Publisher: Acclaim
Developer: Western Technologies, Inc.
Size: 16 megs
No. of players: 1
Got it for: $4.90, complete.
Alright, deep breath and....every villain that Spidey has ever caught has escaped from the Ravencroft asylum and is now, of course, trying to take their revenge on our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, so he'll have to run all around New York in order to beat the living piss out of each and every one of them in yet another attempt to save the city. I feel dizzy...

What's it all about?
It's a sidescrolling action title that has Spidey all over New York trying to round up everyone that escaped from the asylum. Each level has you running, jumping, crawling and swinging your spider-ass off, trying to either kill or just avoid the hordes of assorted unknown minor villains and hopelessly mediocre super villains....and I do mean hordes. The game should have been called "Cheap-ass Spider-Man Boss Simulator". It’s like the team said “Man, we sure liked how they sent out multiple bosses to kill you in Maximum Carnage, let’s do that but make it a sidescroller”. In terms of Spidey's fighting abilities, on top of punches and kicks he now sports an assortment of grenades(!?) that you'll be forced to save for boss fights...if you can make it to them. The level design in the game was built using a new technique called "fucking disgraceful"...I think you're going to like how it turned out.
It boils down to two things: Either knowing where you need to go, at which point you can get there by just running past all the enemies in, like, two minutes....or not knowing where you need to go. If you're like the other 99.9% of the gaming populace and *don't* know where you need to go it can take forever and a day to finish the given level(the "correct" path is just unbelievably hard to find at times).

I must have sat there for twenty minutes trying to figure out what they fuck they wanted me to do on the third level. There's just simply no indication on what they want you to use to get to certain places.
Then you've got these inane "sewer" sections. Basically you're just running around a level, you fall in a hole and you're suddenly in the city's sewer system. What's interesting about that: NO MATTER WHAT LEVEL YOU'RE ON, IF YOU FALL IN A HOLE IT'S THE SAME SEWER. The purpose of it, I'm guessing, is to refill your items and life bar, but it turns out being a huge fuck bucket as they throw *three* bosses at you at once, while you're trying to pick this stuff up. What's a spider to do? Well, taking a cue from the Acclaim Spider-Man series(Maximum Carnage and Separation Anxiety), if you're lucky enough to find a "helper" icon(I was...ONCE in the entire game) you can call out a member of the "Fantastic" Four. They show up, do nothing, then leave. It's wonderful.
Graphics - Character graphics are really well animated, colorful, detailed and all that. Everyone just looks outstanding in terms of art and design, it really brings in a sense of style to the game. The environments are also knockouts, especially places such as the "Mean Streets" level where you’re on some sort of bridge and you’ve got parallax scrolling clouds, water, street, etc. Pretty nice effect. Also, the last level(Ravenwood) has some really cool lighting effects where Spidey will go in and out of the light, slightly changing colors and whatnot; there’s even some slick, faked transparency going on.
Sound - Mediocre in every way, shape and form. Sound effects are generic and scratchy, the music is bland and boring. About the only thing of note in the entire sound dept. would be the Coney Island level’s BGM, which has actual Three Stooges sound bytes in it...I shit you not.
Control - Sluggish as fuck. Most stuff seems to come off a second or two after you do it, or not at all. Ducking is the worst: You press down, sometimes Spidey ducks...most times he just sort of stands there. Attacking is just about the same, and as most enemies(and pretty much all bosses) don't seem to show any signs of taking damage you just have to guess as to whether you've hit them or not. Adding to the frustration is one of the game's key ingredients to getting around a level: Jumping. It's fucked. He does these high-ass leaps but barely moves forward at all...so you end up getting these jumps that shoot your ass WAY up in the air only to come back down to the ground a mere three inches from where you left it. Finally, to top it off you're really only allowed to swing from or crawl on certain surfaces....and because of this, you just sort of run around and jump up to a wall while praying it's one of the pre-determined few you can actually latch on to(via web or your hands/feet). Let me tell you, on levels with death pits that's a whole lotta fun...
AI - Difficulty is through the roof thanks to the cheap-ass AI and the fact that they just pop up on the screen most of the time. You'll be running through a level, then all of the sudden some enemy just sort of magically appears in front of you, you touch them, they hurt you, then they run for it. No shit, they really make a run for it! So, of course, you chase the fuckers down only to have them suddenly stop, at which point you touch them, they hurt you, then they run for it(again). It's infuriating to say the least. Now, as if that's not enough they also respawn the *second* they are off the screen...it's almost like you've been teleported back to 1985 and your buddy is handing you the NES controller. Then, and this is just the cherry on this cake of awesomeness, the game is just filled with cheap deaths. We're talking one hit kills and death pits, and they're all over the place without any warning.
Replay value - Low. The sluggish control mixed with the bullshit AI make Spidey a bad play. If I had a choice between being shot in the crotch with one of those bean-bag shotguns, or playing this game again...I'd go ahead and take the bean-bag shotgun option, and ask that they also pack it with rock salt for that extra "umph".
Tips for better gaming experiences:
Don’t play it! If you must play it though...
Any of your kicks are WAY more powerful than the various punches. So, if you jump kick someone it’s like punching them six times or something. In short: Always kick!

Any time you jump, just hold down the kick button and Spidey will just keep kicking in the air(it's like it’s on turbo). Believe it or not, this will generally get you past most enemies...even if it's just making you fly past them rather than taking them out.

Boss strategy? Grenade the fuck out of them until they die. Do not approach them, definitely do not attempt to punch them...stand back, throw grenades. You run out of grenades, shoot webbing. You run out of that, attempt to jump kick them to death(good luck on that last option, you'll need it).
If you can back enemies into a corner, your crouching kick will actually juggle them and you can kill most in as little as two hits.

Game Genie:
Invincibility: GJAA-C33C 

Start with 10 lives: BE7A-RADA

My rating: 35(out of 100) - Solid graphics, great animation, mediocre control and crap gameplay. If you are just super hard up for Spider-Man action, I guess it’s kind of ok to go through the game once with the unlimited lives or 10 lives code, or whatever you feel your nerves can handle. If not, just stick with the excellent Genesis, 32X and/or Sega CD versions...you're not missing anything here.


Spider-Puss used his webbing to jack my turkey-dog right out of the bun, and screamed this before leaving: Son of a bitch, another fucking shitty, non-Sega made Spider-Man game? You know that no one else seems to get it right, stop subjecting me to this shit! Reow!

Note the length on the web, that's the *MAXIMUM LENGTH* you can swing from.
The Lizard, Morbius(I think) and some sort of blob = A good time for Armored Spidey in the sewers tonight!
Poor Scorpion, no one ever takes him seriously...
Voyeur Spidey!
Let us give thanks to the ebay snipers:
I have tried and tried to get this game off ebay, and each time(thankfully) I lost to the gang of snipers who just seem to hang out waiting for this piece of shit to show up. I don’t understand how this constantly goes for $40+ every time. If I'd of paid that...I think I'd of just shoot myself in the throat two minutes after turning it on(kind of like I almost did after only paying $5 for it).