Marvel's Wolverine review

Insomniac has made some of the most cinematic comic-based games to date.  Spider-Man 1, 2, and Miles Morales, the Ratchet & Clank series, the best Spyro titles, the awesome Resistance games, and so much more have given us 30 years of fantastic adventures, and now they’re taking a run at another beloved Marvel anti-hero – Wolverine.  It’s arguably their biggest swing yet – can they give us the fast and brutal action Wolverine is known for, but also the character depth you only get once the claws stop flying?  

Marvel’s Wolverine tells a story we’ve not seen in games to date – what happened to Logan before the X-Men? Positioned after the events of X-Men: Days of Future Past, but before the establishment of the X-Men, the game is very different from the frequently-retread origin stories we’ve played and seen time and again.  At this point, Logan has left a group called Team X and has been on his own for a few years.  When things are at their worst, Wolverine returns to the team to face the rising threat of Bolivar Trask - an anti-mutant zealot bent on destroying anyone not fully human.  Team X is composed of some very well known actors.  Victor Creed (codename Sabretooth), Raven Darkhölme (codename Mystique), and their leader, Nathaniel Essex – a celebrated physician and telepath who has dedicated his life to building a world where mutants can live free, and of course, Logan.  When the game begins, Logan is coming back to the team when Essex has been kidnapped by Trask and his goons, and Logan knows that he’s the only one that can save him from whatever Trask has in store.  

I’m not going to give a lot of detail on the storyline as Marvel’s Wolverine is a heavily cinematic title, and I don’t want to ruin where it goes or how it gets there.  I’ll touch on some elements, but I’ll do my best to keep it as spoiler free as I can.  That said, I’ll have to hit some broad strokes to talk about some characters, so bear with me. 

During the raid on the compound to rescue Essex, it becomes clear that Trask is also experimenting on mutants, though for what reason is unclear.  To that end, he has captured and is imprisoning children – something Logan isn’t going to stand for.  In freeing them, he discovers that one of them has incredible telekinetic powers. As we saw in the trailers, it turns out to be Jean Grey.  Joined up with fellow mutants Callisto and Caliban, they stand up for those who can’t fight for themselves. She convinces Logan that things might be better if he sticks around and helps Essex with his goal.  Everything from there is up to you to discover.

One of the things that is immediately clear from the game’s opening moments is that the team focused hard on the moment-to-moment combat sequences for Logan.  His attacks are fast, brutal, bloody, and can turn on a dime.  It’s clear that the team has studied great close-combat fighting games like the Arkham series, Sifu, and Sleeping Dogs, if I were to hazard a guess.  Incoming attacks can be parried and countered, or dodged.  Attacks can be interrupted mid-strike, and movements reversed.  It’s as kinetic as it is fast, and as your enemies grow in number or skills, it gets downright frantic.  Your foes are not interested in attacking one at a time, and will happily overwhelm you from multiple directions, while still more shoot you from a distance.  Let’s come back to this.

Surprisingly, Wolverine has a full levelling and skill system for Logan’s power to grow. Fighting enemies, finding collectables, and destroying various things in the environment will earn you XP.  Earn enough and you’ll go up a level, earning a point you can spend on a sequence of different attack types.  I say “sequence” as these are somewhat linear – you’ll unlock them 2-4 at a time, so you won’t be drilling deep on a particular power until you’ve hit the appropriate level to do so.  In that way, the game remains very even in its power progression, both for Logan and for his enemies.  While enemy variety starts off fairly repetitive, stick with it – you’re in for more than a few surprise appearances that mix things up nicely.  

One of the things I appreciated most about the combat in Wolverine is the boss battles.  There aren’t a lot of them, so when they show up they’re a treat instead of a constant cap for each level.  They are also puzzles in and of themselves.  Some fights are straightforward and just require impeccable timing, others need you to do some work to figure out a foe’s weakness lest you otherwise end up chipping at their health bar forever.  I didn’t die frequently in Wolverine – Logan’s healing factor saw to that, but I did get to see the loading screen a few times during boss battles.  

Combat in Wolverine feels like the best parts of their Spider-Man games, what with its ability to disengage from a target and engage with another without dropping a beat, combined with the best parts of games like the Arkham series, with blocking, countering, and parrying at a very close distance.  You can switch mid-attack, roll, dodge, counter, and more to switch things up in a way that exceeds combat in anything they’ve done before, and it flows remarkably well.  When you’ve killed enough, your rage will build up and you’ll start seeing red – that’s when the claws really start to fly.

