The PlayStation 5 isn’t out here in the UK until Thursday, November 19. I’m waiting for mine to come in the post, but until then I’m just getting really confused about what’s going on with Marvel’s Spider-Man. Sure, I’d love to play the game on the PlayStation 5, but there’s a new standalone expansion with Miles Morales, and then there’s a remastered version of the base game as well. How does it all work? I don’t think anyone actually knows, but here I’m going to try to explain it to you in a way that makes sense. What I will say before I start is that this is the most convoluted way Sony could have done things, it’s also clearly all about money. Which is pretty gross of them.
Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales is a standalone game. You can buy this for PlayStation 4 or PlayStation 5. If you buy the PlayStation 4 version, you can upgrade to the PlayStation 5 version for free. That’s the only free Spide-rMan upgrade we’re getting within Sony’s ecosystem though.
There is also a product called Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales Ultimate Edition. This packs together the Miles Morales expansion as well as the original game for PlayStation 5. In this instance, this will be Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered. Buying this for PlayStation 5 gives you both games on the console in one neat little package. Not confusing at all right?
Well here’s where it does get confusing. If you buy Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales for PlayStation 4, you have to pay to upgrade the Ultimate Edition on PlayStation 5. This will get you Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered. If you only own Marvel’s Spider-Man, there’s no free upgrade for the remastered version.
This is where things get a little nasty. Sony has made it impossible to enjoy the PlayStation 5 version of Marvel’s Spider-Man. All the content upgrades are locked into the remastered version, which you have to pay for. If, like me, you own the base game on PlayStation 4, no matter how you look at it, you’re buying it again for PlayStation 5. If we want a better-looking version of the game, we have to fork out for it again.
This is insane when you consider that most other PlayStation 4 games get an upgrade to PlayStation 5 for free. From what I can tell, Sony has made this remastered version a reality in order to capitalise on sales. I think we all see through that though. Only time will tell how good the sales are.