GENRE
	Action
	DEVELOPER
	Torus Games
	PUBLISHER
	Activision
	NUMBER OF PLAYERS
	1
	CONNECTIVITY
	No
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With the success of the Spider-Man films, the inevitable arrival of mediocre video game ports was expected. Some of the games based on the films were decent, while some fell short of expectations. Spider-Man: Battle for New York from Torus Games has a more page-turner visual style, but plays just like the games that missed their mark.

visuals

The Game Boy Advance reached its graphical peak a long time ago, so visually Battle for New York will not inspire any gospels. But the game does employ a comic book style, especially when detailing the story, which are quite entertaining. Level design is standard street fare with typical urban side-scrolling areas and apartment complexes for Spidey to fling around. They look decent, but are nothing special. It appears that the developer also tried to implant a comic book level design, but things end up looking like bland tri-colored blocky areas.

In general, just about everything in this game has a disappointing look to it. Spider-Man and the Green Goblin look about what you would expect from GBA, but they don't animate fluidity. Effects are visually the best part of the game, with nice busting animations and fire hazards to jump over. It's hard to say that this game looks good, but it's easy to say that it looks worse than the previous Spider-Man GBA entry.

audio

Imagine one of your favorite songs playing on the radio. Then imagine listening to a mere ten seconds of it. Now imagine those ten seconds continuously looping until you've guided Spidey across some dangerous high school hallway. This is essentially what the music in Battle for New York is like. The sounds are great, but they are low quality and loop continuously. This leads to extreme monotony, and the audio eventually loses its connection to the gameplay. The sound effects are limited to combusting objects and other important actions like web slinging and fire burning. The enemies and frightened citizens are strangely silent.

gameplay

Battle for New York allows players to take control of both Spider-Man and the Green Goblin in separate levels. They are ultimately against each other, but you get to splat people with cobwebs and rampage through the different environments as both. This is a smart concept, but the controls fail to push this Spidey game any higher than its current state.

Many previous games in the series gave players almost infinite web slinging abilities, where you could literally fly from building to building, but Battle for New York employs a blue meter that limits the amount of web activity you can perform. You can recover some of your power by picking up leftovers from dead henchmen and foes, but this just deals a severe blow to the free-flying spirit of many previous titles in the series. Controlling both characters can also be a challenge, especially since some environmental hazards don't effect enemies at all.

Both the Green Goblin and Spider-Man are reduced to using blunt force attacks like punches and kicks, which is against the whole premise of the word super heroes and super villains. The sad thing is that many of your punches will appear to hit enemies, but actually just go right through them. Also, some hazards, like lasers, appear to miss you onscreen, but actually burn right through you. Small, but annoying problems like this make Battle for New York difficult to get through.

multiplayer

N/A

overall

Spider-Man: Battle for New York should have been a fun and easy to play title, but instead the game is frustrating, bland and difficult, despite short levels and simple tasks. This one is truly hard to recommend. Maybe it’s just a matter of succession: every other Spider-Man game is bad, while the one’s in between are much better.

3.7/10