Review: Marvel's Wolverine
Logan is back, and his claws have never been sharper.
Marvel's Wolverine begins with a characteristic that ends up defining much of the experience: Insomniac knows exactly how to present the character, but it takes a little while before allowing the player to truly take control of him. Logan is at the center of a story that moves through different moments of his past, introduces important characters from the mutant universe, and puts the player through increasingly violent combat. The problem is that the beginning spends too much time explaining how to play, interrupting short gameplay sequences with scenes, dialogue, and interactions that could have been handled much more directly.
GAMEPLAY
Combat is, without a doubt, where Wolverine begins to show his full potential. From roughly the first third of the game onward, especially after Logan and Jean set out through the snow to find the others, the experience becomes much more enjoyable. The game finally assumes that you already understand its mechanics and starts introducing new enemies and abilities without having to interrupt the action all the time. Wolverine remains extremely linear, but within combat arenas there is greater freedom to decide how to attack, use the claws, perform executions, take advantage of the environment, engage enemies directly, or rely on stealth. The variety also improves with the introduction of different enemies, including invisible opponents, larger enemies, and leaders who require a slightly different approach.
The Rage system is one of the biggest highlights. As Logan enters combat and builds up his Rage, he can perform more powerful attacks and use special moves that completely change the pace of a fight. The healing factor also plays an important role in this dynamic, making Logan's resilience an essential part of the fantasy of controlling Wolverine. Progression is divided between gear, techniques, and adaptations. Techniques and adaptations must be selected to determine which abilities will be prioritized, while the number of available adaptations depends on character progression and the DNA strands obtained. Gear is mainly tied to outfits and claws and can increase attributes such as health. Active abilities appear less frequently, and many of them work as specific bonuses, such as allowing another takedown after a stealth execution.
The boss fights also show the difference between what works and what could be better. The battle against Omega Red was one of the fights I enjoyed the most, especially considering the difficulty setting I was playing on. The fight is brutal and highly cinematic, but the enemy's movements are relatively predictable, particularly the attack in which he pulls Logan closer and drains his life. The battle against the prototype Sentinel, however, gave me a different impression. The fight drags on because the enemy appears to take no damage during certain moments, which turns what could have been a challenging encounter into something somewhat tedious. The motorcycle sections are also fun, although I expected more urgency from them. Actual crashes could have happened during the rides and made these sequences more tense.
STORY
⚠️ WARNING: this section contains story spoilers, including the ending and post credits scenes.
The story of Marvel's Wolverine is quite good and fairly grounded within what it sets out to do, but it is far from extraordinary. There is also a curious issue right from the opening minutes: the game practically gives away who the main antagonist will be before even starting to build the mystery. The presence of Troy Baker as Nathaniel Essex, combined with the character's appearance and that blinking red eye, immediately made me suspect that there was something much bigger going on with him. For anyone who follows the industry and easily recognizes a casting choice of this magnitude, it is difficult not to think that something is being hidden about the character. Essex also takes on some narrative functions that resemble the role Charles Xavier would normally have in X Men stories, particularly through his connection to the formation of Team X and his attempt to protect mutants, although he is not a literal replacement for Xavier in this universe. The absence of Charles Xavier in this universe is also curious and could have at least provided an opportunity for a cameo, especially considering his importance to X Men mythology.
At the same time, I liked the idea of presenting a universe where mutants are still beginning to organize themselves and are living in hiding, with Logan, Jean, Mystique, and Sabretooth occupying very different positions within this reality.
The story remains cohesive throughout much of the campaign and succeeds mainly by keeping its focus on Logan, his memories, and his relationship with Jean. The problem is that almost the entire rest of the cast ends up in the background, and I would have liked to see more development for characters such as Sabretooth and Mystique.
Wolverine's loss of memory works within the premise, and the presence of Apocalypse adds an interesting layer to the character's past, especially because the threat is not completely resolved by the end of the campaign. The boss battles are also generally very good moments, with the exception of Deathstrike, which bothered me mainly during the first phase of the fight because she moved away practically every time I tried to get close. What disappointed me the most about the story, however, was the relationship between Logan and Jean. I expected a much more intense romantic relationship between them, especially considering the weight that their relationship carries in the comics. Throughout practically the entire campaign, their relationship feels like two teenagers who clearly like each other but never go beyond that. Even with the additional revelation involving the two of them in the post game content and the Repressed Memories achievement, I felt that the game lacked the courage to develop their romance more explicitly. It is curious because the game shows no hesitation when it comes to blood, mutilation, and extremely graphic violence, yet seems much more restrained when it needs to explore intimacy between its protagonists. In the end, Logan's loss of memories and Jean's speech did not have the emotional weight they could have had for me, although the story still works as a good introduction to the character for those who do not know his journey in depth.
