Four years after the release of Spider-Man on PS4, and two years after Spider-Man Remastered on PS5, we are not going to dwell on all the substantive qualities of this great game for the umpteenth time. After all, you you certainly already know Peter's adventures by heart (!). If ever this were not the case, the long test written by Maxime in 2018 is still reaching out to you. For our part, we will focus on everything that makes the specificities of this PC version. From the first seconds of the game's first launch, an informed eye will be able to notice, for example, that the essential logos of PlayStation Studios, Insomniac Games and Marvel have been joined by that of Nixxes. This studio specializing in ports was acquired by Sony last year, and it is a cornerstone in the recent strategy of opening up to the PC world. The CV of these Dutch is indeed rather encouraging, since in the past they have notably produced the PC versions of Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, or the Xbox One X conversion of Rise of the Tomb Raider. We are not dealing with amateurs, and this immediately feels because Spider-Man Remastered makes full use of the capacities of the most powerful PCs, while remaining accessible to more modest configurations. The latter will be able to lower the quality of the graphic options at leisure, which are numerous enough for everyone to find a good compromise. It is thus possible to fine tune the quality of the textures, the filtering of the textures, the quality of the shadows, the ambient occlusion, the reflections in ray-tracing, the dynamic reflections, the level of details, the quality of the weather particles, the depth of field, light blur, flare factors, chromatic aberration, vignetting, motion blur intensity, field of view and grain intensity. Phew! Admit that we are miles away from simply switching between the Loyalty, Performance and Performance RT modes of the PS5 version.
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It should be noted that most of these options also have an additional quality notch ("very high") compared to the (hidden) parameters of the console versions, which makes it possible to obtain a more precise and realistic image. than ever. In addition, the framerate has been completely unlocked and can therefore reach 120 fps or more, depending on your configuration. The resolution is also freed from any constraint. Not only does this allow you to play in 1080p, 1440p or 4K, but it also becomes possible to enjoy the widest resolutions: 16:9 and 16:10 of course, but also 21:9, 32:9 and even 48. :9 for the happy owners of three monitors. The avalanche of good news does not stop there, since the game fully supports the keyboard/mouse pair and perfectly manages the transition to an Xbox or other controller in real time. At any time, a simple press on one of these peripherals is enough for it to become a priority and for the interface to display the correct commands on the screen. More surprisingly, and this is a direct legacy of the PlayStation ecosystem, this version supports DualSense (provided it is connected via USB) and therefore allows you to take advantage of adaptive triggers and haptic feedback on PC. As for the content, this Remastered version also acts as the "ultimate" version, since it includes the DLC "The city that never sleeps", consisting of three additional chapters (The Heist, The Gang War, The Return of Silver) .
RAY-TRACING ON ALL FLOORS
If we haven't mentioned raytracing yet, it's quite simply that we saved the best for last. Like most other graphics options, this too has an extra level of quality. The game suddenly becomes a real living advertisement for this technology, which too often turns out to be anecdotal elsewhere. Here, benefiting from realistic reflections on the gigantic facades of buildings that you constantly climb really changes the situation. The generic image of the city that is displayed by default is replaced by a real mirror effect, while the reflection of the superhero no longer responds to absent subscribers. This realism also concerns reflective floors, and is reinforced by very high resolution textures. The introductory sequence also gives a good overview of all this, since it displays close-up objects (which remain very detailed), as well as reflections in ray-tracing on the screen of Peter Parker's laptop.
The only criticisms that can reasonably be made to the game therefore concern the adventure itself. Remastered version obliges, we are for example obliged to support the new face of Peter Parker, while that of 2018 seems to us to stick much better to the character.
And if you ever fear for your framerate (which inevitably takes a hit when ray-tracing is activated), rest assured because the game supports three different uspcaling methods: NVIDIA's DLSS, AMD's FSR 2.0 and the game-specific IGTI (Insomniac Games Temporal Injection) algorithm. The combination we chose (maximum ray-tracing and DLSS) gave us top-notch graphics and exemplary fluidity, even though we tested the game on an average configuration. Conversely, those who have a configuration powerful enough not to have to activate upscaling have the possibility of using DLAA (Deep Learning Anti-Aliasing) in order to obtain an image free of the slightest staircase effect. From a technical point of view, it is therefore flawless for this PC port, fluid, beautiful and full of options. The only criticisms that can reasonably be made to the game therefore concern the adventure itself. Remastered version obliges, we are for example obliged to support the new face of Peter Parker, while that of 2018 seems to us to stick much better to the character. Some players will also be able to wince at the "plethoric" aspect typical of the open worlds of the past decade. Going to collect around fifty backpacks scattered around the open world and carrying out dozens and dozens of activities can get boring in the long run. But that ultimately matters little in the face of the great qualities of the game, which remains eminently recommendable, even essential, in 2022.
