After the fight with Sandman, Peter and Miles are trying to rescue civilians trapped in sand choked streets. Unfortunately, the city's entire telecom network is down, so residents are unable to directly petition the Spider-Men for help. Fortunately, Ganke comes up with a workaround, using some equipment set in place by a tech start up. He claims that he even got in contact with the head guy, who Ganke describes as super nice and excited about helping Spider-Man. Taking a look at the equipment, it very clearly has the Emily May foundation logo on it.
Many people have complained about the armored look the symbiote gives Peter. But when you remember that In-Universe the Advanced Suit is armored to some extent (Word of God is that the white areas are reinforced with carbon fiber and that the spider symbol is meant to help protect against firearms) it make sense that the symbiote would complement this.
Also considering the suit seems like it was specifically designed to help its host survive and is alive like its comic counterpart (as seen by the fact that Norman has been using it to keep Harry alive) it makes sense that it augmented his suits defensive capabilities as well as offensive.
Indeed, when Harry first takes the symbiote suit out to a fight, he assumes a bulky, full body armoured look that slightly resembles Peter's Spidey costume, but mostly looks like he was copying some of Oscorp's protective gear. As this is his first fight, it makes sense he'd try to maximize his protection whilst trying to resemble Spider-Man in looks as well. When the symbiote repeatedly tries to bond with Peter instead, it slowly modifies Harry's suit to resemble the Spidey costume, and actually shrinks down and compresses even further when it finally succeeds in the bond, leaving it still bulkier-looking than Pete's usual look, but not as much as Harry's own.
When Harry is doing his Agent Venom stint at the beginning of the game, he often jumps straight into battle without thinking things through, prioritizing beating bad guys over anything else. Given Venom's general bloodlust and aggressive nature in general, it makes sense that Harry would act like this, even as a benevolent hero.
Since Kraven is searching for a Worthy Opponent, it seems strange that he first targets Spider-Man's villains, rather than immediately going after Peter, who has already defeated all of them. However, Kraven wants to be killed by his Worthy Opponent, and he knows that Spider-Man doesn't kill. That's why he only takes an interest in Spider-Man after he sees his more aggressive attitude under the Symbiote's influence, as he realizes that he might be able to push Peter into killing him.
Kraven has spent his life hunting the most dangerous creatures Earth has to offer. What finally kills him? A creature not from Earth.
The Anti-Venom suit getting created from Mr. Negative's energy interacting with the residual symbiote matter within Peter and "purifying" it into a positive version of the symbiote that can burn away original symbiote matter makes sense. As Miles notes, Li is a Man of Kryptonite towards the symbiote because their powers operate on a similar principle, feeding off the negative energy within others to bend them to their will. When Li channels all his power into Peter, it's a negative times a negative, transforming into a positive.
While it may seem strange that MJ as Scream is stronger and tougher than the regular, mindless symbiotes Peter and Miles fight, she may not actually be. It less about Scream being a stronger symbiote, and more that Peter doesn't want to hurt MJ and intentionally holds back. Now you could say Peter should be holding back against the other symbiotes, but MJ is much closer to him than most.
The underground is confirmed to have been wiped out after Tinkerer's death, despite remaining a present threat in post campaign gameplay in "Miles Morales"; initially after Phin's death there will still have been stores of tech she built left for them to use, but over time, not only will they have had their weapons confiscated when the Spider-Men and the Police took them down, as well as other criminals likely attempting to steal their tech, as well as Miles swiping their caches. Finally even the technology they could retain will have been lost upon it breaking, since without Phin, they would have no way of repairing it, ultimately removing their edge, leaving them easy prey for bigger gangs, once circumstances stopped protecting them.
Miles taking the time to create the Evolved Suit during such a hectic and important mission might seem like he has Skewed Priorities, but given everything he went through just prior (e.g. saving Peter from the symbiote's influence not once but twice, learning responsibility by becoming civil with Martin Li), he likely just experienced a huge wave of inspiration and put it together extremely fast.
Said job also makes sense considering his main role in the first game, namely creating the armored vehicle for the Inner Demons. It's likely that doing so made him realize he could make more money using he and his crew's skills as professional mechanics instead of the riskier business of dealing drugs as a biker gang. Not to mention, with two Spider-Men running around, it would actually be a riskier investment to start up a new criminal enterprise as opposed to just going straight and not having to worry about Peter or Miles stopping him.
