As a nod to fans, Marvel's Spider-Man's PlayStation 5 remaster has recreated the 2018 game’s infamous, boat-sailing monstrosities in loving detail. Insomniac Game’s Spider-Man released two years ago as a wonderfully detailed, beautiful game, which is why fans freaked out when they stumbled upon some of the most repulsive NPCs known to modern gaming. The objectively unimportant background characters were never meant to be seen, but gamers found a way and circulated the model’s distorted images across the internet, resulting in a kind of inside joke for the game’s fans.
Reactions to the PS5’s Spider-Man: Remastered have been all over the place leading up to the game’s launch. Many were upset that Peter Parker had undergoing some major cosmetic surgery. According to Insomniac, the Peter Parker that had become familiar to fans in the 2018 version of the game needed to be redesigned to better fit the team’s vision. The studio explained the change by saying the new facial model would more closely match the voice actor. There has also been a lot of concern about the how game was making the jump to the next generation of consoles. At least one of those concerns was address when the studio recently detailed how fans could transfer saves from the PlayStation 4 version of the game to the remaster.
Thankfully, or maybe unfortunately, not everything from the original game is changing in the PS5 Spider-Man remaster. IGN delved into the return to the nightmarish, boating NPCs in all their poorly rendered glory. Apparently, the characters look even more startling in the remaster than in the 2018 game just by virtue of the game’s boosted visuals. The enhanced lighting features, the article explains, cause the figures to “look even more gruesome.” The developer has also snuck in a little extra joke just for fans. One of the misshapen humanoids has a sticky note stuck to its shirt which asks the reader whether they missed the creepy NPCs. It is unclear whether a reference like this has made its way to Spider-Man: Miles Morales or whether it was a special nod just for the original game.
Though it may or may not get boat-sailing homunculi, Spider-Man: Miles Morales has its own secrets for fans, like a statue in honor of Stan Lee. Creator of some of the best-known comic book heroes of all time, the recently deceased Stan Lee made a cameo in Insomniac’s 2018 game and his likeness is now memorialized in Spider-Man: Miles Morales.
The wild-looking sailors are such a fun Easter egg for Insomniac to include in the PS5 remaster of Marvel's Spider-Man, especially considering its potentially limited audience. To get the joke, a player would have to be fairly tuned into not only the original game, but also the discourse surrounding it. But for those who do recognize these horrible figures and know the game’s history, it is a nice treat.
Source: IGN