#msm2 thoughts

[edgepunk]

Okay, filtered MSM 2 thoughts:

We knew Kraven was gonna show up in the sequel, however, I def did not expect The Lizard/Dr. Connors and the fact that Kraven is focused on him instead of Peter or Miles is very interesting. I wonder if they're gonna sort of recreate/reference Kraven's Last Hunt 👀

Either way, I'm very excited to see these classic villains showing up. Maybe we'll see Yuri Watanabe/Wraith too??? They were building her up in one of the DLCs quite well. Also, interested to see how Peter will react since they were friends.

Gameplay!!!!!! I already loved the gameplay in the first game, and the Miles Morales game improved upon that. And they seemed to take it another step further, it's like they actually listened to the criticism that people had, and I didn't know it was possible to improve the already banger gameplay (tho yes the first one was a little clunkier but still v intuitive)

The new traversal features look so good hello?? The web wings used as a glider? Miles slingshotting himself across the city??? aoughhfg and also!!! It looks like we'll be able to explore other parts of New York like Queens and maybe Brooklyn??? tbh Manhattan became a little restrictive after a while in the first two games, so it would be cool to expand the map a bit. Y'all know I'm meh about huge maps with some exceptions, but if done right, I think it's gonna be good.

Putting this under a read more bc this game is driving me insane I'm eating drywall

So I was right that we'll be able to switch between Peter and Miles. I kinda guessed that they're gonna be mission specific, and maybe, we can switch between them in free roam like with Jacob and Evie in AC: Syndicate (this specific feature isn't confirmed, just speculation on my part)

Looks like Nuform changed Miles' abilities since his Venom (heh) powers can turn blue? I'm interested to see what it did to him and if they're going to address it. Maybe it's purely for aesthetic/gameplay reasons. Who knows, I'm still curious.

Also, love how they incorporated Ganke as their guy in the chair. I loved him in MM and the fact that he helped Miles with the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man app. Just give me more Ganke please, he was really charming and they managed to differentiate him from MCU Ganke Ned that he feels like his own character.

Okay, I'm done beating around the bush and I'm going to address the elephant in the room - the symbiote. This is all we've been waiting for, we knew from the post-credits scene from the first game that Peter is gonna have the black suit. I'm glad Insomniac were like "yeah let's get this over with" and showed it to us.

And people are already calling him Bully Lowenthal 💀

Now, I was a little bit iffy about the design of the black suit, but after I watched the trailer a couple of times, it's starting to grow on me? Maybe I'm looking too much into it but the organic armor/exoskeleton design gives me xenomorph vibes, and I love the tendrils in the "exposed" exoskeleton. The texture looks gross and slimy and I love it. I was wondering if they're gonna add some subtle sci-fi horror elements to it and they delivered. I've always said that the symbiote has a lot of space/eldtrich horror potential.

Which brings me to the tendrils (I can already hear the p*rn artists working hard), jokes aside, they look so cool and they're animated so well???? The way Peter fights with them??? He straight up turns into a uhhh tentacle monster for a split second. And his fighting style is so brutal, I liked when he kept repeatedly kicking the guy as if he was a punching bag ddjhsjh

but the scene where he shows up in the sewers(???) yeah this shot legit gave me chills bro looks fr intimidating

And do I really need to gush about Yuri Lowenthal's voice acting? Ben 10 off the shits I'm gonna do it anyway bc holy shit he got the guttural growl down to a T. However, I do wish they put a very subtle filter on his voice. Doing that kind of growly voice must've hurt his throat real bad. Maybe his voice is gonna become more monstrous as the game progresses, that'd be real neat :3c

Honestly, I'm really curious to see how it will affect Peter since May is dead, the whole thing with Otto (I think they're gonna have a convo on the Raft maybe???), he's got a lot of debts to pay and he mentioned that Harry is dying. Bro's going through it fr also parksborn angst???? I'm ready for the homoerotic undertones in their cutscenes kdjkdjdkj I'll take any crumbs I can get 👀

And the way that Peter just dismissively shoved that one civilian away??? Ah?? I'm not ready for Peter to become an absolute cunt and be mean to Miles. There's a high probability we're gonna have to fight Peter in a boss fight as Miles aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

ANYWAY THAT'S IT I'M LOSING MY MIND

[addybrock]

the fact that all of miles' sidequests are about community makes me 🥺🥺🥺

[mustasekittens]

current progress on the wade painting! I got rid of the strap across his chest so his boobs r free now 🕺

