The PlayStation-exclusiveMarvel’s Spider-Manseries owes a lot of its success to its combo-based combat. By interweaving melee strikes, ranged gadget attacks, and web-swinging, Insomniac Games has developed a formula that allows players to live out their Spider-Man power fantasies.Marvel’s Spider-Man 2built upon the gameplay of the previous two games by adding more gadgets, more combos, and more skill trees for both Peter Parker and Miles Morales. WhileSpider-Man 2’s combat is as fluid as ever, it still fell short of the studio’s earlier expectations for the game.
When fighting thugs and supervillains alike, one of the most satisfying ways to dispatch a foe inSpider-Man 2is with a finisher. These flashy animations allow players who build up enough of a combo in combat to unleash a devastating attack on an enemy of their choosing. It’s an integral part of combat in this series that Insomniac meant to expand upon.Unused code found inSpider-Man 2revealed that new double finishers were not only considered for the game but were animated as well.
What Double Finishers Would Have Looked Like in Marvel’s Spider-Man 2
Reddit user TheEternalVortex sharedfootage of unused double finishersforSpider-Man 2earlier this month. As the name suggests, these function like typical finishers but would allow Spider-Man to take down two enemies simultaneously once the player builds up enough of a combo meter. Though there are a variety of finishers and ways to chain them inSpider-Man 2, players have never been able to use a single combat finisher to take down two different enemies in any of theMarvel’s Spider-Mangames.
Every Revealed Double Finisher Animation
Three animations for double finishers were found in the game’s code. One sees Spider-Man flip on to an enemy’s back before shooting out two web strands and slingshotting the thug forward into a head-on collision with another enemy. In the second animation,Spider-Man jumps up between two enemies, kicks one in the neck, and uses the momentum to spin around in midair and kick the other’s jaw. The third animation is the least involved and simply shows Spider-Man crisscrossing and yanking webs to force two enemies to headbutt each other.
The Exclusion of Double Finishers in Marvel’s Spider-Man 2
Despite being animated and implemented into the code, double finishers never made their way into the final version of the game. The finisher animations showcased by TheEternalVortex featured unique camera angles and time dilation like many of the finishers currently inSpider-Man 2. This level of polish combined with the fact that the code for the double finishers wasn’t removed before launch means that Insomniac likely decided to remove this feature late intoSpider-Man 2’s development.
It’s unknown why exactly Insomniac scrapped double finishers.Spider-Man 2already allows players to perform double finishers in stealth thanks to an unlockable skill. The exclusion of double finishers from combat scenarios could mean that Insomniac simply wasn’t able to properly integrate the feature over the course of its limited development time.Spider-Man 2features a variety of enemy types, from hunters to symbiotes to robotic animals. Each possible combination of enemies would require a different set of animations for double finishers, which means that a lot of work would have needed to be poured into these cool yet inessential combat moves. It’s also possible that double finishers were too tricky to balance among the many existing layers inSpider-Man 2’s combat system. Giving players more power and a new move to spend meter bars on means that Insomniac would have had to rework the combat economy from the first two games.
Additionally, Insomniac could have just decided to keep double finishers in their back pocket.Spider-Man 2’s combat is competent as is and could support itself without double finishers. Since Insomniac already had athirdSpider-Mangamein mind while makingSpider-Man 2, the developers needed to improve upon the gameplay of the firstSpider-Manwhile also leaving themselves room to grow later. Therefore, Insomniac might have removed double finishers where they weren’t needed so that the studio would have an easy way to up its combat in the next entry.
