Spider-Man

In Summary

Peter Parker gets bitten by a radioactive spider. Then he nearly gets knocked over by a car, but in jumping out of the way sticks to a wall and finds out he has arachnid capabilities. Shamelessly exploiting this, he stars in a number of comics, cartoons and films before turning up in his first PC game.

What's the Big Deal?

It uses the Tony Hawk's 2 engine and if the conversion works as well as that did we could be looking at the best superhero game on the PC. It's not just a platformer either, expect a game that requires thought and quick reactions, along with a great storyline.

Console games; normally we wouldn't piss on them if they were on fire, but then a certain Tony Hawk's came along, flipped a few ollies, won our hearts and minds and helped us lose our front teeth. Take the engine from this superfluid game, add the best superhero of all time, and you've got the recipe for a console conversion that could just prove that lightning does indeed strike twice.

Spider-Man made his debut in 1965, shortly after being bitten by a radioactive spider, which endowed him with super-strength, super-speed, the eerie Spider-Sense and the ability to walk up walls. It's even been rumoured that I used to possess a Spider-Man costume and once made a baby cry by walking up to the pram and sticking my masked-face in, but then every superhero has his off day.

Since then he's remained one of the most popular of the Marvel heroes.

And with a best-selling PlayStation game last year, and a brand new film, directed by Sam Raimi, due for release next year, the red-suited one who finds it hard to use conventional urinals is back where he belongs -on top of the game.

If you want to keep him there you're going to have to guide the spandex one through 34 (count 'em, go on...) missions, each coded to mimic an edition of the Spider-Man comic, and with an original storyline to match. As you'd expect, Spidey can punch, kick and generally move around with the agility of an 11-year-old Russian girl, but the game goes far beyond a simple platformer. The first mission involves a bank heist, a bit of web-slinging, some Metal Gear Solid stealth moves, and a sodding-huge bomb to defuse. The fact that this game is infused with different elements like this is the reason that it's garnered praise and high review scores on both PlayStation and Dreamcast. According to a spokesperson at Activision, the game is going to be a direct port of these two games, although we've yet to confirm how the control system will work, however, the surprise that a certain skateboarding game gave us upon its release last year, you could be in for a big treat when the game is finally released in September this year.