I only did a few edits to wade today bc I was mostly working on correcting my Spidey for the second coat🫡🫡 the initial block in was done before msm2 came out so I had only really drawn the og advanced suit up till that point (we also had only seen glimpses of the advanced 2.0)

as per usual I made edits on medibang to plan out what I was gonna do today hehe

also irl jumpsare but I wore my insomnipete shirt today with my Spidey socks (not pictured) just to get in the Spidey mood™ (also this pic shows the colors better bc I couldn't get a good photo for the life of me)

but yeah idk posting about my paintings here isn't really a priority but I thought you guys would be interested :)

[hawkogurl]

Yeah, I basically had a similar reading on Insomniac!Harry as you did, I think - I do like him a lot, and I definitely see why he would the most popular version of him in the fandom right now, but he's a very smoothed over and simplified version who feels written to be as broadly loveable as possible, if that makes sense? I read a very thoughtful critique of the game recently that described Harry as being Peter's 'comically perfect' best friend, and I think that gets at the game's take on him and ties neatly into what you said about how the characters in Insomniac feel like they're written mostly to serve Peter's story and character, which is not necessarily a bad thing when he's the protagonist, but can flatten characters into narrative devices who don't necessarily feel like full characters; and any time Harry could be perceived as doing or saying something flawed, he's justified, or at least it's understandable, and it doesn't help that the last part of the game where he's Venom was rushed (not the fault of the devs for being pushed by corporate to meet a deadline they couldn't meet ofc) and it's not really clear how much is the symbiote amplifying his emotions, manipulating him, or outright controlling him like a puppet for its own agenda - but any way, it's very easy and probably correct to read him as not being truly at fault for anything.

Regarding Norman, my take is that I don't necessarily mind an interpretation of him that focuses on corporate greed and lack of ethics while exploring what if Norman was villainous, but genuinely loves and cares for his son in this universe, but MSM2 weirdly wanted both that and the usual drama from Harry being jealous of an abusive Norman choosing Peter over him, so we got that awkward scene where Norman is doing no such thing and still being a great father, but Harry mistakenly believes he's choosing Peter - so it's manufactured drama to follow the universes where Norman is abusive and Harry has issues from that, but here, everyone is still a good or at least neutral person at worst and it's all an honest mistake, which goes back to what you said about taking the edge out of the characters here - doesn't mean they're bad, like you also clarified, but definitely softer.

Can’t form intelligent thoughts because I need to go to sleep but I’m going to say I agree with all of the above. He’s very palatable in a way that just becomes boring for me. I’ll probably come back and contribute later when I’m not barely conscious.

For now, I agree especially because them wanting the Norman drama but also sort of pussying out of the Norman drama sort of like… feels like a good example of what I mentioned in that when you write an established character but change a major aspect of them, you need to compensate. They wanted the benefits of those arcs but weren’t willing to either include the original arcs or do the work to come up with something that can get to point b in a different way with what they’ve kept. It’s not the best writing decision in my opinion. And I agree with that articles assessment he feels like, comically perfect. Scrubbing away all his unsavory aspects lost him a lot of the ways he’s flawed and interesting because it often feels he exists solely to progress Peter’s arc rather than having the personal drama he often has.

I don’t personally like these softer versions. I’m not gonna say it’s bad or wrong to like those versions, but they definitely feel watered down when it’s not looked at in isolation or looked at more critically. It rapidly became boring for me.

[spider-xan]

Thinking about this excellent post by @hawkogurl about the Coney Island scene in Insomniac MSM2 and how Peter, Harry, and MJ each symbolize a different connection to and perspective of childhood, and specifically the part about how this version of Harry works better as a symbol than a fully rounded character if the writing wasn't going to commit to the latter - and I completely agree, and I don't think that's a bad thing either bc sometimes, a character does work better as just a narrative device to explore themes than being a character in their own right, if not both.

But it got me thinking again, and these are preliminary thoughts, about how I think that plays into the way the ending of the game where Harry lives instead of dying like he was originally going to in the early script outline feels off from a narrative perspective - I've already discussed how Norman's rage and revenge feels more convoluted in that context than simply wanting revenge for the Spider-Men allegedly killing his son (though Peter does very much kill Harry in the actual game, and it's frustrating people act like he didn't bc in erasing that, it weakens all three of Harry, Peter, and Miles' characters and storylines), and I understand not killing off Harry bc it's too bleak and repetitive when the first game already ended with Peter having to make a choice that leads to the death of a loved one, but if Harry does indeed symbolize childhood and how you can never return to that time, then him surviving ends up symbolizing Peter being unable to let go and move on from his past, which is an odd direction that feels kind of regressive and in opposition to his symbolic coming of age when Aunt May died last time.