Logan has an uncontrollable rage that simmers within him at all times.  When he’s hurt, or when he has done enough damage, that simmer turns into a boil, finally exploding in a semi-uncontrollable rage.  At this point, combat actually becomes easier, simpler, and faster.  Enemies that take any damage then have the option to be immediately destroyed with a press of both shoulder buttons to jam both claws directly into them, often eviscerating, disemboweling, or dismembering them in spectacular fashion.  Leaping from foe to foe, Logan dispatches the enemy with ease, roaring in rage the entire time.  The more you kill and destroy, the longer this rage lasts.  The longer you go without a kill, the more that rage dissipates.  It encourages and rewards aggressive combat, combining nicely with your various unlocked attacks and skills.  

There is an area that’s both side content and filler, of sorts.  Logan, as a character, has both purposefully and also forcibly had his memory altered and otherwise fractured.  Restoring those memories are a trial for him, and that’s represented in a sort of “prison of the mind” sequence called “Nightmare Trials”.  Logan can periodically find odd purple tentacles in the environment that lead to doors. Within this space is a cabin from his past, containing the memories of his lifetime.  To unlock them he must perform various tasks that mostly amount to time trials, combat trials, and speed run navigation.  Completing these unlock an artifact with a storied history tied to Logan’s past that serve as some formative moment.  Whether that sort of time-pressured content is fun for you is up to each player, but I can’t help but feel like there could have been a story-based method to provide the same story content.  

In all, Marvel’s Wolverine takes around 15 hours to complete.  The good news is that the team knows how to pace content.  Right about the time you get tired of dealing with one type of enemy, you’ll be onto the next story beat, sometimes with a small time jump in between to keep it fresh.  True to Insomniac’s pedigree, they’re also great about not shying away from Logan’s brutal and often tortured past.  Given that this is not a story we’ve explored so many times before, it’s going to bring some surprises.  You will want to complete these – there’s something you’ll want to see after the final one that I won’t spoil here.

Speaking of surprises, it shouldn’t be a huge shocker that this game is filled to bursting with fan service. They range from subtle to overt, such as a small note from Remy Labeau, or a poster of Dazzler.  Logan often has some quippy thing to say that’ll give you a chuckle, so spend the time to explore and find these – they’re worth it.  

This wouldn’t be an Insomniac game without a few vehicle chase sequences.  Unfortunately we do see a few bugs here where enemies can go through vehicles that otherwise crush your bike into dust, cars that clip through one another, and other visual anomalies.  It’s a minor thing in some otherwise awesome sequences, but it does break immersion a touch.

If there’s one area that is not in debate, it’s the audio/visual experience – this game is a FEAST.  The motion capture is magnificent, with incredible facial expressions for everyone involved.  The motion is fast and visceral, ensuring you always feel like an absolute badass – true to the animal nature of the man himself.  The expansive cutscenes are equally as impressive, if not moreso, with detail that frankly I would have expected might have exceeded the power of the PlayStation 5 Pro, had I not seen it myself.  Yes, you can choose between your Fidelity and Performance modes, just as in most of Insomniac’s games, and with equally as consistent results, but it truly is a step above even the highest highs of what they achieved with Spider-Man and Miles Morales. And just as with those two previous outings, the game loads at warp speed and does so with nary a loading screen once the action begins.

Sony has one area completely cornered, and that’s audio. Marvel’s Wolverine fully embraces the DualSense controller, not only giving you a left-right-left-right heaviness to Logan’s movements with targeted “bumps” (and other similar accents), but also occasionally gives you audio cues that give an additive quality.  For example, during one sequence I was trying to locate some missing mutants, and the DualSense’s speaker gave me an ever-loudening giggle of kids playing and other such sounds to help me find the items I was searching for to solve the sequence.  Occasional clanks and sharp metal-on-metal moments also ring out from the controller, though thankfully not enough to ever make it a nuisance.  It’s used sparingly, putting a smile on my face every time it happened.  

Beyond the controller, the sound in this game matches the out-of-this-world visuals.  During the game you’ll visit a number of places that I’ll gloss over with vague descriptions like “forest” and “city” and “interiors”.  All of these carry their own soundscapes.  The hum of machinery, the soft sounds of the forest and the creatures that reside within it, and the hustle and bustle of a busy city are all present and carefully curated.  Better still, it’s directional.  Just like the controller, it also adds to the gameplay by providing directional context to incoming attacks.  It’s not something you use directly, but something additive that gives you that momentary notice as you get the same thing visually with on-screen indicators.  It’s masterful, especially when paired with the excellent haptics of the controller itself.  

Logan has never been much of a traditional hero in any sense, but this deeper look at what makes him who he is, or more accurately who he has become, is better than any movie has ever achieved, and more than most casual fans have ever known.  Comic devotees will appreciate this look into the character’s past, as well as all of the awesome, (and occasionally hilarious) costumes.  Wolverine loves to quip "I'm the best there is at what I do, but what I do best isn't very nice”, and now Isomniac can change it up to “I’m the best at what I do, and what I’ve delivered is pretty awesome”.