"Face front, true believers! It's your old pal Stan 'The Man' Lee here - creator of The Amazing Spider-Man (the less said about Steve Ditko the better)!
"I'm contractually obligated to make a cameo appearance in this list of semi-obscure Spidey games, but unfortunately I'm very busy cleaning out my car - so I hope you can bear with me while I get that done. It won't be a wasted exercise, though - I'm always coming up with ideas for new characters, and a good writer can take inspiration from almost anywhere!
"Please note - this is not an exhaustive list, so please don't go whinging that Maximum Carnage, or the Mega Drive games, or whatever, aren't in it. Excelsior!"
"I'm contractually obligated to make a cameo appearance in this list of semi-obscure Spidey games, but unfortunately I'm very busy cleaning out my car - so I hope you can bear with me while I get that done. It won't be a wasted exercise, though - I'm always coming up with ideas for new characters, and a good writer can take inspiration from almost anywhere!
"Please note - this is not an exhaustive list, so please don't go whinging that Maximum Carnage, or the Mega Drive games, or whatever, aren't in it. Excelsior!"
SPIDER-MAN (Atari 2600)
I rented this - the first ever Spider-Man video game - from a shop. A shop that rented out video games. Like most Atari 2600 games, it was terribly disappointing, featuring level after level of Spider-Man scaling a building, webbing enemies who peer out of the windows, and defusing bombs. And then defusing another bomb while avoiding the Green Goblin. In other words: standard Atari 2600 stuff.
QUESTPROBE: SPIDER-MAN (Various)
Adventure International's Questprobe series comprised three graphic adventures featuring Marvel characters: The Hulk, the Fantastic Four's The Thing and the Human Torch, and this guy: Spider-Man. I recall being lured in by the gorgeous John Romita box art, which - on the Spectrum at least - promised far more than the game could deliver. A fourth game in the series was due to star the X-Men, but Adventure International went bust before it could be released. How much of a shame is that? A real big shame.
"Honestly, pals, you gotta wonder how one car can get so much trash in it! Say, this gives me an idea for a brand new super-hero. What about a guy who gets trapped in his car, and has to survive by eating all the trash in there? We could call him, I dunno, Captain Car-trash, and he could defeat bad guys by spitting the trash back at them, through a small gap in one of the windows of the car. Or maybe he builds a suit of armour out of the trash? It sounds kind of icky, I know, but they said the same thing about the one and only Spider-Man!"
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN & CAPTAIN AMERICA IN DOCTOR DOOM'S REVENGE (Various)
Doctor Doom's Revenge was an odd, side-scrolling, beat 'em up, which played like a series of boss battles against mostly second-tier Marvel super villains. The stages alternated between Spider-Man and Captain America, and - notably - included an all-new villain character designed exclusively for the game. His name? Rattan. His super-ability? He had a big stick. Made out of rattan.
REVENGE OF SHINOBI (Mega Drive)
Technically not an official Spider-Man appearance - at least, not at first - but a familiar-looking, web-slinging, wall-crawling, character appeared as a boss in Sega's peerless Revenge of Shinobi (along with a scarcely-disguised Batman). After copyright claims, Batman was changed in a later re-release to a sort of winged demon thing, while Spider-Man was allowed to stay, now acknowledged with a copyright notice from Marvel Comics.
"Glad you could join me again, friends. I've thought up a theme song for Captain Car-Trash. Brace yourselves, true believers, for a new epoch of super-heroic adventuring:
Captain Car-Trash, Captain Car-Trash,
Lives in a car and made a suit of armour out of car-trash,
Spits trash at bad guys through a small crack,
He remembers a time when he had lots more good ideas than this,
Captain Car-Trash, Captain Car-Trash!
I'm going to sell this idea to Nah-na-na-na-na-na-na-nah-netttttfliiix!"
Captain Car-Trash, Captain Car-Trash,
Lives in a car and made a suit of armour out of car-trash,
Spits trash at bad guys through a small crack,
He remembers a time when he had lots more good ideas than this,
Captain Car-Trash, Captain Car-Trash!
I'm going to sell this idea to Nah-na-na-na-na-na-na-nah-netttttfliiix!"
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (Game Boy)
This first Spider title on the Game Boy was pretty standard Spider-Man-y stuff - some of the levels even resembled the character's debut video game on the Atari 2600. What is interesting is that it was developed by Rare, during the company's wilderness years, when it was flailing around for some sort of post-ZX Spectrum identity. The best thing about it was the soundtrack, created by David "Donkey Kong Country" Wise.
"Of course, all great super-heroes need a cast of supporting characters, and Captain Car-Trash is no different... starting with the love of his life, a girl who's trapped in the car next to him. He doesn't even know her name! Will they ever get it together? Not if Captain Car-Trash's arch-nemesis, The Traffic Warden, has anything to say about it. Watch out, Traffy - he's going to ticket you!!"
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: LETHAL FOES (Super Famicom)
A Japan-only title, Lethal Foes was relatively unremarkable, save for the fact that it was compatible with the Barcode Battler II. Connect it to the Famicom via the Barcode Battler interface, and by scanning barcodes you'd be able to unlock additional content. What content? I dunno. Who even cares at this point?
SPIDER-MAN: THE VIDEO GAME (Arcade)
Spider-Man: The Video Game was a weird mix of platformer and beat 'em up - it'd alternate between standard side-scrolling fighting game, and then zoom out for a wider view of the level for a platforming battle against a super-sized boss. There were another three playable characters in addition to Spidey: Black Cat, Hawkeye, and - oddly - Namor the Submariner, a man who runs around in his pants. Developed by Sega, it reused elements of the soundtrack from the company's similarly four-player arcade game Quartet.
SPIDER-MAN CARTOON MAKER
Using backdrops and animated elements, and sound, from Spider-Man: The Animated Series, the Cartoon Maker was a CD-ROM utility which - yes - would let you create your own cartoons. Nicely, you could add speech bubbles to the characters, allowing them to say whatever you wanted (see above).
"You're probably wondering how I could possibly sustain a series of comics starring a hero who never leaves his car. Let me tell you, friends, such is the power of imagination that Captain Car-Trash has all of his adventures inside his own head!"
SPIDER-MAN: WEB OF FIRE (32X)
Web of Fire holds the dubious honour of being the final game released for Sega's ill-fated 32X - after Sega's announcement that it would no longer be supporting the Mega Drive add-on. It's standard mid-era Spider-Man stuff - lots of side-scrolling punching and swinging - and did little to convince that the 32X was anything other than Sega's biggest mess-up.
SPIDER-MAN: FRIEND OR FOE (Various)
There have been some great 3D Spider-Man games. Friend or Foe is not one of them. For some reason, it attempts to be a sequel to the Sam Raimi's three Spider-Man movies, albeit aimed at a younger audience.
It had an international feel - there were levels set in Nepal, Tokyo and Egypt - and was beset with a cartoonish, tongue-in-cheek, sense of humour. It was a bit like a proto-version of the Lego games - not least in the camera angle, which disappointed anyone who'd played the brilliant, free-roaming, Spider-Man 2, released three years earlier.
It had an international feel - there were levels set in Nepal, Tokyo and Egypt - and was beset with a cartoonish, tongue-in-cheek, sense of humour. It was a bit like a proto-version of the Lego games - not least in the camera angle, which disappointed anyone who'd played the brilliant, free-roaming, Spider-Man 2, released three years earlier.
"I just fell over and wet my pants!"
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