And don't get me wrong - I like this version of Harry a lot, despite my writing and narrative issues, and from a character perspective, I'm glad he lived and am interested in seeing what happens with him in the next game, but from a narrative perspective, it doesn't feel right in terms of progressing Peter's character in a symbolic way; at the same time, and I have written about this before, I get that Insomniac wrote themselves into a corner after ending the first game with a major death, so there were reasons why they had to go with the ending they did and I can't really fault them for that.

[watsonjackpot]

+ ( So after seeing that cute giftset the other day from the end of the City That Never Sleeps DLC for MSM2, really think it was time to point out just how important a step like that is, not only for Peter and MJ's relationship, but for Mary Jane as a whole.

Buckle up, this may be a bit heavy.

Mary Jane, as a character, has shown more than a few times in differing canons that she can have a problem with intimacy. For a long period of time, she's been pretty adept at putting up a front to mask what she actually feels. Almost all of this stems from her family life growing up.

Mary Jane's father was a failed writer , and despite the loving way that their relationship and marriage started out, he quickly turned to take his anger out on not only Mary Jane's mother, Madeline, but also her and her sister, Gayle. Eventually, this was grounds for the three of them to outright leave . They bounced around from relative to relative, including Mary Jane's Aunt Anna, whom would come to play a big role in her life .

But the problems didn't just stop there. Gayle fell in love with a man, and married and quickly discovered she was pregnant with their first child. While things again were happy at first, they quickly began to fall apart , just as they had with Madeline and Philip . When Gayle broke the news to him that she was pregnant again, he abandoned her and their children, leaving Mary Jane and Madeline to help Gayle pick up the pieces.

This mirror of what had happened to their parents wasn't something Mary Jane could ignore.

Things truly came to a head in her life when Madeline fell ill, and eventually passed away, leaving Mary Jane and Gayle on their own. Having already developed the party-girl facade that she would allow to define her for years to come, Mary Jane finally snapped at the idea of now being the one who would be forced to help her sister raise her children.

It's important to note that Mary Jane had been using this mask for a long time by this point as well, to the point that Gayle entirely viewed her sister as not caring for her whatsoever. To MJ, it was like a second skin, and one that she almost seemed to prefer living in entirely.

Eventually, MJ came to live with her Aunt Anna , and finally find some grounding in her life. By this point, she was well aware that Peter Parker was Spider-Man, having found out the night that Uncle Ben was shot, and had been keeping this secret the entire time . Prior to this discovery, she had felt a sense of kinship with Spider-Man after seeing him on television, feeling that they both wore a mask to protect themselves. After finding out who really was under the mask, however, she couldn't deal with knowing the kind of dangers Peter was putting himself in, and actively avoided meeting him, despite Anna and May's attempts to set them up. Eventually, she ran out of excuses, and did meet him finally. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Fast forward a bit, and after having grown closer after the death of Gwen Stacy, Mary Jane and Peter did start to date a bit . Eventually, Peter thought that he should ask Mary Jane to marry him, which he did ... to be met not only with Mary Jane's rejection, but also that she was leaving to Florida with Aunt Anna . She would not return for a few years, but when she did, things with Peter eventually came to a head. She revealed that she did know he was Spider-Man, and that she had known all along . While this was initially done by her to explain why she couldn't handle being around him, it eventually led to their friendship becoming even more important in both of their lives.

After a mess of a situation involving Peter's then-romantic entangling's with Felicia Hardy, the Black Cat, Peter asked Mary Jane to marry him again. Right on the cusp of Mary Jane heading to Pittsburgh to deal with Gayle being arrested in connection with helping their father steal art . While her initial answer was again ' no ', she did concede that with how chaotic things were, she didn't have an answer for him. Leaving for Pittsburgh, Mary Jane quickly discovered upon landing that Peter had followed her there, intent on standing by her side while she dealt with her family issues.