Out of universe, Peter's bad reaction to Yuri making a Spider-Cop joke reflects the general shift away from the overwhelmingly positive depiction of the police in Spider-Man (PS4). In universe, however, Yuri had made a particularly dark joke: "Just the one I got of Spider-Cop's gravestone" when asked if she had gotten any tattoos, and with Yuri gone from the police, Peter probably doesn't have any other friends among the police he can make Spider-Cop jokes to.
Some Fans have cited the fact that the Carnage Symbiote doesn't disappear when the Meteor is destroyed like the rest of the symbiotes, however, given that it was in Oscorp custody before Cletus acquired it, it is likely that it was a sample taken from Venom, before or during Harry's treatment, and thus not sustained by the meteor in the same way as the other symbiotes, similar to the Anti-Venom Symbiote, which also survives the game. Also, the fact that there are still Symbiote nests and crimes in the post-game clearly indicates that destroying the meteorite doesn't automatically destroy all of the Symbiotes.
In a way, being able to play as Venom, even for just one sequence, makes sense, as it's a combination of several key points from within the game series:
Venom is Harry, Peter's friend and closely connected to the main cast, and just like MJ and Miles in 1, and even Hailey within this game, you get to play as a friend of the Spider-Men for one section, even if this time around, you just happen to have superpowers
Harry just got the symbiote, while it is still fresh from being separated from Peter. By this point of the game, you've been playing Pete as he slowly succumbs to the symbiote that you're practically just playing as the symbiote by the time you beat the Lizard. Now that you're Venom, you're basically just playing the symbiote one last time without Peter's "limitations" (i.e. morals and weaknesses)
This could also be used to explain the Gameplay and Story Segregation of Venom being weaker while playable as opposed to being Nigh-Invulnerable as an enemy. The symbiote had not only been weakened by having just been separated from Peter, but also needed time to readjust to Harry's mind and body, especially with Harry's illness flaring back up. Venom's rampage was probably hampered both by Harry's own morals (at least till it manipulates Harry into accepting it) and having to put a bit of extra effort into fixing Harry up again.
Both of the above combined are then finally broken by the end of Kraven's boss fight. You've been playing as both Harry and the Symbiote and while brutal, you can see their actions more like self defense, fighting off Oscorp goons that want to separate Harry and the Symbiote, then fighting the Hunters because they wish to hunt you. All in all, one can see this as you are still mostly Harry being helped by the symbiote. But once Kraven's head was bitten off out of maliciousness, that's when the sequence finally ends. By that point, you're no longer Harry, the best friend of Peter Parker, another playable side character. You're now Venom, the arch enemy of Spider-Man. You aren't a "playable ally" anymore. You just promoted Venom into Big Bad status.
The Venom symbiote doesn't have a leitmotif of its own; instead, its leitmotifs while bonded to Peter and Harry are Dark Reprises of their respective leitmotifs. It's disturbingly fitting of its role as The Corruption; after all, it's a symbiote, taking over other people for its own ends.
In Miles' solo game, when he first discovered that Peter habitually set his radio to JJJ's "Just the Facts", he humorously wondered if his mentor had a masochistic streak. However, in addition to JJJ usually having some valid arguments amongst the anti-Spider-Men angle, it' showcased in this game that Peter still holds a deep emotional pain and feeling of inadequacy towards his superhero actions and the good he's actually achieving as Spider-Man, most prominently with May's recent death and him feeling that there was more he could had done. On some level, Peter actually does have a self-punishing streak to himself, and actually enjoys Jonah's Caustic Critic antics because part of him does believe he deserves such harsh criticism in order to do better.
Furthermore, Uncle Ben's death, in most iterations, is caused by Peter's feelings of arrogance born from his new powers leading to him not properly handling his mugger/killer when he had the chance. Peter may feel that Jonah's criticism helps keep him grounded and not get as much of a swelled head, no matter how well he actually does as a hero, or how much he self-criticises already.
Word of God compares the symbiote to a drug addiction and like any long term addiction, it can be easy to relapse. However, if they're strong enough and have enough support, they can use that experience and use it to help others battle theirs...sort of like how Peter obtains the Anti-Venom suit and its effectiveness against other symbiotes.
The Webbed Black Suit is the only symbiote suit that doesn't turn Peter's webs black. This might be a case of Gameplay and Story Segregation, but in Spider-Man 3, the suit didn't change his web color either, so it's still accurate.
Kraven is revealed to have killed many of Spider Man's other foes from the first game. We see that he had a serum made from a plant to counter and No-Sell Scorpion's poison. With that, there are ways he took care of the others.
