Nightmare Fuel / Marvel's Spider-Man 2

Per wiki policy, Spoilers Off applies here and all spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned.

"We're going to heal the world."

The moment fans learned the Venom symbiote was gonna be a crucial part of the second game's story, they all knew just how horribly wrong things could go from there...

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Pre-Release

• The gameplay reveal has its chilling highlights:
  • Kraven's introduced doing what he does best: Hunting the Most Dangerous Game. In this case, it's another warrior whom he finds lacking, and he tells the poor guy so to his face before snapping his neck. Then he learns that there may be more worthy game in New York City...
  • By the time we meet Peter at the point in the story the trailer covers, he's already bonded to the Venom symbiote, and its effects on him are definitely showing: no wise cracks, no quips, nothing but laser-like focus on stopping Kraven's men from hunting Connors, and his voice is deeper and more growly. Even Miles picks up on these changes, and he's not sure that he likes what he sees...
    Ganke: He's not usually like that right?
    Miles: No, he’s NEVER like that.
  • After escaping the Lizard and failing to catch Kraven, Pete angrily growls "He got away from us." There's a very good chance that by "us", he doesn't mean him and Miles...
  • The Lizard is portrayed in an almost Jaws-like fashion: not giving the viewers a direct look at him for much of the reveal, moving through the river at frightening speeds, and at one point repeatedly leaping up out of the water to lunge at Miles.
  • Venom’s introduction in the story trailer. We see him taking down one of the gunships with ease before landing and showing the audience just how BIG he is. Peter and Miles truly have their work cut out for them. Another promo teaser shows Venom in action - and he's an utter Lightning Bruiser easily manhandling both Spider-Men at the same time, slamming Peter furiously into the ground and using his tendrils to throw Miles hard into a car. And a Blink-and-You-Miss-It moment shows that civilians will not be protected from Venom's rampage either, with one hapless person and several cars being sent flying helplessly through the air as Venom slams Spider-Man to the ground. The Lethal Protector, this Venom is not...
  • Another part in the story trailer has MJ hiding from Peter, who seems to be searching for her, perhaps even hunting her. Makes you wonder just how much the symbiote has corrupted him and how bad his aggression is at this point.

