TL;DR: Marvel’s Wolverine nails Logan, the brutality and the SNIKT-powered fantasy, but repetitive combat and conservative design eventually dull those adamantium claws. Great Wolverine; merely decent Wolverine game.

Marvel’s Wolverine has a wonderfully uncomplicated opening pitch: give Logan six adamantium claws, surround him with people making spectacularly poor decisions, and let physics handle the paperwork. Insomniac Games certainly hasn’t confused Wolverine with Spider-Man. Enemies are stabbed, sliced and separated from limbs with enough enthusiasm to make “non-lethal takedown” sound like something Peter Parker invented to annoy him. The combat initially feels fantastic, the violence is gloriously excessive, and this is one of the most convincing videogame interpretations of Wolverine yet.

The surprise is that Logan himself is far more interesting than the carnage. Beneath the SNIKT-powered chaos is a story about a damaged man struggling with his past, his instincts and whether he can ever become more than the weapon people expect him to be. Liam McIntyre brings genuine vulnerability to Wolverine without softening his intimidating presence, and that emotional complexity carries a campaign whose gameplay doesn’t always evolve alongside its hero. The claws stay sharp; unfortunately, the experience surrounding them gradually gets duller.

Wolverine is the best thing about Wolverine

The story begins decades after James “Logan” Howlett encountered Nathaniel Essex and joined his mutant community and Team X. Reports of missing mutants eventually put scientist Bolivar Trask in Logan’s sights, sending him across multiple locations while dragging pieces of his past back into the present. The wider superhero plot has some predictable beats, but Wolverine works best when it stops worrying about the next big threat and simply lets Logan interact with people who know exactly what hides beneath all that hair and rage.

McIntyre is excellent at balancing Logan’s aggression with exhaustion, regret and surprising tenderness. His relationships with Mystique, Victor “Sabretooth” Creed and particularly Jean Grey bring out different sides of him, with Krizia Bajos giving Jean enough warmth and emotional authority to become one of the campaign’s strongest characters. Insomniac’s animation deserves credit too: Logan can look emotionally crushed one minute and become an ambulatory workplace-safety violation the next. It’s a shame several supporting characters aren’t developed nearly as thoroughly, because the quieter character work is frequently stronger than the larger superhero narrative.

SNIKT first, ask questions never

Thankfully, playing Wolverine feels immediately right. Quick and heavy attacks combine with dodges, parries and special abilities, while Logan can launch himself towards distant enemies and instantly turn their personal space into his personal space. Aggression builds rage and Wolverine’s healing factor restores health during combat, meaning there is no awkward superhero treasure hunt for conveniently abandoned medical kits. Logan is basically his own health pack, which feels considerably more appropriate.

The violence is spectacularly over-the-top. Finishers involve dismemberment, impalement and enough anatomical rearrangement to make Mortal Kombat nod approvingly from across the room, while tandem attacks involving allies add cinematic flair. Insomniac’s animation and camerawork make Logan look terrifyingly efficient when everything flows together. At its best, controlling Wolverine feels less like traditional superhero combat and more like somebody accidentally dropped an angry blender into a mercenary convention.

The problem is everything starts feeling familiar

The combat foundation is excellent, but Marvel’s Wolverine reveals too much of it too early. Skills and special abilities expand Logan’s options, yet progression rarely changes how I approached encounters in a meaningful way. Several hours in, I was still lunging towards enemies, parrying attacks, unleashing abilities and carving through whoever remained. It still looked fantastic, but spectacle can only disguise repetition for so long.

Enemy variety helps without completely solving the problem. Trask’s forces, members of The Hand, ranged attackers and heavier enemies demand slightly different priorities, and mixed groups can produce entertaining chaos. But many variations ultimately ask for familiar responses: attack more, parry more or quickly murder the annoying person shooting from across the room. Wolverine desperately needed enemies and abilities that forced me to rethink my habits rather than simply become better at repeating them.

Logan deserves better playgrounds

Encounter design makes that repetition harder to ignore. Missions regularly funnel Logan through linear environments before opening into arenas where melee fighters occupy the ground and ranged enemies attack from elevated positions. Wolverine’s speed makes bouncing between targets satisfying, but after seeing similar arrangements repeatedly, I started recognising the choreography before the music had even started.

