The next chapter in Spidey's adventure back into the Spider-Verse has arrived! After Gwen comes upon an encrypted file in the Super Collider schematics, Spidey must team up with the Advanced Spider-Man to face down against one of his oldest and fiercest foes: The Kingpin. It's time to Be Greater!
Bringing the Game to Life
When adapting Advanced's world, I wanted to bring the look and feel of the game to life. That includes a title screen and loading screens that imitate what's seen in the game. The title screen was a fun new way to drop the "Return to the Spider-Verse" title card. And the loading screens add just the right amount of anxious anticipation that we all felt when we popped the game in our PS4's for the first time!
I also wanted to display the two main mission types from the game, stealth and combat. I knew immediately I needed an HUD, which I created from scratch. Monitoring health and web gadgets was a vital part of playing the game, and I really wanted to make sure it came across here!
The one other element I was sure I wanted in there was the gadget wheel! Creating that from scratch was a daunting task that I wasn't sure I could pull off, so I took some in-game photos with the gadgets I needed highlighted, and cut it out! A nice little shortcut for a feature that added a little more authenticity to the mix.
Speaking of in-game photos, the scenes where we're panning by the city were all shot by me! Using the PlayStation 5 capture feature, I loaded up Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered and got some epic 4K shots of Advanced's world! I was sure to include iconic locations, like Oscorp, F.E.A.S.T., and Avengers Tower!
Easter Eggs!
Of course, this being a Face Front video, I'm gonna fill it to the brim with Easter eggs! Let me list a few you might have missed:
Fisk is Back
-When Advanced looks up Wilson Fisk, he finds a newspaper article that says he's back out of prison! This article was actually on the official website for the PS4 game!
Just the Facts
-The controversial podcast by J. Jonah Jameson makes an appearance in the video! I created the rant to be something Jameson would probably say if he found out that the amount of Spider-Men in the world literally multiplied overnight! They were so much fun in the game, it would be criminal to exclude from my video!
Another Miles
-Advanced mentions that he has a Miles in his world, who we all know was the star of last year's hit PS5 game Spider-Man: Miles Morales. When he mentions that he was undercover at Fisk Tower, this is a direct reference to the level in the game where Miles convinces Phin to take him to the Underground's HQ, which is a... redecorated Fisk Tower!
Yuri Watanabe
-A charter from the comics that made her way into the game, Yuri Watanabe was Spider-Man's main contact on the NYPD. But during the City That Never Sleeps DLC missions, she went rogue and started taking out bad guys with prejudiced, which is what Advanced meant when he says "She's been a little off the rails lately".
Hostile Takeover
-JJ does flat out say the words "Hostile Takeover", which for those who don't know is the official prequel novel to the game. When Advanced references Maya Lopez's father, that's a direct pull from the book, where Fisk murdered her father, framed Spider-Man for it, and raised her to be the deadly assassin Echo. In fact, you can check out Face Front's review of the book right here!
Marvel's Avengers
-When Spidey figures out that Advanced knows the Avengers, he gets excited only to learn that they're often never around, which is a line from the game. He says that they're on the West Coast fighting AIM, which is a direct reference to the plot of the Marvel's Avengers video game! When the Avengers actually turn out to be there, Iron Man gets some strange quantum readings which Cap guesses is AIM's Scientist Supreme Monica Rappaccini and her Cosmic Cube. Maybe it is. Then again, maybe it isn't.
Goon Conversations
-Goons like to talk a lot during stealth missions. Listen closely to their conversations in the video! You'll hear them reference events and villains from the games, like Mr. Negative and the Tinkerer! FYI, the goon says working for Tinkerer was terrible, and when the original Tinkerer was introduced in the comics, he was known as the Terrible Tinkerer!
The Score
Of course I used John Paesano's soundtrack for the game! I've used songs from this album before, but I made sure to entirely score this video with it! The only exception being the scene with The Avengers, where we briefly hear the Every Hero Has to Start Somewhere track from that game. Other than that, I matched scenes from the video to songs from the game. The stealth mission overlaid with Webbed from the Shadows, the combat mission featuring All the King's Men, and of course the Kingpin fight with Eight Years in the Making! Check out the soundtrack, it really is the best!
And that wraps up this Face Front Original! I really hope you guys liked this one, I did my best to make sure it captured the spirit of the game and advanced the overarching plot of Spider-Man: Return to the Spider-Verse! Who is the Master Planner? Does Spectacular Spider-Man really know? Find out in the next video when he and Spidey team up, Episode 5: Living on the Edge! Thank you guys so much for your support, I only make these videos because you love them so much. Face Front True Believers, and I'll see you in the Spider-Verse!