About that 'Great Web'

 

So to my absolute surprise it would seem that Insomniac had more stuff to leak pertaining to the many efforts their company worked on. Despite the blow-out leak which pretty much detailed every waking thought the company plans to have for the next decade, with everything from perspective release dates to expected Employee toilet breaks plastered across the internet for the perusal of all. Yet somehow in all of that no one bothered bringing up a supposed Multiplayer Spider-Man game that was conceived of, made it to the development of marketing materials, and then subsequently cancelled in short order. So unbelievable of a prospect that is that I honestly thought it to be an outright lie, but now I've see the actual trailer I'm only maybe 5% sure it's still a lie, just one put together by an extremely talented amateur filmographer.

But assuming what we saw was true, I guess that means Spider-Man 2 was originally conceived of to be the basis of a multiversal Spider-Man game called 'The Great Web', pitting Spider-Man against the threats of the multiplayer connectivity and enemy scaling complications. (I know how multiplayer superhero games work by now!) Spider-Man 2 lightly dabbled with some Spider-Verse adjacent side activities throughout it's story, but The Great Web was going to drag us kicking and screaming there to bask in the chaos of the multiverse split wide open. Or at least, that's what we're led to believe, but in practice it just kind of looked like a semi-competent multiplayer mod across the exact same New York map they've had for two games now. Although to be fair, the marketing material we've seen would appear to be excessively unfinished. Wherin lies a bit of my continued scepticism.  

How common is it for entire trailers for games to be constructed and voice acted, before you've finished the visuals? Because there is no way that these 'The Great Web' trailers were designed to be the final look, not with the animation quirks, the general lack of visual charm and the odd weird juttering. I mean- sure, throw a mock-up together so that the marketing team knows roughly what they're looking for when shipping off the trailer to dedicated third party studios- but to put this much effort into the mock-up? I can't help but wonder who exactly this was made to please. Was this supposed to sell the game to investors in lieu of a traditional pitch document? Or in addition to? There's too many unanswered questions for my liking.

Well as it appears this trailer was leaked as part of a Powerpoint pitch- not unlike one I've made myself when pitching ideas, but even when speaking to games industry professionals no one ever mentioned trailer mock-ups were a thing. Perhaps that's just one of those concepts everyone assumes you already know and so no one brings it up. My world is personally rocked, I want to see the trailer conceptual to all my favourite games now. What do you think the Baldur's Gate 3 one looks like? Do you think they just recycled Divinity 2 gameplay? (Actually, BG3 was an independent game so I guess they didn't need to pitch it to anyone apart from Wizards of the Coast- who probably didn't need a visual reference to remind them what games are. Shame.) 

Now if there's one thing which immediately struck me weird about the concept of The Great Web, beyond the fact it was cancelled despite being exactly what fans initially thought they were getting out of Spider-Man 2, it's the way they proposed to use the Multiverse. We actually see some special vorpal portals conjured in the air, teasing multiple earths, in a manner I find disconcertingly familiar. Yes... multiplayer superhero game where the progression is fuelled by dimension jumping? Why- that's just The Suicide Squad game, is it not? Wait- was this supposed to be one of those several dozen live Services that Sony was working on before the crumbling state of the genre scared off their investors? Is that what this is?

Yes, according to the PowerPoint from which the leak originates- this was very much meant to be Insomniac's live Service fuelled Spider-Man game resplendent with Seasons and battle passes and all those other hundreds of little things that Insomniac's series was initially praised for lacking. Which is why all those campaigning for the game to be put back into development are missing the point-  the reason this was cancelled is because the team looked at the writing on the wall and realised exactly where they would end up if the project entered serious development- which is exactly where most every other Live Service game ended up- squeezing out the development team between multiple projects- sucking creativity and resources until the live service dries up dead in less than a year.

It's galling to think of just how many Live Services the industry is hiding under it's skirt that are slowly being brushed under the rug and/or blamed on the guilty looking dog in the corner. Even the super-player darlings at Insomniac were briefly seduced by the apparent 'easy money' of a Live Service Spider-Man, and seriously pursued the possibility of sacrificing their reputation for some Whale Farming instruments. It's going to become a rite of passage for every company to at least plan out a Live Service before they're allowed to enter the 'big boys league' of the AAA space at this point. And I can't say I like the lack of integrity this field is synonymous with.

There's so many people out there that just see 'Online Spider-Man' and immediately start pining for what could have been, before realising the reality of the industry we're in and the obvious road to ruin which is the cost for doing business around these styles of games. Just a fun online title can't be considered anymore, now it has to be your new lifestyle that one's entire growth as a human is based around. Their children's births, their vacations, their funeral- all life events now have to be slotted around the Daily Great Web grind in order to get enough premi-bucks to shell out on that cool outfit which will only be around for the rest of this season. Does that sound like Spider-Man to you? Because to me, that sounds like abject hell.