Marvel's Spider-Man is a 2018 action-adventure game developed by Insomniac Games and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Based on the Marvel Comics superhero Spider-Man, it is inspired by the long-running comic book mythology and adaptations in other media. In the main storyline, the super-human crime lord Mr. Negative orchestrates a plot to seize control of New York City's criminal underworld. When Mr. Negative threatens to release a deadly virus, Spider-Man must confront him and protect the city while dealing with the personal problems of his civilian persona, Peter Parker.Gameplay is presented from the third-person perspective with a primary focus on Spider-Man's traversal and combat abilities. Spider-Man can freely move around New York City, interacting with characters, undertaking missions, and unlocking new gadgets and suits by progressing through the main story or completing tasks. Outside the story, the player is able to complete side missions to unlock additional content and collectible items. Combat focuses on chaining attacks together, and using the environment and webs to incapacitate numerous foes while avoiding damage.Development of Spider-Man, the first licensed game by Insomniac in its then-22 year history, began in 2014 and took approximately four years. Insomniac was given the choice of using any character from Marvel's catalogue to work on; Spider-Man was chosen both for his appeal to the employees and the similarities in traversal gameplay to their previous game Sunset Overdrive (2014). The game design took inspiration from the history of Spider-Man across all media but Marvel Comics and Insomniac wanted to tell a story that was not linked to an existing property, creating a unique universe (known as Earth-1048) that has since appeared in novels, merchandise, and comics.Spider-Man was released for the PlayStation 4 video game console on September 7, 2018. The game received praise for its narrative, characterization, combat, and web-swinging traversal mechanics, although some criticized its open-world design for lacking innovation. A number of reviewers called it one of the best superhero games ever made, some comparing it favorably to the Batman: Arkham series. Spider-Man became one of the fastest-selling games of the year, one of the bestselling PlayStation 4 games of all time, and the fastest-selling superhero game in the United States. Spider-Man was followed by a story-based, three-part downloadable content, Spider-Man: The City that Never Sleeps, which was released monthly from October to December 2018.