‘Marvel’s Wolverine’ Game Review: Disappointing Gameplay and Wasted Potential
After 5 years in development, Insomniac Games has finally released Marvel’s Wolverine. The game is another exclusive (for now) PlayStation 5 game that takes a noticeably different approach from the studio’s iconic Spider-Man games. There is no enormous open world to explore, no side quests, no meaningful side activities, and no attempt to turn the game into another superhero open-world playground. Instead, Insomniac created a linear, cinematic action-adventure game focused on making the player feel like Wolverine. Did it work? Not entirely.
Marvel’s Wolverine has some genuinely impressive ideas, some good character work, and brutally visual combat. At the same time, it is a game that struggles to make all of those elements work together. Despite understanding the game’s protagonist extremely well, its gameplay and story do not always reach the same level as Spider-Man games. They are not even close.
[Warning: Light spoilers from Marvel’s Wolverine are below]
The story in Marvel’s Wolverine is too linear and lazily written
Marvel’s Wolverine‘s story is interesting in the beginning because Insomniac tries to use familiar parts of Logan’s story, but they create their own flashbacks, connections, and friendships. Unfortunately, the further we go, the lazier the writing seems.
This is an original adaptation of Logan, set several years before the formation of the X-Men. Three years after walking away from Team X, Logan has attempted to distance himself from the violence and responsibilities that came with being Wolverine.
That becomes impossible when Bolivar Trask, a wealthy industrialist obsessed with human superiority, begins kidnapping mutants and Essex for his own purposes. Logan is forced back into action alongside former teammates, including Mystique and Sabretooth, to save Essex. Eventually, he crosses paths with Jean Grey and becomes involved in a much larger conflict surrounding the future of mutant kind than he ever anticipated.
As we go deeper into the story, we see that this version of Logan isn’t simply a man who enjoys fighting. He is someone who has spent much of his existence trying to understand what he is, where he came from, and whether the brutality inside him defines him.
The game repeatedly returns to that conflict between Logan’s animalistic instincts and desire to retain some sense of humanity. His healing factor, claws, enhanced senses, and rage are not treated merely as cool superhero abilities. They are connected to the question whether Logan can control the person he has become and use it to help others.
The relationship with Sabretooth is especially effective because the game does not make him a villain once again. He is more of a broken friend rather than a big bad foe. There is a strange brotherly quality to their relationship, mixed with resentment, competition, and completely weird ideas about how they should live.
Mystique is another unexpected friend in the story. She understands deception and survival in a way Logan never fully can, and her ability to change identities provides unpredictable outcomes.
Jean Grey, meanwhile, represents a relationship that is built around a shared desire to protect vulnerable people, even though they approach that responsibility from very different perspectives. They are connected in more than one way, and their connection evolves throughout the story.
Unfortunately, the story does not always maintain the same level of consistency. It sometimes struggles to deliver its serious exploration of Logan’s anger, extreme violence, interesting villain, and overall idea of what the game was meant to be.
That contradiction is difficult to ignore. Logan spends a lot of time questioning what his rage means and whether he can become something better, yet the story frequently explores the idea of unleashing that rage in spectacular and extremely bloody ways. All because we only see that it is there. We don’t get to explore much about why it is there, what stands behind it, etc.
Still, the performances of Liam McIntyre give the character enough performance, strength, character, and more without turning him into another angry man without purpose.
Gameplay is some of the worst in superhero games
The most significant change from Insomniac’s Spider-Man formula is that Marvel’s Wolverine is not an open-world game. It is a primarily linear single-player action-adventure built around cinematic progression, combat encounters, stealth sequences, environmental traversal, and occasional limited exploration.
Combat is the game’s defining feature, and when it works, it is extremely satisfying, but it doesn’t happen often. Wolverine fights at close range, using his claws, fists, kicks, and mutant abilities to tear through enemies.
Attacks feel heavy, enemies react to them, and Wolverine’s healing factor becomes part of the visual identity of a character rather than something we have to look out for. The game also uses dismemberment and dynamic blood effects to make the violence feel appropriately extreme.
The Rage system is designed around the same philosophy. As Logan builds momentum during combat, he can unleash more devastating attacks that emphasize his anger. It’s too easy to use, because all you have to do is stay aggressive, close the distance, avoid being surrounded, and keep fighting.
Wolverine is at his best when he feels unstoppable for a few seconds before an enemy manages to break that rhythm. The game also includes parries, dodges, special techniques, and different enemy types that are supposed to force the player to vary their approach, but they all get repetitive after a while. The problem is that the combat can become repetitive. There are upgrades and techniques to unlock, but basic attacks are often effective enough that they can be forgotten.
Marvel’s Wolverine game rating and final thoughts
Marvel’s Wolverine is a game with a lot of wasted potential because it gets so many things right, but it doesn’t take long time for them to be forgotten or wasted. It truly never quite becomes the definitive Wolverine experience it could have been.
Insomniac has created an impressive and fresh take on Logan, supported by strong performances from Liam McIntyre, who is one of the best parts of this game, but it’s not enough. Even the character designs, new locations, and a story that understands the conflict between Wolverine’s humanity and his violent instincts are not helping.
The relationship between Logan, Sabretooth, Mystique, and Jean Grey is something we have not seen typically, so that is something cool to see. Additionally, the journey through Canada, Madripoor, Tokyo, and other locations provides enough variety to keep the adventure visually interesting. Unfortunately, we don’t get to explore more because of the game holding our hand the entire time.
The combat is spectacular when the claws first come out, and there are moments when the game delivers exactly the brutal superhero fantasy fans have been waiting for. But that same combat is also one of the game’s biggest weaknesses. The mechanics do not evolve enough to sustain the interest in the campaign, and some mechanics feel less meaningful than their presentation suggests.
In a way, the linear structure works for the cinematic storytelling, but as a game itself, it leaves no room for the kind of experimentation and variety that made Insomniac’s Spider-Man games so endlessly playable and fun. It’s almost exactly like the game plays itself, and you’re there to just smash a button once in a while, I kid you not. It may sound harsh or repetitive, but it’s true.
Marvel’s Wolverine tries to be darker, more focused on an adventure part of the game that is built around a character, rather than on making it more open for everybody. The result is an uneven, repetitive, and frustrating game about Wolverine that acts like something that was meant to look this way and to save the rights to the X-Men characters, rather than a proper project around the Marvel character.
Marvel’s Wolverine is now available to play exclusively on PlayStation 5.
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