Post-Release

• The opening scene doesn't skimp on this — The game starts with a brief conversation between Norman and Harry, with Harry attempting to get Norman to promise to let him out, should the treatment not work. Norman assures Harry that he won't lose him... before the symbiote's tendrils emerge from his arm and crawl onto Harry revealing he's both dreaming and unknowingly conversing with his alien life support. The symbiote forces its way into Harry's mouth and, after a fade to black, Harry wakes up in the Symbiote tank. He screams, and the container's lead doors slam shut on him, leaving him in the dark. The way the Symbiote's traditional Yandere fixation on its hosts overlaps with Norman's own well-meaning parental determination to save Harry no matter the cost is extremely unnerving, showcasing how easily his positive love of his family can be twisted into making him a future monstrous villain for Spider-Man, should Norman continue to devote himself to this path.
  Norman: I'm not going to lose you. I will never let you go.
• When Peter tries coming to MJ's and Connor's defense once the latter starts transforming back into the Lizard, he's able to fight off a few of Kraven's hunters before confronting the man himself. In less than a second, he deeply impales a machete within Spidey's abdomen before tossing the superhero aside like he's nothing. If that wasn't bad enough, the player then takes control of MJ carrying Spider-Man, who's teetering on the verge of death at this point and continuously remarks how bad his injury is before finally collapsing from bleeding out and doesn't move or respond to his friends. Sure the symbiote took advantage of the moment to bond with him to resurrect him and heal his wound, but for a brief moment, Peter actually died.
  Kraven: Not as venomous as they say.
• After the symbiote bonds with Peter and they return to the Emily-May Foundation, Peter tries to will the symbiote off himself and back to Harry. Not only does it not work, MJ quickly calls attention to something emerging from his side, which turns out to be the knife. We see when it clatters to the ground that the blade is the same size as Peter's whole foot, and has been stuck deep in his side for what's likely been hours. At no point in the fight beforehand or the swing back home did Peter even notice that it was there.
• After Spider-Man smashes the Lizard through the pavement in an attempt to cure him, his arm is visibly broken from the impact. We are then treated to a scene of the symbiote's tendrils snapping it back in place, which even Peter can't help but yelp at.
• The Symbiote's effect on Peter is harrowing to watch play out, starting at first as a rather disturbing-looking power boost before warping his body and mind to suit its needs.
  • The fight with the Lizard and the aftermath. While the reptilian beast was always a tough opponent for Spider-Man, this one is far and away the deadliest. Not only is this Lizard the biggest version so far, he actually gets BIGGER as the fight progresses. And even with his massive size, he's still incredibly fast, able to chomp on Spidey with attacks that cannot be blocked. Afterwards, Peter's remarks suggest that he would not have been able to survive let alone win without the suit.
  • It’s not the multi-ton reptile that’s so scary though, it’s Peter. The corruption the Symbiote is having on him is on full display as he goes from appealing to Connor’s better nature to telling him he deserves the pain and isolation because he was too weak to stop it. Adding on the more Venom-like appearance the suit takes on after the fight, and it gets hard to tell which one of them is the real monster.
  • Peter's behavior takes a nosedive from uncomfortable to downright frightening from the moment he touches the meteor. His voice sounds almost unstable during his conversation with Connors, and we get the first sign of the symbiote taking a stronger hold on Peter.
    Connors: We need to call Oscorp. We need to destroy it.
    Spider-Man: Destroy us?
  • Peter's combat style and finishers get much more brutal than his previous ones, which generally showed off his skill and primarily featured kicks. Now, his finishers involve brutally slamming enemies to the ground with tentacles including one where he jumps off of his foe, picks them up with the symbiote and slams them to the ground, pulls a foe in and unleashes three vicious punches to knock them back and out and one where he pulls an enemy, jumps slightly and slams them to the ground with a massive punch to the head. There's no chance in hell that a lot of the enemies finished like that ever get up again.
  • The Symbiote Surge, while similar in function to other rage abilities like in Spartan Rage also features animalistic growling and snarling while active. It's made explicit you're not controlling a hero, but a predator.
  • After the battle with the Lizard, Peter is exhausted and falls asleep for the night, only for Kraven's hunters to track him to his home. While already terrifying enough of a situation for MJ, who has to fend them off on her own, matters only get worse when the Symbiote sends Peter on a rampage through the neighborhood, culminating in MJ knocking him out with sound waves in a nearby tunnel. When Peter proves unresponsive for several minutes, she decides to take desperate measures and resuscitate him with her stun gun. The effect works... and focuses the Symbiote's attention on her.
    "Peter": MJ... RUN.
  • Should Symbiote Spider-Man manage to capture MJ, he pins her to the ground before smothering her face until she chokes to death. One can only imagine how Peter would react afterwards.
  • There's also optional dialogue should you complete the remaining hunter bases with Peter in the symbiote suit: Once Ganke and Peter realize that not only did the Kravinoffs kill each other during Kraven's absence, but that the latter set up a hit on his own daughter, Peter's response is chilling to say the least.