Vulture despite his age and dying from spinal cancer had the advantage in the air which Kraven noted he wondered if he would be able to combat him due to his wings. But due to his condition, Vulture could only keep away from him. Plus, Vultures in real life don't engage in enemies head on as they are scavengers and carrion feeders who go after dead or those who are dying. All Kraven had to do was feign an injury and bait him and when Vulture swooped in for the kill, Kraven was waiting to pounce.
Electro was powerful but lacking in skill and ability. To Kraven it was no different than fighting a wild animal. Once he figured out Electro's pattern of attack, he was easy pickings.
Shocker gave him the most trouble as Shocker wasn't trying to fight and kill Kraven, he was trying to survive and his gauntlets which he could use to launch himself made him able to elude Kraven. In the end, it came down to a battle of stamina and who could outlast the other.
The conversations both Miles and Peter can have in the Graveyard with the graves of their loved ones notably only include Aunt May and Jeff, not Uncle Ben's tombstone like in the first game. Whilst it's justified for Miles due to him having never met Ben, and Peter's ability to interact with Jeff's memorial is mainly because of the mentorship role he has with his son, Peter only speaking to May makes thematic sense. Not only is Peter fully living up to the "Great Power, Great Responsibility" mantra, to the point of it negatively affecting his domestic life, he's had 8 years to deal with Uncle Ben's passing and his role in it, so the pain isn't as fresh and raw for him anymore. Thematically, with the symbiote being an Emotion Eater that thrives off the negative feelings in the host, May's more recent death, which forms the emotional centre it feeds off of in Peter, is therefore a more pressing weight upon him, with Peter troubled by the idea that he could have done better, and every time he interacts with the grave, it's boosting the symbiote because he's fixating on that loss once more, to the point of starting to lose track of the original heroism motto that inspired him lying right next to her. After the suit is removed, Peter is ashamed of his actions, and on some level seems to realise that the symbiote was leeching off his pain towards May, and in the end game, all Peter can do is sadly ruminate that his "Parker Luck" is back with a vengeance, as the whole event ultimately caused him to suffer another deep personal loss, if not as final as May's own passing.
Kraven never goes after Mysterio, despite him also being on Coney Island with Tombstone. Since Kraven is seeking an opponent strong enough to kill him, a supervillain whose gimmick is illusions wouldn't be worth his time.
Unlike the other supervillains in Spider-Man's rogues gallery, Kraven tells his hunters that they should kill the Chameleon on sight instead of capturing him and taking them to see him. Seeing as though Dmitri is Kraven's half-brother, it makes sense why he wouldn't have any interest in fighting him, as not only is he an illusionary fighter like the above-mentioned Mysterio, but Kraven has already fought Dmitri multiple times already and is likely fed up with him to the point of not even bothering to show up in person to see him die.
During the hunt for his old tech stashes, Uncle Aaron muses about how he and Jefferson Davis actually played hobby music and nearly got booked for a gig at one point. Miles offers to team up with him for another go, but Aaron chuckles and says New York isn't ready for a "Prowler-Spidey mixtape". Except this plan, if executed correctly, would be absolutely brilliant. Miles obviously can't reveal himself as Spider-Man Two, which Peter notes in the first game as why he could never monetize his hero persona. But Aaron's identity as the Prowler is public knowledge. If the two wanted to actually start a music duo, any proceeds, trademarks, and copyrights could go through Aaron. Granted, there is the rather glaring problem that anyone clever enough to connect the dots might start looking into the family of Spider-Man's new partner, to say nothing of anyone that might have a grudge against Aaron for his thievery in the past...
While it's generally agreed that Mile's Evolved Suit... is hardly the greatest look, it's not hard to see why he might have designed and switched to it from his classic costume. The past few weeks saw New York grow increasingly afraid of Peter on account of his own switch to a black suit coinciding with his sudden bouts of (symbiote-induced) aggression, and the new super-villain leading an alien invasion of New York is a giant monster with a similar look. Whether permanent or temporary, it's likely that the change is to avoid dredging up bad memories in the city's populace and help with PR.
Also note that the suit predominantly features blue as part of its color scheme. It’s possible that Miles may have been inspired by the discovery of where his new blue Venom powers came from and made the suit to show that he’s finally come to accept it.
