Spider-Man 2 Launches with Mixed Steam Reviews Due to PC Performance Issues

The much-anticipated PC release of Spider-Man 2, developed by Nixxes, has encountered a rocky start, reflected in its 'mixed' user review rating on Steam. Despite initial optimism about the game's performance based on its system requirements, many players are reporting significant technical issues. Currently, only 55% of the reviews on Steam are positive, highlighting widespread dissatisfaction among the gaming community.

Players equipped with high-end hardware, such as those with an RTX 4090 and the latest Nvidia drivers (5.66.36), are experiencing frequent crashes. One user lamented, "Despite having a high-end GPU and running the latest Nvidia drivers, the game frequently crashes." Another player found the game "completely unplayable on PC," citing crashes every five minutes and has already requested a refund.

The severity of the issues has led some reviewers to advise caution. "Hold off on buying until they get a couple of stabilization patches out because holy hell," one reviewer warned. They described the game's state as "rough," pointing out problems like lighting not loading in cutscenes, scenes running at seconds-per-frame, audio desynchronization, freezing, stuttering, and a host of other performance issues. Frustrated, this player decided to seek a refund, stating, "I'm gonna get a refund for now because frankly, there's other stuff I could use $70 for right now."

The primary issue seems to be related to the game's graphics controller, which crashes frequently, even on higher-end PCs. One error message reported by a user reads, "A problem has occurred with your display driver. This can be caused by out of date drivers, using game settings higher than your GPU can handle, an overheating GPU, or an error with the game. Please try updating your graphics drivers, or lowering your in-game settings."

Additional complaints include malfunctioning features like DLSS and ray tracing, long loading times, missing textures, and audio issues. Some players have also reported performance stuttering after several hours of gameplay, which can lead to hard crashes, with suspicions pointing towards a possible memory leak.

In response, Nixxes has acknowledged the issues on the Steam forums, advising affected users to consult the troubleshooting guides on the Nixxes Support website and to submit logs and crash dumps for further assistance. They have also identified a specific bug during photo-op missions in Spider-Man 2, which can occur at very low frame rates (below 20 FPS). As a temporary solution, they suggest lowering graphics settings or resolution to bypass this issue.