Sony's recent history on the PC platform has had some ups and downs. The first Horizon: Zero Dawn game had a few issues but was mostly stable, and the situation quickly improved post-launch. Games like Days Gone and God of War had great launches, as did Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart. Things nosedived with The Last of Us: Part I, and the recovery process has been rocky. For every victory like the Helldivers II launch came drawbacks such as the PSN requirement for recent games regardless of their single-player or multiplayer status — and the subsequent removal of those titles from regions that PSN doesn't serve. Marvel's Spider-Man 2's launch for PC should have been a celebrated event since the previous launches in the series have gone well, but there was a lack of promotion for the PC release. The result is a game that is making people question what's going on with Sony and its related developers.

The story takes place after the events of Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales. After the tragedies of that game and the original Marvel's Spider-Man, both heroes are trying to deal with the aftermath of the events while handling some obstacles of their own. Miles is trying to get his college applications done, and Peter is trying to land a steady job and further his relationship with Mary Jane. Both heroes are trying to juggle life while being superheroes. After a tussle with Sandman, the duo goes up against the usual rogue's gallery while fending off Kraven the Hunter, who vows to use the city as his new hunting ground, and the symbiote that will eventually be known as Venom.

We reviewed the original PS5 iteration of Marvel's Spider-Man 2 more than a year ago, and everything stated in that review still stands in this PC incarnation. The story does a good job of balancing the perspectives of both Peter and Miles, giving each person some emotional heft without making them too similar. The combat remains just as fluid as before, so you can still zip between enemies with ease while deftly dodging incoming attacks. The addition of a parry move is nice, but mastering it doesn't feel necessary, since all of your old techniques still work. Traversal via web swinging is just as fun and fluid as ever, and web wings are a neat addition. It has the formula for a good superhero action game and executes it just as well as the past games did.

Along with the aforementioned praise comes the same criticisms as before. Having both Spider-Men is nice, but there's very little to differentiate them in combat. The city is expanded, but it doesn't feel that much bigger, and you'll get side missions that feel like filler. It is also a very safe sequel in that there aren't too many changes that make the game feel different from the last two titles. It means that you should be prepared to experience more of the same kind of mechanics with a new story instead of something completely fresh.

With a solid game as its base, the PC port should've been easy to recommend. The typical set of PC-specific upgrades from Sony are all present, from 4K resolution to ultrawide monitor support. High refresh rates are supported, along with all of the various upscaling technologies on the market. There's better ray tracing support and support for DualSense controllers, provided you use a USB cable. New to this version compared to the company's other PC releases is the ability to connect the game to PSN, but it is now optional instead of a requirement. Using this now comes with PSN Trophy support that's separate from Steam Achievements.

However, the game's launch was anything but clean. Textures were constantly popping in, despite this not being an Unreal Engine title. Particle effects seemed low resolution, and frame rates would constantly drop regardless of your hardware or settings. Crashes were also a constant alongside stuttering and a litany of other issues, so the game felt unstable. It's surprising that the port was done by Nixxes, a studio known for making very good PC ports of console games.

Three patches later, the game's technical state is still in flux. While some players have reported that the game feels more stable, there are no reports that the product is absolutely clean. Other players have stated that nothing has changed on their end, with the game still being prone to slowdown and instability. We've personally experienced the several crashes in the game's opening Sandman fight, and movement in the city streets still felt like it wasn't running at the optimal frame rate even when using a GeForce RTX 5090, 32GB of DDR5 RAM, and a Ryzen 7 7700X. A full reinstall of Windows 11 solved some of the crashing issues, but that felt like an extreme move since no other game demonstrated instability on that same rig. The good news is that those three patches were released within a month, so it shows that Nixxes is dedicated to fixing the issues. The game should be in a much better state sooner rather than later. As an aside, the game ran crash-free when playing the same opening fight on a Steam Deck, further pushing a new narrative that Linux is starting to become better for PC gaming, while Windows 11 begins to introduce more issues.

Speaking of the Steam Deck, users will like the fact that the game is quite playable on Valve's device without any tweaking. The game plays at the device's 1280x800 resolution, while the settings are a mix of Low to Medium values with ray tracing off and FSR 3.1 set to 30% resolution. The result is a game that has a decent amount of visual sheen removed, especially for things like hair, but it can run between 30-40fps even when things start to get hectic. Aside from the necessary visual hit, the device really eats up some energy. The battery life on the LCD version of the Steam Deck can hit roughly 90 minutes on a full charge, and the system fans are going at full tilt more than half of the time.

Marvel's Spider-Man 2 is a good game stuck in a package that is far from ideal. Visual artifacts and a few crashes still remain even after three patches, and the game can feel less than optimized when the frame rate drops on powerful hardware. If you're willing to wait just a little longer or are the patient and forgiving type, you'll be rewarded with a safe sequel that can still satisfy fans of the Insomniac-developed games. This title also gets fans primed for the eventual finale what is almost certainly a trilogy. However, this release serves as a warning that Sony and its studios need to do some real work to ensure future game releases are stable from day one, or else they'll lose the PC audience that is crucial to funding future endeavors.

Score: 7.0/10