It was this steadfast refusal to abandon her, and the way that the two of them teamed up to defeat a Spider-Slayer that had been tracking Peter, that finally made Mary Jane step back and think. She had long harbored fears that Peter, despite all the years she had known him, might end up being exactly like her father . But the way that time and time again, he had refused to abandon her, finally made her realize that she could trust Peter completely. While waiting for their flight back to New York, MJ agreed to marry him.

What does all this prove ? It shows just how much an important moment it is for Mary Jane, in any adaptation, to tell Peter that she's willing to make that step . Because it's not something that she would make with just anyone , but rather, it's a symbol of just how much she absolutely trusts Peter with that step . No-one else would ever be capable of that level of trust from her. No-one.

Furthermore, it highlights MJ being willing to push back her own fears of not being a good mother, or a good wife . Reading through the Spider-Man material post the wedding annual highlights just how much growth it takes for MJ to grow into the role of being a partner to Peter, especially given the horrors she had already witnessed via Madeline and Gayle's relationships . And she and Peter are not perfect , by any means. They have their spats, but they make up . They don't give up on one another, rewarding that faith MJ placed in him time and time again that things wouldn't end like her parents or Gayle's marriages .

It's this continued renewal of trust that makes it so when they do decide to take that step to having a family, it's without even a smidge of fear hanging over her . Because she knows that if there's anyone in the world who she could have that family with ? It's Peter , the person who she would trust with her life, time and time again .

[maroonmused]

spiderbros anon from a few months ago here every time you post msm fics i get up and start irish dancing and boyncing off the walls and cheering and saying YAHOO! like im mario ☺️ literally have never seen anyone who just Gets these characters in the same way i do so thank you for your service 🙂‍↕️🙏

HIII spiderbros anon i am too lazy to look for a gif of msm2 peter and miles hugging post-crimefighting rn but i’m laser beaming it to ur brain, thank u SOOO much!! <3

even though i think i’ve had a chance to get comfortable with them, part of me still has that anxiety when i post/update a fic that it’ll be the one where my characterization’s slop and i won’t realize it. it’s prob a silly thought but anyways it means a lot to have messages like this bc of that and thank u for being infected with the msm brainworms the same way i am 😁

[oliveroctavius]

I've had a day to mull it over but I still don't know what to think about the third act of MSM2. Feels like the weakest part to me from a character perspective. A lot of setups I thought I'd like and then was meh on the execution of

[eddiechim]

finally replayed some of msm2 today so here are some little thoughts

i adore how ganke and miles have different methods of signing in conversation with hailey; miles speaks at his natural pace and then his hands follow, whereas ganke's is more stilted because he speaks and signs at the same time. such a little detail that gives a surprisingly deep insight into how both of their brains work

completely did not realize the first time that the "random startup" whose tech ganke uses to repair the FNSM app is the emily-may foundation. and that the "really nice guy" who was "excited to help out spider-man" is in fact harry. my HEART!!!!!!!!!

again this didn't really properly sink in the first time round but harry says flash & his buddies "cornered me and broke my laptop". which is so interesting because it implies harry has not mentioned a word of the bullying to norman (despite knowing he'd make it disappear instantly) most likely because 1. it would only make things worse in terms of only being seen as a spoilt rich kid, and 2. it would make him seem weak to his dad

[edgepunk]

I'm excited abt the black suit arc in msm2 while being scared that there will be an inevitable falling out between Peter and Miles bc the game(s) were building their friendship up to the point that Pete became sort of an older brother figure to Miles

[spider-xan]

Just getting this thought down before I forget, but following the conversation with @hawkogurl in this post, I do feel like a big reason why the Insomniac version of Harry, while very likeable and cute, doesn't quite work as a narratively compelling character is the fact that for whatever reason, Insomniac didn't quite commit to how they are doing their own thing with him in the same way they did for other characters, so Harry ends up feeling like two different versions the games switch between when convenient for the plot or emotional beats, and not in a complex character with multitudes or facades sort of way.