    Spider-Man: Don't know what else we expected from Kraven. Good riddance, the city's safe.
  • There is also the dialogue from after random crimes in the city while wearing the Symbiote; they end up chilling.
  • Upon learning that Miles has been captured by Kraven, Peter rants that the Hunters and Kraven have ruined his life; at that point, the Symbiote speaks for the first time and its words are as sinister as they sound:
  Symbiote: "KILL KRAVEN."
  • Upon arriving Peter once again flies into a burning rage as he pummels all the hunters in the area. Following this, he outright threatens to crush one of them with one of their armored trucks shall he not tell him where Miles is — the hunter in question is so terrified that he can only silently point to where Peter needs to go.
    Spider-Man: WHEEEEERRRREEEE?!
  • All of this culminates when, after the already infuriated Peter sees Miles stopping him from killing Kraven, he immediately turns on his fellow Spider-Man. And then, a new health bar pops up...
    PETER
  • After an emotional boss fight we get a front row seat to just how bonded the symbiote was to Peter. Every time Miles strikes the bell, Peter is crying out in absolute agony. It shows how much of a physical toll it took on him as much as a mental one to get the suit off. It goes without saying Yuri Lowenthal's performance was absolutely incredible in this boss fight.
• Kraven in general is a very serious threat to everyone around him in his mad quest to get a worthy death.
  • He's already killed Vulture, Shocker and Electro and tanks Scorpion's stinger through the shoulder like it's nothing before stabbing him to death with it. He also forcibly kidnaps Tombstone and Curt Connors and tries to kidnap Black Cat despite the fact that Tombstone is sincerely reformed and Connors clearly doesn't want to turn back into the Lizard.
  • Apparently a hidden room that was removed from the game but has been found in photo mode where you would find the heads of Scorpion, Shocker and Vulture mounted on the wall. But not just them, it would be revealed that he had also gotten Rhino as well.
• VENOM. After years of waiting for this series' depiction of him, he proves to be every bit as menacing as promised. So much so to the point that this could easily be argued to be the most downright terrifying and scariest version of the black symbiote yet.
  • Not only is this incarnation an Adaptational Badass and full-blown Eldritch Abomination that can spread his influence across the whole city in a matter of minutes - he confirms what the trailers were implying in that he isn't doing what he does out of a desire to protect the innocent. In fact, this Venom stands out to be one of the cruelest versions of him.
  • Everything about Venom rampaging throughout Oscorp as Norman desperately tries to get his son to stop but no matter what Norman says or tries to do in order to stop the monstrosity, Harry doesn’t listen since his mind is now being corrupted by Venom.
  • The scariest part? This is not a cutscene. For the whole sequence, WE are Venom. The player renders entire hordes of guards completely helpless against the Symbiote's power, as you listen to Norman begging for his son to come back to his senses. But of course, nothing takes, and you're out of Oscorp in just a handful of minutes, Venom only wanting more blood to shed. As desperate as he may be to do it, nothing Norman says or does can stop you.
  • Venom's combat style is much more vicious and animalistic than either of the two Spider-Men. Even Peter under the influence of the symbiote doesn't compare. Your basic combo is ferally clawing at Oscorp security before smashing an enlarged symbiote tentacle down in a brutal smash, sprinting is a mad charge forwards that shatters the environment and enemies alike and Venom can pick up and use Oscorp security as weapons against their comrades.
  • And the finishers, good Lord: one has Venom pick up and brutally slam down their target in a flurry of tentacles, another has them picking up an unfortunate target before biting down and flinging them to the side like a feral dog, yet another sees Venom charging forward and biting down before smashing them to the ground and tossing them aside like trash. In one, Venom picks up someone in both hands and breaks their back with an audible crack before throwing them to the side — the Oscorp security force even have a visible reaction to Venom's display of savagery; pure, understandable, horror. It's more like playing as the Hulk than Spider-Man, and by and large, the Hulk doesn't want to eat people. (unless you're talking about the Ultimate Comics version)
  • And how does Kraven the Hunter go out, after getting the Last Hunt he craved? Venom bites his head off. And then drops his headless body to the ground without a second thought, after finishing the Old Hunter off for good. And unlike in other media, where Venom biting someone's head off is rather... "clean", for lack of a better word, this time you can see Venom's teeth and mouth covered in blood, with the symbiote absently licking its mouth clean afterwards. One wonders how this scene didn't raise the game's rating.
  • While showing Peter their new office, Harry mentions offhandedly that he heard his dead mother's voice while in the tank, saying it was his responsibility to save the planet. Then, after they kill Kraven, Harry looks at Venom's blood-soaked hands and the reality of what they just did brings him back to himself for a moment. He jumps away and visits Emily Osborn's grave, asking her My God, What Have I Done?. Then Emily reassures him that he finally has the power to heal the world. Then Venom lifts chunks of Manhattan into the air and it becomes abundantly clear that the symbiote has been impersonating Emily this whole time. Hallucinating a dead loved one's voice is one thing. Being manipulated by a monster who can mimic a dead loved one's voice is another. Now imagine that monster being physically and mentally bonded to you at all times.
