Alien Spidy Preview: The Cutest and Most Likable Spidy Ever

Alien Spidy Preview: The Cutest and Most Likable Spidy Ever

Alien Spidy
Platform: XBLA, PSN, PC
Publisher: Kalypso Media
Game Type: Action/Platforming

Alien Spidy is probably my favorite spidy ever and by far the best looking spidy. There is no ugliness about this little guy. Alien Spidy is an action/platform title that will be made available later this year on the Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network, PC and Mac. I recently had the opportunity to get some hands-on with a preview build of this game and so far, I find myself impressed by what is being done with this upcoming arcade title. My opinions are based strictly off a preview build and not the final game.

This game is a hardcore fast paced platforming title that forces the player into learning perfection, well, only if you want a high score. You play as spidy and use his spidy abilities to spring a web and swing through the levels. You’ll also come across special items that allow you to go under water in a bubble or to jump high over other obstacles. As you progress through each level you’ll be collecting coins and putting together scoring streaks – the more coins you collect in a row, the higher your score will be. A high score is what this game is all about and you are graded on your overall performance. You’ll want to do the best you can to get through a level as quickly as possible. You’ll lose points if you take too much time and you’ll certainly lose points when you die. I say certainly because you’ll probably die, and die a lot.

Alien Spidy Teaser Trailer

The challenge I had in this demo was absolutely brutal at times. While yeah, the game still remained fun, there were moments in the game where I wanted to throw my controller – not really, but it certainly got frustrating. It gave me a great challenge and the game pretty much knows that you are going to fail a lot. The fact that the game counts the number of respawns and that you get negative points for doing so, shows that it’s going to happen a lot. The trick, of course, is going to be challenging yourself to perfect a level and get the highest score possible to have on your online leaderboards. They say it’s easy to pick up and play, and that certainly is the case. It’s a nice theme that has a lot going for it, but you are going to be in for quite the challenge.

The good thing about such a difficult and challenging game is that the more you play, the better you will get. Thankfully, the game seems to have an addictive quality that kept bringing me back for more and wanting to get better at some of my favorite levels that I got to demo. I had one level where I respawned 108 times… 108 times! It took me just over 11 minutes to finally complete it. I clearly had a difficult time in one section of the game and I wonder if it will be just me that struggles in that area or if everyone will have that same difficulty. That is exactly what could end up being so great about this game, that everyone should have a varied experience where one person will do well in a specific area while the other does not. This could make the challenge on the leaderboards far more fun than usual because there are many areas that will challenge you in different ways. It will also provide those who perfect the game, if that is even possible, a deserving spot on top of the leaderboards. The scoring system and gameplay look to be a winner – I can only hope that is the case in the final build.

Alien Spidy is definitely a game to keep an eye out for, especially for hardcore platforming fans. When this game releases, you’ll have a difficult challenge ahead of you, but it certainly has the opportunity to be a great one. If you are challenging friends to a high score and you crush their score, you’ll have every reason to brag about that because crushing a high score in this game will be an impressive accomplishment for you – that’s how challenging this game looks to be. You should be on the lookout for 69 unique levels while overcoming a range of various enemies and bosses.

This spidy has promise.