YouTuber tears up at cultural representation in Spiderman: Miles Morales

YouTuber P1SM has shared an emotional clip of his first reaction to seeing the cultural representation in the new Spiderman: Miles Morales game.

The YouTuber set out to review the demo for Marvel’s Spiderman: Miles Morales, based off hit movie Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse, which was released in 2018 to critical acclaim.

The film follows the main character Miles Morales in New York, who becomes the Spiderman of his universe, but quickly discovers there are others like him from five other universes. Miles is half African/American and half Puerto Rican.

When the film was released, it gained notoriety for more than just ticking a box for diversity; it was praised for providing the right nuances to represent a biracial teenager from Brooklyn.

The same can now be said for the game; an important development in the quest for a greater diversity of video game protagonists. Spiderman: Miles Morales is a stand-alone adventure and a sequel to Marvel’s Spiderman (2018), with the demo released this week.

The 26-year-old gamer tweeted the clip out on Thursday of his reaction to seeing the same nuances played out in the game. The clip went viral on the platform, racking up an impressive 18,000 likes.

In the clip, JC becomes tearful as soon as he sees the number of Puerto Rican flags displayed in the scene from the trailer, and the markets in Harlem. He said: “This is awesome to see, part of my heritage just being on display with a character that I love.”

JC tweeted reiterating his point, writing, “I’m a Puerto Rican/Dominican/Black man who grew up in the south Bronx. Everything I saw here reminded me of home, reminded me of family, reminded me of all the things I love about my culture. It hit me hard. Again, representation matters.”

His reaction resonated hard with a lot of people who felt the same way. As well as many others, streamer Ms 5000 Watts responded to the clip and wrote: “I felt the exact same way. You never know how a lack of representation affects you until you see that representation actually happen. Seeing the PR flags everywhere really hit me.”

Spider-Man: Miles Morales is set to launch on both the PS4 and PS5 on November 12 in the United States and November 19 worldwide.