Insomniac Reveals How Spider-Man 2 Handles Character Switching

Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 is nearly here and one of the most exciting things about this sequel is that it features a story focused on both Peter Parker and Miles Morales. As if that wasn’t amazing enough, Insomniac has confirmed that players will be able to switch between the two Spider-Men at will in the open-world and at specific times during the story.

Speaking to Eurogamer following Spider-Man 2’s 10-minute gameplay demo in the latest PlayStation Showcase, Spider-Man 2 creative director Bryan Intihar explained how the game handles switching between the characters and how a lot of it is made possible thanks to the power of the PS5.

“When you’re playing the main story, we control when you switch between Pete and Miles… it’s done in service to the story when we’re making those switches, for sure,” Intihar said. “So, as you saw on that gameplay reveal, which is a segment of the main story, we are pre-determining those based on what we want to do for how the story plays out.

“We have content designed around Peter, we have content designed around Miles and we have content where you can play either. You’ll be able to – in the open world – freely switch between them with a simple button press.

“Being able to switch in the open world so quickly between the two characters is really, really awesome. Just being able to pick and choose who I want to play as for a certain activity… it’s been so awesome to have that feature. [It’s] something we probably wouldn’t have explored previously.”

Spider-Man 2 game director Ryan Smith then touched upon the fact that there will not only be dedicated skill trees for both Miles and Peter, but there will also be one shared between the two superheroes.

“We want to make sure that when you do switch between the heroes, there’s a sense of familiarity. They’re both Spider-Man, you know how to play the game, but you still have that flexibility in that customisation for upgrading each of them with their [skill trees],” Smith said.

“We saw in the gameplay reveal where Miles has the evolved Venom powers, whereas Peter has the Symbiote abilities. And so those, those change a bit of how you play, and you can upgrade those in their respective trees as well.”

Spider-Man 2 is set to swing on PS5’s around the world this Fall. For more, check out our chat with Insomniac about how the team set out to create a “borderline brutal” Venom suit, nine brand new details from the PlayStation Showcase trailer, and how the sequel’s map will be twice the size of the original.

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Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.