Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered PC Review

The Webhead's New Suit

When I first played Insomniac's Spider-Man on the PS4, I remember believing that it was one of the best games I've ever played. The story, the visuals, the gameplay, and the world were all so well-done, and few other games came close. As such, the re-released Spider-Man Remastered on the PS5 was one thing I never touched, mainly because I knew never needed it. The original game was already great, why would I want to buy it again?

Some time later, I'd eat my words. One of the best PlayStation games I've ever played is coming to PC, in an announcement that surprised so many folks. Forgetting what I felt about the first re-release, I got far more excited than I should have. So I got the PC copy on Steam, and found that the port was well-worth the wait in a lot of aspects - if not in other very glaring areas.

When it comes to visuals, it is clear that this game is indeed a remaster and not a remake. I remember telling my wife how we still didn't need a PS5 because the graphics on old gen hardware were still so good. I still stand by that. If you're still playing Spider-Man on PS4, you're not exactly left out in the cold in terms of graphical fidelity. But it's the graphics options that I believe make this one more worthwhile than its PS5 counterpart, because I know I could go beyond what that one was capable of.

I played on a relatively capable system, and the game's visuals weren't a major step up. But it's the implementation of ray tracing that makes this version stand out. I mean, look at this. Just look at it! That's ray tracing in action in this game, and that's not even on its highest settings. The reflections are so lifelike, I've literally never seen them implemented this well in any other game before. With how Insomniac Games managed to implement ray tracing this well with Spider-Man Remastered's PC port, it's gotten me excited for the future of video game visuals as a whole. And it really pays to have hardware capable of doing graphics like this - at least in my opinion.

Spider-Tech

Other former PlayStation exclusives (Horizon Zero Dawn, in particular) didn't run all that well on PC. But Spider-Man (and God Of War before it) changed that, proving that PC ports should never, ever be piss-poor. Spider-Man Remastered's PC port was handled by Nixxes, and it's safe to say that they did a really good job with the technical side.

I was surprised a bit, however, at how demanding the game can be at higher resolutions and graphics settings. My game was able to maintain a consistent-enough framerate at 1440p, but the dips were very pronounced whenever things get heavy. To at least solve this, I went for DLSS "Dynamic" and set the frame rate target to 60, and the game was able to maintain things more often than not.

That said, the game isn't without technical problems. The biggest annoyance for me is how simply alt-tabbing out of the game crashes the game up nine times out of ten. You won't believe that a lot of people, including myself, do this often because we also have other things running in the background.

Next up, the DualSense haptic feedback was very muted - I think I'd rather play using an Xbox controller, thanks. What in the world happened with this, Insomniac? I was expecting way better and more pronounced haptics. I hope this gets fixed. Furthermore, setting up the haptics required a little bit more tinkering than what you'd need. This should be plug and play, but it never was.

Another thing I noticed: CPU usage is just so darn sky-high even at 1440p. I'd really rather stick with my current chip for the entire gaming generation and not have to upgrade more often than I'd like. CPU usage is even more egregious at 1080p, too, considering this is the resolution so many gamers plan to play this on. Not everybody has a 1440p or 4K monitor, more so the kind of PC hardware that can power such resolutions.

Peter Parker's Story

It's been four years since this game originally came out, so I won't go into much detail about the story since you probably all know how it ends. It's an excellently crafted story that will not be out of place in a movie. And me, personally, looking back at it shows me just how "human" of a super hero Spider-Man really is. Furthermore, the dialog feels natural, the pacing is great, and the villains all have very understandable motivations. Their version of Peter Parker is also brilliantly portrayed, and I really can't say anything more.

Conclusion

Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered is a technical feat of console to PC porting that isn't exactly perfect, but it still works when it needs to. My only gripe about this is that despite the remaster being a great revisit, it's hardly worth the full price it's asking. So my suggestion: wait until the game is on sale, then get it. Then, and ONLY then, will it be worth your money.

SCORE: 8.5 out of 10

Related Article: 'Marvel's Spider-Man' Remastered: When's the Release Date? DLSS, Ultrawide Monitor PC Support Coming

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Written by RJ Pierce