Like, on the one hand, Insomniac Harry, unlike other versions, is a well-adjusted mature adult in his mid-twenties who is a super genius and super successful right out of college, and while he loves his father, who has been nothing but extremely loving and affectionate, and any rare flaws as a father are borne out of genuine love and desperation, plus he had a loving mother for most of his life, he's fully aware that Norman is a bad person and isn't looking for his approval, and is even somewhat embarrassed with how excitedly involved Norman is with the EMF - but then halfway into MSM2, he suddenly starts acting like the traditional scared and insecure teenager who is jealous of his best friend Peter for having the love and approval of his father while he's never good enough for Norman and objectively a failure by comparison, even though this Norman has never not been completely loving of Harry and has never chosen Peter over Harry, and Harry himself is wildly accomplished at such a young age and has been praised for it; and while it's not always bad writing for characters to behave irrationally, it still has to be set up and come from somewhere in a narratively organic way, whereas here, that jealousy moment feels more like the game felt obligated to do a traditional Osborn family dysfunction plot beat, despite the lack of set up in this universe - but also not really bc it's just a misunderstanding and Norman didn't even do anything wrong himself either, and then it doesn't really add much to the plot, tension, or character development anyway.

And the thing is, there were absolutely ways a jealousy plot could have been set up while still working within the parameters of this version of Harry! Maybe instead of having him be almost perfect as a superhero right away as Agent Venom, have it be something he sucks at (which would also make Harry feel more like a rounded character than a perfect paragon), so this is something Peter is better at for once and stokes jealousy in him, even if he's aware Peter has years of experience on him, and adds early tension to their relationship while also feeding negative emotions to the symbiote that then amplifies that jealousy, sparking more conflict so that their falling out makes sense later! That would be a new way to do a jealousy and rivalry plot between them that fits into Insomniac's approach of respecting the source material, but still doing their own twist on things that is unique to their universe and interpretations of the characters.

[addybrock]

my next-day thoughts on the opening act of msm2 are that the game would be so, so much better/more effective if they cut like, half of the cutscenes -- and i'm specifically talking about the kraven ones here. like yeah, they look good & serve their purpose (informing you of the character, his motivations, & that he's coming, creating suspense as you know something the characters don't), but in doing so they commit a Cardinal Writing Sin, which is showing you the threat before it has a chance to be threatening.

kraven is a hunter! we are meant to be being hunted here! they should be drawing on the tried-and-true visual language of the stalker, the unseen threat slowly encroaching upon our heroes, but instead the stort very abruptly halts and flashes back in time to explain what they're foreshadowing. can you imagine if they did that in the first game? if fisk was like "i kept the crazies in check, and without me they'll ruin this city! you'll want me back!" and they immediately hard cut to martin li embueing demons with his power and going "osborn will pay for what he did to me...... i just need to find the location of devil's breath, and then they'll all see what a monster he really is"??

by giving you a detailed look at him at the very beginning of the game, before he even enters the plot, you completely kill any tension that could have been built. fuck, you don't even feel shocked when he suddenly crashes into their lives, which is Very Bad when everything else about it is framed as if you're meant to be? it's not very unseen if you can see him the entire time??

it's such a baffling decision, and one that feels like it exists only because they were worried the audience just... wouldn't get it? which is a really bad place to start from, as both an artist and a viewer, because you're starting low and working from there. i know gamers are illiterate and comic fans are even worse but you don't have to drag the rest of us down with them 😔

[spider-xan]

Reading parts of the Insomniac MSM2 early script again bc I've been thinking again about the problem where Miles ended up being written less like a co-protagonist and more like a supporting character for Peter in the main storyline, and how even Miles' arc with Martin Li, while great overall, still runs into that problem bc the resolution, rather than focusing solely on Miles, ends up taking place in Peter's mind where Miles spends just as much, if not much more time exploring and fixing Peter's emotional problems with Li as much as his own, and the end game is creating the Anti-Venom suit for Peter, so even Miles' one main story important plot beat ends up being about Peter and Peter's development more than himself - and I thought that a simple fix would be to separate Miles resolving his problems with Li from the Anti-Venom creation, and sure enough, in the early script outline, while Miles helps, Anti-Venom is created by a joint effort between Connors and Li instead, which also fixes a different issue where despite being the symbiote expert, Connors does little to nothing for that part of the plot in the actual game, whereas he's very involved in the early script.

[spider-xan]

Anyway, I agree with that really thoughtful critique of MSM2 I read awhile ago that said that the politics of the game feels like it was written by well-meaning old white man liberals from San Francisco or wherever bc yeah, the game has things like gay students going to prom, a Deaf Black girl as Miles' love interest, a diverse cast, etc. - but then it also posits that climate change can be solved by Good Capitalism via venture capitalist tech start ups run by benevolent billionaires lol

[edgepunk]

oh no the msm2 thoughts post is turning into an essay 😭