Marvel Rivals players convinced it has the best playable Spider Man in gaming history

John Esposito
Marvel Rivals Spider-Man costume cover

With Marvel Rivals in Closed Alpha, some players are arguing NetEase’s version of Spider-Man is the best playable version to date.

Marvel is finally entering the hero shooter genre with Marvel Rivals, letting players duke it out in an Overwatch-style title. Players choose from a star-studded roster of heroes and villains while battling across various modes and objectives.

The game is currently in Closed Alpha until May 20, and with a stacked cast to choose from, initial reactions are flooding in on NetEase’s portrayal of Marvel’s iconic characters.

Spider-Man has been one of the major talking points. Yet, it’s not because of his abilities or quips, although the latter was a criticism before release. It’s because some players feel NetEase has done an incredible job with the Web-Head’s wall-crawling mechanics compared to other depictions of the same character, most notably, Insomniac Games’ version.

While Insomniac’s rendition of the character has been nearly flawless, the act of controlling the character hasn’t been perfect. For example, one of the replies argued that Spider-Man can’t run down walls like in Marvel Rivals, which is a fair criticism, albeit rather niche in usage.

Many of the replies to AllFatherMedia’s post were defensive of Insomniac’s portrayal of the character, as many were critical of how little was shown that proves this take to be valid.

“They are NOT being outdone just because they have upside-down wall crawling.” one player laughingly replied, which happened to be the overwhelming consensus.

Despite the criticism, AllFatherMedia did double down on their take: “Same people who are telling me Insomniac’s wall-crawling mechanics don’t need to be improved are the ones who said we didn’t need better-swinging physics, loop de loops, and slingshots but then lost their minds when they were revealed even though we’d been saying it for years.”

As more players get their hands on Marvel Rival’s depiction of Marvel’s finest, more divisive takes will certainly populate the forums. For now, be sure to catch up on how to join the Closed Alpha so you can see what the fuss is about.