WonderCon 2010: Spider-Man Shattered Dimensions!
Yesterday I took some time out from gawking at the likes of Ali Larter and Milla Jovovich to attend Activision’s panel on their upcoming release “Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions.”
Written by Anti-Venom creator Dan Slott, Shattered Dimensions begins when the mystical “Tablet of Chaos and Order” (whatever that is, but I guess we’ll find out) is split into four pieces and begins wrecking havoc across four dimensions that each happen to have their own version of our favorite web-slinger. As each of the Spideys, players will have to fight through 3 different levels of gameplay featuring 3 different baddies (each enhanced power-wise by a piece of the tablet) culminating in a final level that “somehow” incorporates all 4 Spideymen working together to defeat a common foe. That’s 13 levels of chasing bits of the tablet and beating villains such as Noir-Hammerhead and Kraven (the only two villains announced as of yet).
Creative Director Thomas Wilson (no… not the Thomas Wilson who played Biff)
The hook of the game seems to be this idea of being able to play 4 different versions of Spider-Man. And it doesn’t seem like such a bad hook really. Each version will be taken from previously existing alternate versions of Spider-Man with only two having been announced so far. Those are Amazing (normal 616 Marvel universe continuity) and Noir (based on the recently launched Marvel Noir universe). In addition to how the characters and environments look, each version will have its own strengths weaknesses and fighting styles. For example, of the two already announced, Amazing will specialize in using his webs to create weapons and to wildly swing around his opponents. Noir’s specialty will be close combat and stealth.
A nice touch brought to the game is that each of the Spider-Man versions will be voiced by a different actor who had previously voiced the character. On hand at the panel was Christopher Daniel (CD) Barnes who voiced Spider-Man for the early 90’s animated series. CD will be voicing the Noir Spider-Man. I don’t know if he was getting all method on us, but with a shaved head and goatee he looked nothing like the CD from the Starman TV series or the Brady Bunch movies.
Spider-Man Voice Actor CD Barnes
All-in-all I have to say the game looks promising. People are already criticizing it for it’s lack of an open world system, but Thomas Wilson, the Creative Director at Beenox (the studio behind the game) assured attendees that the DNA of previous Spider-Man games, namely things like web swinging and slinging, would be intact. But this is a very story focused game and it’s important to keep players on track. As someone who constantly veered way off course and got lost when swinging around in previous Spider-Man games I look on this as a blessing. I’m more than happy to focus on combat and achievements.
It’s clear that this is Marvel and Activision’s attempt to create a Spider-Man game worthy of standing along side last year’s stellar Batman: Arkham Asylum. Whether or not that is going to happen is just too early to tell… but I liked what I was hearing!
