I’ve been a Wolverine fan since long before the movies made him a household name, and I can count on one hand the games that have actually done the character justice. Marvel’s Wolverine just joined that list. Insomniac did such a great job with Spider-Man across their last few games that expectations for their take on Logan were always going to be impossibly high. In reality, Logan is a very different proposition to a graceful web-slinger. Rather than reskin its own formula, the studio has made the most brutal game it has ever shipped, and somehow one of its most heartfelt.
In many ways it nails what makes the character work. The violence, the tragedy, the sheer stubbornness and refusal to die, wrapping it all in an engaging story with satisfying combat, slick visuals and excellent pacing. It’s not flawless, and I’ll get to where it stumbles, but this is easily the best Wolverine game yet made.
A Logan Worth the Wait
Before anything else, some housekeeping – this Wolverine is not Hugh Jackman. The 5’11” Australian has owned the role for over a quarter of a century, and for fans of a certain generation Jackman IS Logan. But Insomniac’s take is based firmly on the comics, and once you make peace with that, the game is better for it. This is the short, hairy, savage, deeply sad Logan of the page – a man who is functionally immortal and has to live with what that means. Aussie Liam McIntyre is excellent in the role, delivering a performance that carries the weight of that contradiction without ever losing the heart that makes Logan likeable.
The story follows Logan as he attempts to recover the memories he has lost, with the help of Nathaniel Essex aka Mister Sinister to the comic-literate, who is assembling a group of hero mutants. Along for the ride are Mystique and Sabretooth who are all up against Bolivar Trask and his mutant-elimination agenda. Jean Grey arrives a few chapters in, and the Logan-Jean relationship gives the whole thing a beating heart.
If you know these characters you’ll see some of the twists coming, but the pacing is Uncharted-tier – cinematic, globetrotting, always moving – and my roughly 18-hour playthrough flew by. I finished it wanting more, which is a rare thing to say about a AAA game. When the credits role, there is no open world, no side missions to explore, you can replay the entire thing again and get all of those collectible you missed but it is just a replay of the game.
The Best Combat Insomniac Has Built
As you’d expect, combat is the heart of the game, and it’s here that Wolverine truly excels. We’re talking claws through eyeballs, limbs leaving bodies, and gore physics that at least one country’s ratings board presumably had a long meeting about – and it feels incredible. Where Spider-Man was calm and peaceful, swinging through the city without a care in the world, Wolverine made me feel like an unstoppable force of nature.
The healing factor quietly flips the entire action-game script. Most games train you to never get hit; Wolverine’s whole deal is that getting hit is Tuesday. You’re not a dodging, rolling jumper – you’re a wading-in brawler who trades wounds, because the wounds close. When the game leans into that, it’s the best-feeling thing Insomniac has made since the first Spider-Man.
That said, a block and parry system becomes increasingly important in the later parts of the game as enemies grow more mechanical, and you can unlock additional moves and combos that let you clear rooms faster. The scent trail – Logan’s sense of smell visualised as a glowing path when tracking Jean and others – is a character mechanic first and a navigation aid second. It’s used a touch too generously in the back half for my liking, but a post-launch patch has already made it less intrusive, and I’d still take it over a game too scared to reference the character’s signature sense.
The Linear Problem
Wolverine is linear where Spider-Man was open, and that costs it replay value, this is a one-and-done rollercoaster, not a playground. The enemy variety is thin in the back half, where you’ll fight the same mechanical archetypes with slightly different hats, and boss fights are surprisingly sparse for a game about a man whose entire genre is punching monsters. The Team X premise is also only partially explored; there’s a richer game in here scratching to get out, and this could be explored in future games acting as prequels exploring the Team X dynamic. For what it’s worth both Mystique and Sabretooth are incredibly layered and I would love to spend a lot more time with them.
Is it Insomniac’s best work? No, that title still belongs to the webhead, and possibly always will. But “not the studio’s best” is a bar so high it needs supplemental oxygen, and Wolverine clears every bar that actually matters.
Final Thoughts
Marvel’s Wolverine fights through its flaws with the determination and grit of Logan himself, resting on an engaging, comic-accurate story, a superb lead performance from Liam McIntyre, and the most satisfying combat the studio has ever built. It might not reinvent the wheel, but it doesn’t need to – I finished it, immediately wanted to start it again, and that’s the highest compliment I can give to this game. Fans of the film series may struggle with the comic book accuracy of the character in the game, but if you allow yourself to dive into the incredible story on show here, you will have a great time.
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