When Miles first tests out the Coney Island Mysterium, a recording of Beck tells him to think of where he sees himself in the future, before creating a simulation where he's a DJ. You may wonder how the Mysterium was able to perfectly reflect Miles' career ambitions, as there's no indication given that Beck has any way to actually read anyone's mind... until you learn that he was developing a system that scans the visitor's credit card details to customize their experience, in a way that Beck compares to targeted ads on a web browser. Assuming that Beck had already installed this system in the Coney Island Mysterium, it's likely that the attraction scanned Miles' financial data, found that he purchased a large amount of music equipment and interpreted his desires based on that.
The web browser comparison may also explain why the fantasy is interrupted by Miles' memories of Martin Li. Assuming that the Mysterium can also access Miles' internet searches along with his financial data, it likely saw his recent searches regarding Li and incorporated them into the simulation, which causes it to go haywire as his two imagined futures conflict with each other.
In the flashback in the high school, Harry distracts the cops so Peter can escape by Rick Rolling them, take into account the lyrics "Never Gonna Give You Up" sounds a lot like Venom's attitude towards Peter. It also equally echoes Harry's relationship with his father; after losing Emily, Norman doesn't care what it takes, he's never gonna give Harry up.
When Miles accidentally ends up in the Symbiote hivemind, Venom's attempts to manipulate him to join him are far less effective than they are with Harry and Peter. Which makes sense, because unlike with them, Miles hasn't bonded to Venom or any other Symbiote himself, meaning Venom doesn't have access to his memories to speak to him in a way that would entice the younger Spider-Man. And of course, the fact that Venom secretly hate Miles for being responsible for separating him from Peter likely means that Venom isn't all that keen on assimilating him anyways.
Venom's general fighting style is a dark reflection of how Peter fights, in part due to having been bonded to him for so long. So why does he grow wings during the climax of the story? Because he's trying to replicate Peter's web wings for gliding, but in his own dark way.
The way the Insomniac trilogy is set up is brilliant in it's Big Bad selection. While taking a different tact in moving this Trilogy past the college years, the structure of it all happening is perfectly set up to follow Spider-Man's comic villains in terms of infamy.
First is Doctor Octopus. King of the Silver Age Villains, the Master Planner, thematically connected in both being eight legged creatures. Like in the 2010's, reinterpreted into being deeply personal after a great betrayal.
Second is Venom. Greatest Villain of the Dark Age. Peter's Evil Counterpart and second Arch-Enemy, the Outside-Context Problem in his life, Traumatized MJ and Peter and became Iconic in its own way.
And finally, all the signs point to the Green Goblin being third. The Arch-Enemy, DEEPLY personal, psychotic, rearose in the 90's, dedicated to causing misery for Peter. Norman here also fits even better as the Greater-Scope Villain for both Big Bads of the two installments. A smart but well put together way of exploring all the great villains in a fun way.
Fridge Horror
The meteor that the Venom symbiote originated from, and from which most of the other symbiotes are spawned, has a glowing red spiral emblazoned on it; and the symbiote mooks also have spirals on their faces. This strongly implies that Knull, the King in Black and dark god that created the symbiotes in the first place—is out there somewhere in the cosmos, as the red spiral is one of his emblems.
That "replica" of Scorpion's armor that Peter finds? It's likely not a replica. Kraven is a hunter and hunters are known for keeping the pelt of their prey as a trophy.
Unlikely, for one Peter describes it as a near perfect replica, indicating it isn't quite right, for another it is being used to test for weaknesses, which would be unneeded if it was put in place after Gargan's death.
Otto was suffering an illness that makes his body useless while his mind is still intact. He's found writing something called "the final chapter" and given his desire for revenge, he's unlikely to be teaming up with Osborn to get revenge on Spider-man and more likely trying to show how... Of a master planner he can be to him.
Despite the symbiote infection suffering No Ontological Inertia after Venom's destruction, this is notably not the case for traces of it left in people's systems. Peter still had parts of Venom in him long after he was separated from the black suit, the Anti-Venom suit is still active after the game's events, and even Li couldn't remove the symbiote's remnants from Peter's system and had to purify them instead. Now consider just how many New Yorkers, MJ included, who would still have dormant bits of the symbiote in their bodies, just waiting for something to come along and potentially reawaken them...
Moreover, Peter and MJ therefore have residual traces of symbiote matter within them, and Peter's is very much an active power than he can utilize in a fight. If they do wind up having Mayday and Benji down the line, what effect would the dormant symbiote matter from both of them have on their son and daughter, let alone what powers they'd already get from Peter's DNA?
Given that Peter's Symbiote traces were converted into Anti-Venom, presumably either that would overpower the Scream traces in MJ, since that's what Anti-Venom does or they'd cancel eachother down.
