With Spider-Man: Brand New Day hitting theaters this week, we’re revisiting a well-liked but oft-forgotten entry in Spidey’s video game catalog: 2005’s Ultimate Spider-Man.
Developed by Treyarch and released for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and GameCube (as well as handheld devices), Ultimate Spider-Man served as the first video game adaptation of the critically acclaimed comic series of the same name. First launched in 2000, Marvel’s Ultimate comic universe was a then-modern reboot of its characters, with Spider-Man, penned by writer Brian Michael Bendis, considered arguably the best of the bunch. The game boasts Bendis himself as a director, a cel-shaded presentation that accurately captured the comic art style, and the revolutionary web-swinging introduced a year prior in Spider-Man 2. Story-wise, Ultimate Spider-Man takes place months after the comic’s Venom saga, and players switch between controlling Spider-Man and Venom, who each possess unique abilities and gameplay sections.
Join editors Marcus Stewart and Kyle Hilliard as they revisit Ultimate Spider-Man live on Twitch and YouTube starting at 12 p.m. ET/3 p.m. ET.