Pros: Nice graphics and animation
Cons: Clunky controls, lame gameplay
The bottom line: There's much better Spidey games out there.
Spider-Man: Battle for New York is a run of the mill action platformer for the GBA. It gives the impression that it was a rushed released because there are some kinks that should have been worked out. Spidey fans might get a kick out of being able to play the Green Goblin, but there are a lot better games out there.

The game begins with a lab experiment where Mr. Osborn is turned into the Green Goblin, then you get to control him through some ‘rampage’ levels where you get to beat up people, smash cars, light stuff on fire with your fireballs, and so on. From there, the game alternates where you play Spidey or the Goblin, with each one having different abilities. The gameplay is pretty unoriginal in that you just run around between levels beating up people and finding objects. This type of game has been around for a couple of decades now.

I thought this game had a very unfinished feeling to it, especially with the control system. This is one of those fighting games where you can stand on top of an enemy and both of you can punch and nothing happens. I also found myself running back and forth a lot just to find my way around the mazelike platform levels, and that really isn’t much fun. Additionally, there’s a constant onslaught of annoying enemies who often hit you before you get close enough to hit them.

Graphically, I thought this game looked pretty good. The animation is very well-detailed and the characters all have a comic book look to them, even with the black outlines. Character movement is articulated with a few frames of animation, so things move very smoothly. The levels themselves are nothing to brag about, what with all the climbing up and down and inconveniently placed walls that block your way.

The sound in this game is almost not there. While preparing this review, I actually had to stop and remember if I even heard any sounds. There was a little bit of music, but nothing special. The in-game sound effects consist mostly of repetitive punch and kick sounds that you’ll eventually tune out after the first few times.

In the end, there’s just not much to Spider-Man: Battle for New York. It’s a very cookie cutter game that cashes in on a brand name instead of delivering a quality product. You could take this same gameplay and change the graphics and call it something else. There’s just nothing new here, and what you get might have been fun if you hadn’t already played this kind of game a million times before.