  • The most haunting element of Venom's character, above all, is that while he is no Anti-Hero, he still sees what he's doing as right. Assimilating people en masse to become twisted caricatures of their human selves at best, extensions of himself at worst, in his screwy modus operandi to "heal the world". He claims to mean well, but his motives and actions are so visceral and self-serving that it all just flies back in his face.
  • When Peter calls MJ about what went down in Venom's breakout, Peter tells her to avoid Harry at all costs. Just as he says this, MJ hears a knock on the door...and the last thing Peter sees in the video call are black tendrils swarming over her...but when he gets there, things seem eerily normal. Except Harry, who seems to just... drone on, in a Soft-Spoken Sadist tone. Only when Peter calls his symbiote a 'thing' does he lash out and transform. And as he does, while his body becomes covered in the symbiote and his voice shifts to that booming hissing baritone... you hear it.
    "We are not Harry. We. Are. VENOM."
  • And what becomes of MJ? Venom forces Peter to watch as she gets forcibly bonded to a symbiote, while screaming in horror the whole time... out comes Scream, your next boss fight, and quite possibly one of the most terrifyingly personal attacks Venom ever dealt on Spidey in any incarnation. The final scream MJ makes before succumbing to Scream is particularly horrifying, as it almost sounds like she's being outright smothered by the symbiote as she's changing against her will.
• Watching Black Suit Spider-Man operate from the perspective of MJ gives us a glimpse on how the regular mooks that we fight see Spider-Man when he comes out of nowhere and overpowers them without breaking a sweat.
  • The Symbiote taking a stronger hold on Peter illustrated by all the hisses, roars and all the extra tentacles he uses doesn't help either. Then comes the section where MJ and Peter are together in a sealed off tunnel by Miles, where MJ is desperately trying to snap Peter out of it. Unfortunately for her, she unintentionally hurts him a bit when she uses her shock gun to wake him up, which then quickly turns into a chase straight out her nightmares. Peter/Venom viciously chases her, with MJ having no idea if he's gonna kill her when he gets his hands on her. The worst part? Peter doesn't remember any of it the next day. It's a dark mirror to the awesome stealth sequence in the first game where you get to call Spider-Man for takedowns and see him at work. This time, you can't control him, and it's terrifying.
  • Peter's waking up the following day is frightening in itself. To elaborate: he wakes up on a bench in the middle of the city, with no memory of how he got there. Checking his phone, he sees that he has missed calls and frantic texts from both Harry and Rio. Peter takes all this in... and gets to his feet with a creepily calm smile on his face, like he's just woken up from a refreshing nap.
• As soon as Miles had called him and done with the Symbiotes, Peter is horrified to hear Kraven, a very serious threat, is dead. You could hear the horror in his voice and feel Venom's presence in the form of his theme as Peter realizes that Venom is a greater threat than Kraven could ever be.
• During Miles and Martin's dive into Peter's mind to free him of the symbiote's control for good, they get a look at Peter's inner pain. The layer relating to his insecurities as Spider-Man has Miles experience being smashed through floors of the Raft by every member of the Sinister Six, and the following level is filled with their corpses impaled on symbiote tendrils. Miles and Martin discuss how the symbiote was offering Peter an answer for what seems like an endless revolving door of Joker Immunity for all of his villains: they'd go away for good if he'd just kill them. There's an extra layer of horror for Martin, who's audibly unnerved at discovering his own corpse.
• Guess who else is in the game? Guess who else gets a symbiote and gets away free and clear with it? Cletus Kasady, otherwise known as Carnage. Given how powerful Venom is already and that in the comics Carnage is as strong as him and Spider-Man combined, that's a horrifying prospect for everyone involved.
  • The way its revealed is creepy too. You spend the whole Followers of the Flame subplot chasing after this guy called The Flame who doesn't seem to be anyone we know, likely leaving you wondering why he's even here. Then, in the final mission of the quest line, he's standing over a trapped, gasoline doused Spider-Man with a Symbiote in his hand and the reveal happens:
  The Flame: And when the Crimson Hour rules over this earth... it shall bring truth... judgement... and Carnage.
• After the Venom symbiote's finally been destroyed at the end of the game. Seeing Harry in a coma, Norman lashes out and smashes the room Harry's being kept in as Peter and MJ quietly leave. He then gets on a phone and says something that should have long-time Spider-Man fans very concerned...
  Norman: Get…the G-serum ready…ASAP.
• He then follows this up by going to visit Otto Octavius at the Raft to try and find out the identities of the Spider-Men. For Norman, it's become very personal. In the same scene, Otto is also heavily implied to have been developing sort of revenge scheme of his own. While we don't get to know what it is, we can tell from Otto's tone of voice and his expression that it cannot be anything good.
  Norman: What are you writing?
  Otto: (with a Psychotic Smirk on his face) ...the final chapter.
• Peter and Miles are tracking down the hunters’ targets, however, all of the targets are oddly already long dead, save the final one. Pure Paranoia Fuel sets in as in the final target’s penthouse, you discover that it’s in fact, Kraven’s brother, the Chameleon. And he’s already rigged a lethal gas to kill you, the intruder. Although Peter/Miles escapes, there’s no sign of the villain… until the camera pans out revealing he WAS there, watching you from across the street the whole time, and he’s decided to do what his brother couldn’t…