Learning from past experiences is key to getting better moving forward, and Insomniac has learned about accessibility features over its past several games. Using this information combined with new ideas, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 has a good amount of accessibility features. Today, Michele Zorrilla and Sam Schaffel from Insomniac Games detailed some of these features via the PlayStation Blog. It’s a lot, so I’ll try to condense it a bit.
Gameplay-wise, there are challenge level modifiers and gameplay assists. High-action combat is a signature of the series, so difficulty settings can really make a difference for those that struggle in that way (like me). In earlier games, there were different challenge levels (like Friendly or Amazing) but Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 adds on challenge level modifiers to customize three aspects: Enemy Health, Enemy Damage, and Stealth Awareness.
Chase Assist was first introduced to players in Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales and Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered as a response to players who struggled to complete the story in the original release. It will work in a similar fashion in Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 by reducing the target’s top speed, increasing time windows before escaping, automatically attaching to targets, and adjusting the camera to focus on the target be pressing R3. Quick Time Event Autocomplete gives players the option to changed Repeated Button Presses from Taps to Hold and has a Web-Shooter burst to help reduce motor fatigue.
Shortcuts (above) allow players to assign different options to the Left or Right D-pad buttons. These options include (but aren’t limited to) the ability to toggle High Contrast gameplay options or open Photo Mode with the press of a button. Players can even assign different game speeds (70%, 50%, 30% of the real-time rate) to react to multiple gameplay scenarios, like wanting more time to react while an enemy attacks.
Audio Frequency Controls will allow players to disable uncomfortable sounds via High Frequency Cutoff, Low Frequency Cutoff, or a custom setting using the Notch Frequency Filter.
While all the above features will be available at launch, unfortunately some aren’t expected until December 2023. This includes audio descriptions that add a narration-style voiceover to cinematics and Quick Time Events (available in English, French, German, Italian, Castilian Spanish, Latin American Spanish, and Japanese), Screen Reader to read out things such as tutorials and in-game menus, and captions for cinematics and other key moments (customisable through size, colour, background opacity, and background colour). It’s actually quite a bummer that some will need to wait months to enjoy a very anticipated game, but I suppose better late than never? Hopefully this means that upcoming Insomniac titles will have all these features available at launch.
Developed by Insomniac Games and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 will be released for PlayStation 5 on October 20.
