arriving on Earth via a meteor, being used by Harry as his life-support system before transferring to Spider-Man, and gradually corrupting him. It also has a hand in creating the game's final Big Bad, Venom]
• Tag Team: Peter and Miles can execute special joint takedowns when both are fighting at once, such as simultaneously webbing one unfortunate Mook's upper body and legs before slamming him into the ground. Miles and Black Cat can also do similar attacks during their mission, as can Peter and Wraith during the Flame sidequest. Finally, either Peter or Miles can run into the latter during crimes when The Flame is completed.
• Teleport Spam: There's another mission where you chase Black Cat throughout the city in this game, but to keep it fresh, she has a wand that lets her open portals anywhere she so desires. So when Spider-Man is hot on her trail, she uses it over and over and over in a desperate attempt to get away.
• Tennis Boss: Venom would be much harder to defeat if he didn't have ranged attack combo where the third or fourth projectile could be thrown back at him. Doing so deals a bunch of damage to him, leaves him vulnerable to a melee combo, and he'll just do the same thing again if you get out of range of his melee attacks before he can compose himself.
• Thou Shalt Not Kill: Lampshaded by Mr. Negative, who observes that Spider-Man — Peter and Miles — do not kill and hold strictly to that rule, even as Peter becomes more violent under the symbiote's influence. But it's ultimately subverted. Peter is left with no choice but to kill Venom to stop him from destroying the city. And while Miles is able to resuscitate Harry, the incident leaves Harry in a coma.
• Title Drop Chapter: Most of the mission titles are lines of dialogue spoken therein. The very first mission starts with Peter giving a lesson to Miles' class about "surface tension" and so it is named.
• Token Heroic Orc: There' a side mission about how one of Kraven's robot drone has malfunctioned enough to turn friendly. The mission ends with it helping Spider-Man fight off some hunters before going into the care of an old lady.
• Tone Shift: When trying to find Dr. Connors, the game acts like a Survival Horror game in tone. The music stings doesn't help as it keeps with the tone.
• Took a Level in Badass: Having picked up training and a weapon from her time in Symkaria, Mary Jane is able to better defend herself in her gameplay sections; in the first game, while she eventually gained the ability to perform stealth takedown, being detected was game over, however now she can fight back against enemies that detect her, including, through cunning a Symbiote Behemoth.
• Ungrateful Bastard: For the umpteenth time, J. Jonah Jameson proves that he will never be Spider-Man's biggest fan, as he screams that Miles is abducting him as Miles is rescuing him from a car crash. Miles tries to correct him, but Jameson does not see reason.
• Unnaturally Looping Location: Miles encounters one in the final Mysterio side mission, as the Mysterium's exit hallway keeps returning to the start. It turns out to be comically easy to escape, as you just have to go back the way you came.
• Unseen No More: J. Jonah Jameson, who was The Voice in the first game and only seen from behind, wearing a Santa Suit in Miles Morales, is finally encountered in the flesh in this game. One early mission has Miles rescue an unconscious JJJ from his limo that got buried under a pile of sand during Sandman's attack and carry him to a hospital. Hilarity Ensues as he wakes up mid-swing and, without skipping a beat, launches into one of his trademark anti-Spider-Man rants in spite of the hero having rescued him and taking him to a hospital.
• Unstoppable Rage: Symbiotes get their hooks in a person's mind, causing them to be unrelentingly angry when the transformation takes full effect. There are many "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight moments as a result when symbiote-infected people turn their anger on others. In particular, Miles has to fight against Peter, and Peter later has to fight against Mary Jane when she's transformed into Scream. Both times, the inner frustrations and pain that the heroes feel comes out as accusing someone else of ruining their life and/or holding them back, all while furiously lashing out at everything around them.
• Villain Killer: Not even the villains are safe from Kraven's hunt, as Peter finds a recording of Kraven killing Scorpion and MJ finds the gear of three other supervillains while searching for Dr. Connors, with audio logs confirming Kraven killed them all. He also captured Lizard, Tombstone, and Mr. Negative and would have likely killed them as well if not for the Spider-Men's interference.
• Wake Up, Go to School & Save the World: This trope is showcased in the opening. Miles uses the bathroom excuse to slip out of class to fight Sandman without issue, but Peter is a teacher, so he can't leave as easily. Miles has to make up an excuse for Peter to come with him, and it doesn't save Peter from being fired.
• We Named the Monkey "Jack": Implied; Kraven has a pet tiger named "Dima", the short form of the name Dmitri. The end of a side-quest reveals the supervillain Chameleon, real name Dmitri, is Kraven's estranged brother.
• Wham Line:
  • "Roll Like We Used To" features a pretty lighthearted flashback involving Peter and Harry sneaking around Midtown High. After escaping, they encounter Norman, who delivers these chilling three words that reveal the true significance of the flashback.
    Norman: It's your mother.
  • When Peter goes undercover to infiltrate Kraven's party, he is surprised to discover that Kraven himself is not there. However, when he searches his room, he discovers several bottles of pills on one of his desks...
