Legitimately it is somewhat surprising controversy has already sprung up for Spider-Man: Miles Morales as Sony appears to be at odds with itself over what precisely the company is making. In a paywalled Telegraph article transcribed by Video Game Chronicle. EVP head of European Business, Simon Rutter, goes on record saying the game will be an enhanced version of the original title. Essentially an expansion tacked ontop of a remaster.
“more akin to an expansion bolted on to an upgraded version of the original title.”
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“I guess you could call it an expansion and an enhancement to the previous game.”
“There’s a substantial Miles Morales component – which is the expansion element – but also within the game as well there’s been major enhancements to the game and the game engine, obviously deploying some of the major PlayStation 5 technology and features.”
Later in the day, Insomniac themselves and through Jason Schreier stated the game would be a stand-alone expansion similar in scope to Uncharted: Lost Legacy. An ironic comparison considering they both have taken on sociopolitical agendas and Lost Legacy commercially flopped selling only 48,000 digitally within the first five weeks while only ranking 4th in its launch week in Japan. Perhaps Insomniac should make a better comparison less they wish to invite the obvious parallels between the two.
Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales is the next adventure in the Marvel’s Spider-Man universe. We will reveal more about this standalone game at a future date. #MilesMoralesPS5 pic.twitter.com/GOTAvNhUaF
— Insomniac Games (@insomniacgames) June 12, 2020
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NEWS: Spider-Man Miles Morales is *not* an expansion or enhancement or remaster, despite a Sony executive’s comments this morning, a source tells Bloomberg News. Nor is it Spider-Man 2. It is a brand-new, standalone game similar in scope to Uncharted Lost Legacy.
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) June 12, 2020
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I’ve seen some weird theories floating around, so just to clear something up, Miles Morales was always a smaller-scale standalone game. Sony probably should have said that last night, but the main cause for confusion here is a Sony exec’s erroneous comments
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) June 12, 2020
What the counter-narrative boils down to is, in essence, the employees saying their boss is wrong on the scope of the project in question. Given Simon Rutter is the Head of European business, it is doubtful that he misspoke or was in some way mistaken about what his company was producing. It is his job to know what Spider-Man: Miles Morales is after all.
Schreier’s sources are the very same employees saying their boss is wrong. That instead of being an addition to a remake or upgraded Spider-Man game, this game will be a stand-alone expansion similar to Uncharted: Lost Legacy. A game, that on the easiest difficulty took between 4-5 hours to complete and between 10-11 on Crushing difficulty. With 7 hours being the average according to How Long to Beat.
That is not an inspiring length for a game. Some might be keen to wonder why Miles Morales wasn’t worth his own full-length game or at the very least the cherry on top of a remastered Spider-man for the PS5. After all, Sony has fully committed to black lives matter. By their own definition, this would qualify not only as a contradiction, but outright racism and discrimination against black people.
Of course, that’s absurd as the length of a game is no reflection on a company’s position and attitudes towards race. Yet that is the rational standard, not the Black Lives Matter standard and as Rules for Radicals aptly says, you make them live by their own standard. It’ll be fun to watch when the mob realizes the inherent contradiction between Insomniac and Sony’s statements and their actions. In the meantime, we will have to wait to see whether the employees or the boss is mistaken on the scope of the game.