VISUALS AND SOUND
Visually, Wolverine is a delight. Insomniac uses the same engine as Marvel's Spider Man and once again demonstrates how impressive this technology can still be. The characters are extremely detailed, the environments feature excellent lighting and shading, and even interior areas have plenty of personality. Tokyo in particular looks beautiful both during the day and at night, even though the game gives you relatively little time to explore the region. The research into real world environments carried out by the team can also be seen in the construction of the locations and helps create convincing spaces.
Another technical detail I really liked is the fact that the cinematic scenes are rendered directly through the game engine. The skins used by the player continue to appear in cutscenes, which keeps the presentation much more consistent. Some of these scenes could be even more impressive with CGI, but keeping everything within the engine is a major technical achievement for the team. The visual quality also works very well with the level of violence in the combat, while the soundtrack, sound effects, and DualSense feedback help reinforce the impact of Logan's claws, attacks, and abilities.
ACHIEVEMENTS
Marvel's Wolverine's achievements have some good examples of how to take advantage of the game's own mechanics, but they also repeat the problem of turning exploration into a checklist. Ground Control, for example, requires you to push three enemies off the plane, while Shish Kebab requires you to impale an enemy on an environmental hazard.
These are achievements that work precisely because they make the player pay attention to what Wolverine can do during combat. Parry Perfected, with 500 parries, and Spiral Cut, with 75 enemies eliminated using Tornado Spin, also encourage the use of mechanics that are part of the core experience.
On the other hand, there is still a considerable number of achievements based on collectibles and repetition. Crate Collector requires finding all Material Crates, Full Barrel requires finding all Whisky Bottles, and Pathways of the Mind requires finding all Nightmare Doors. I would have preferred a larger portion of the list to follow the approach of achievements that create specific situations using the game's mechanics, instead of requiring the player to search for hundreds of objects scattered throughout the chapters.
TRAILER OFFICIAL
FINAL THOUGHTS
The biggest problem with Marvel's Wolverine remains its pacing, especially during the first half. The excess of scenes, dialogue, and situations that interrupt the gameplay weighs heavily on an attempt to teach you how to play a simple game, and some missions, such as searching for a cellphone under the sofa or putting a record on the turntable to listen to the "perfect music," feel more like content created to increase the game's length than to develop the story or its mechanics. The voice acting is very competent in both the English and Brazilian Portuguese versions. Even so, I still disagree with the decision not to localize the characters' names for our language, an idea I have considered rather silly since Spider Man 2018. There are moments when the narrative could have been more ambitious, particularly in the development of the supporting characters and the relationship between Logan and Jean.
The experience improves significantly once we reach Japan. By this point, the game has already introduced its main mechanics, the combat is more developed, the enemies offer greater variety, and the story begins moving toward its most important moments.
The final battle is also a good way to close the campaign, especially because it brings together elements that were built throughout Logan's journey. The visual presentation remains one of the game's greatest strengths, and the depiction of Tokyo, despite its limited exploration, is among the most beautiful parts of the adventure. The portals, Rage system, adaptations, techniques, and the evolution of the combat itself make the second half work much better than the beginning, especially once the game starts letting go of the player's hand when introducing new features.
Overall, I had a lot of fun with Marvel's Wolverine. It is a game that works very well when it simply lets Logan fight and use his abilities, and it also serves as a very effective entry point for anyone who wants to get to know the character better. The story is competent, but it is not extraordinary and could have developed its characters beyond Logan much more. The combat, visuals, some of the boss battles, and the evolution of the campaign after Japan were enough to greatly improve my perception of the game. If the experience had maintained the pace it reaches during its second half throughout the entire campaign, we would probably be looking at a very different score.
SCORE: 8.3/10
Review by Gamertag: SCOULZ
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