    Peter: These drugs are for late-stage chemotherapy...
  • Once Peter gets to Dr. Connors and learns that the symbiote is an alien, Dr. Connors says that the symbiote has to be destroyed before it causes any more trouble. Peter's response is "Destroy us?" which indicates that the symbiote has got its hooks in Peter's mind. Connors is appropriately horrified when he hears this.
  • When Peter wakes up in the tunnel with MJ, she tries to talk some sense into him... only for Peter, who has let the symbiote take hold of him at this point, to raise his head and give her a very wise one-word command. Just as chilling as what he says is the fact that it's not delivered in Yuri Lowenthal's voice, but in the deep, demonic growl of Tony Todd: "RUN." It's a sign that Peter is trying and failing to Resist the Beast.
  • After Kraven scores another victory, Peter angrily vents to himself as he searches for him and it's here that we hear the true voice of the symbiote for the first time, giving some chilling advice on how Peter should handle the situation.
    Peter: "Is Spider-Man doing more harm than good?" How about now? Now who needs the "old" Spider-Man? What's so great about the "new" Spider-Man, anyway? He can't even stop some Hunters! They destroyed the EMF! Destroyed my life! I'm gonna lose May's house because of them and… Kraven.
    Symbiote: KILL KRAVEN.
  • In the ending of the game, a grieving Norman makes a phone call while standing over Harry's comatose body.
    Norman: Get the G-serum ready, ASAP.
  • One in the post-credits when Miles meets his mom's new boyfriend and his potential future step-sister.
    Albert: This is my daughter, Cindy.
• Wham Shot:
  • In "The Message" side-quest, one of the Spider-Heroes manages to discover the source of the titular message… a portal in the same style as the Spider Society’s.
  • At the end of "The Flame" side-quest, Cletus Kasady/The Flame gives a monologue to a pinned Spider-Man as his cultists rummage through the train Spidey and Wraith just stopped. Eventually, they hand The Flame what they were looking for; a sample of the symbiote. One that slowly turns a bloody red as Cletus holds it...
    The Flame: And when the Crimson Hour rolls over this earth, it shall bring truth, judgment... and Carnage.
  • When Harry has truly become Venom, he attacks the Oscorp building. As the guards assemble to take him on, the camera pans behind him. For the next few minutes, you are Venom.
  • Harry/Venom grabs a screaming MJ while Peter watches in horror. When they release her, she emerges as a monstrous yellow symbiote with long, tendril-like hair. Enter: Scream.
  • Right after Miles stops Peter from killing Kraven, the older Spider-Man starts ranting angrily at Miles, getting more and more worked up until the camera moves in a now very familiar position, a Life Meter appears, under which is only one word:
    Peter
• What You Are in the Dark: Miles faces the possibility of killing Martin twice, and holds back during both times. It's clear Miles still holds lingering resentment over what happened to his father.
  Miles: You don't know what you took from me.
• The Worf Effect: One particular character finds themself on both sides of this trope: Kraven is shown killing Scorpion with tremendous ease, and is mentioned to have also killed Electro, Vulture, and Shocker, with only the last giving him anything close to the fight he wanted—Electro in particular is worth noting since Peter mentioned in the first game he has the potential to be an Avenger-level threat. This, combined with Kraven easily getting the better of Peter, on whom he inflicts a fatal injury, shows just how dangerous the Hunter really is. Then, when Venom comes around, he and Kraven face off, with the latter, a nigh-invincible opponent throughout the game, is defeated and savagely killed by the symbiote, establishing Venom as an even bigger threat.
• Worf Had the Flu: Peter's been Spider-Man for ten years straight by the time of the game, and while he's still able to carry on with the physical aspect of superheroics, he's clearly exhausted mentally. He's frustrated by the toll that being Spider-Man has taken on his personal life — from being unable to keep a job/pay his bills to the strain it's put on his relationship with Mary Jane — and he's secretly bitter that no matter how many times he sends criminals and supervillains to jail they still get out to kill another day. On top of this, he never took time to properly grieve Aunt May's death, so it's still a fresh wound despite two years having passed. All of these factors degrade his physical performance to the point where Kraven is easily able to slip by his defenses and mortally wound him within seconds of their first encounter, and Peter needs the symbiote just to survive.
• World-Healing Wave: When the Symbiote Meteor is destroyed by the partical accelerator in the Emily-May Foundation, it unleashes a wave that destroys every trace of the Symbiote in the city.
• Worst Aid: The Spider-Men get injured people to trained medics by slinging them over their shoulder and web-swinging to the nearest hospital or ambulance, which could be over a kilometer away. This is not a good way to transport someone with severe injuries, as the jostling about could easily widen their wounds or, in the case of broken bones, dislocate them beyond the point of recovery.
• Yellow Lightning, Blue Lightning: Miles' initial Venom attacks use yellow/orange lightning, the same as in his solo game, while the Evolved Venom powers he unlocks over the course of this game are differentiated with blue lightning.

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"Let's heal the world, Pete… Together!"

Harry Osborn/Venom

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