Mitigated by the fact that Dr. Conners said that the traces of the Venom Symbiote left in Spider-Man were the result of him being bonded to it for an extended period of time. Mary Jane was only bonded to the Scream Symbiote for upwards of thirty minutes in-universe, and those possessed by the Symbiote Hordes would have only been bonded to theirs for a couple days at most.
"The Message" places the events of this game firmly before the events of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, as indicated by Peter's confusion as to who "Miguel" is. So the question remains: How much does this Peter know about Miles' "anomaly" status?
It's only Earth-1610B Miles that the Spider-Society considers an anomaly because he was bitten by a spider from Earth-42. The existence of Earth-1048 Miles is probably fine in Miguel's eyes.
Even more terrifying is if Cletus found a way to spread symbiotes unto his cult, then we're about to see something more dangerous than Venom's symbiote army, in the form of Carnage's fiery symbiote army, complete with flamethrowers, and even the brutes who appear to actually be mutants, mutates or inhumans that have pyrokinesis!
Possibly not. Some of Yuri's dialogue establishes that the Followers of the Flame isn't the first cult that Kasady's formed, coupled with the speech he gives Spidey at the end of the side quest, indicates that he might be preparing to trade up and go solo, which leads to a different kind of Fridge Horror.
Then let's hope, if that's the case, that Cletus' symbiote doesn't come with Cannibalism Superpower and let's him eat his superpowered brutes...
During their fight with the Hunter, the Symbiote learns that Kraven is driven by his desire to die in battle instead of cancer. Small wonder where it got the idea to play on Harry's desire to "Heal the World." Well, that and taking advantage of Harry's trauma from murdering Kraven in cold blood.
Given that Peter wakes up after his rampage against Kraven's hunters and chasing MJ as if he'd gotten a refreshing night's sleep and with seemingly very little memory of what happened, and that failing in the gameplay segment sees the symbiote choke MJ to death, Peter could've very well woken up the next morning having personally killed the love of his life. And not remembering any of it.
Miles going out of his way to rescue Hailey from the Symbiotes is actually super important if one thinks about it. Unlike in most incarnations, the Symbiotes only have one sole Achilles' Heel, and that's to high-pitched sound. If one of them bonded to someone who is deaf like Hailey, it would mitigate their one weakness and make them practically unstoppable.
More likely it'd make it harder for them to locate where the frequency that is disrupting the symbiote mass from coming from and leave them even more vulnerable. Glass doesn't need to be able to hear sound to be shattered by it.
Kraven’s hunters were able to track Peter to his home (and in the "Wake-Up" mission, they explicitly say that they know he lives there). A simple Google search of the address is all they need to do to figure out his secret identity.
Peter’s probably lucky that he got fired from his teaching job. If Ganke could figure out his secret identity within a few minutes, other students would notice too (Ganke has the advantage of knowing who the second spider-man is, but eventually people are going to notice that one teacher and student always running off whenever there’s a supervillain attack)) and not every student is as good at keeping secrets at Ganke...
In the third act, Venom infects thousands of citizens with symbiotes that effectively turn out to be fast zombies. Given how feral and violent they are, a large number of them were probably shot by the police or otherwise euthanized before the Spider-Men destroyed the meteorite.
Likewise, considering Harry was put in a coma because of his fight with the Spider-Men, you really have to wonder how many hosts of the feral symbiotes either died or incurred severe injuries after Peter and Miles freed them.
There’s a lot less police presence in this game. While from a meta-narrative this was done in response to the first game highlighting the police force, in-universe, a lot of cops and other first responders probably perished during the Devil’s Breath incident. That combined with the constant attack from supervillains, probably caused a large amount of police to quit.
When Peter first visits the Emily May Foundation, Harry tells Peter that when he was undergoing treatment, he heard his mother's voice saying that their planet was in trouble, and that it's up to Harry to save it. It seems pretty innocuous at first, but then we see Venom actually use Emily's actual voice to manipulate Harry into surrendering control to it. With that in mind, it's entirely possible Venom was trying to push Harry into going along with its Assimilation Plot since the very beginning of his treatment!
When Peter is fighting Miles, the Symbiote unusually uses first-person pronouns when it starts talking, rather than using "we" and "us" like he does with Harry later on. Symbiotes who refer to themselves in the first person (such as Carnage) do so because they have a near-perfect connection with their host. Which means that had Peter stayed bonded to Venom long enough, he could've lost his sense of identity completely.