That’s particularly frustrating because Logan is surprisingly agile. A spectacular chase through Tokyo’s rooftops and neon streets shows how exciting Wolverine can become when traversal, cinematic spectacle and aggression collide. Unfortunately, these sequences are relatively uncommon and heavily scripted. Insomniac doesn’t need to turn Wolverine into Spider-Man with anger-management issues, but more mechanically interesting spaces could have made much better use of his mobility.

Exploration needed sharper claws

I’m completely fine with Marvel’s Wolverine being linear. Logan doesn’t need an enormous map containing 74 icons, six radio towers and somebody asking him to collect backpacks. A focused structure actually suits this more personal story, but smaller environments need meaningful interaction to compensate for losing open-world freedom.

Instead, exploration frequently means following Wolverine’s enhanced senses, finding whisky bottles or material caches and pressing triangle. An early sequence involving Leech illustrates the missed opportunity perfectly: Logan gathers drawings containing clues to a password, only to solve the deduction himself. Excuse me, Logan, I collected the crayons. Let me do something. More investigation using his senses, environmental puzzles or meaningful traversal would have given the campaign a much-needed middle ground between murder and walking slowly around rooms.

Nightmare trials and Wolverine fashion week

Optional nightmare trials offer a better distraction by combining combat and movement challenges, with a gauntlet variant introducing modifiers between waves. There is a light roguelike flavour to proceedings because apparently every PlayStation protagonist must eventually encounter one. At least these challenges reward players with memories from Logan’s past, connecting optional content back to his character rather than simply filling another progress bar.

Cosmetics are another highlight, particularly for comic fans. More than 30 suits and claws can be unlocked and combined, pulling from different parts of Wolverine’s history and giving players plenty of opportunities to create their preferred Logan. Is meticulously coordinating Wolverine’s costume with his claws important while mutants are disappearing? Absolutely not. Did I appreciate that the option exists? Absolutely yes.

Bosses should have been the ultimate test

Boss encounters occasionally provide the variety normal combat lacks. Omega Red puts greater emphasis on timing, parries and staggering, creating a more deliberate duel than the standard arena encounters, while the final battle delivers the expected superhero spectacle and makes good use of Logan’s established abilities. These fights show how well the combat can work when Wolverine is given something more substantial to chew through.

Unfortunately, the quality isn’t consistent, and there aren’t enough bosses overall. A Sentinel confrontation becomes an extended exercise in attacking part of the machine while much of the enormous enemy remains beyond the arena, which feels strangely old-fashioned. Wolverine versus Sentinel should resemble an insurance company’s worst nightmare, not a boss encounter accidentally teleported in from the early 2000s.

A gorgeous world covered in blood

Visually, Marvel’s Wolverine has the blockbuster polish expected from Insomniac. Its globe-spanning locations can be gorgeous, particularly when colourful environments and dramatic lighting replace the more forgettable caves, facilities and corridors. Character animation is even better, helping Logan’s personality come through during both intimate conversations and spectacular acts of violence.

I also appreciate the restraint shown with the wider mutant universe. Familiar characters appear without turning Logan into a supporting actor in his own adventure, and the story remains personal despite the larger threat surrounding it. Marvel’s Wolverine clearly wants to establish a broader corner of Insomniac’s Marvel universe, but thankfully it doesn’t spend fifteen hours dangling cameos in front of the camera like shiny mutant keys.

Verdict

Marvel’s Wolverine absolutely understands Wolverine. Liam McIntyre delivers a layered Logan, the quieter relationships give the story genuine emotional weight, and when those claws come out, Insomniac finally lets adamantium behave like adamantium. Combat is responsive, vicious and initially tremendous fun, while the animations make every encounter look like Wolverine has declared personal war on the human skeleton.

Unfortunately, the game surrounding him doesn’t evolve enough. Repetitive encounters, modest combat progression, limited exploration and inconsistent boss battles gradually expose how conservative the underlying design can be. Wolverine fans should still enjoy this mature, beautifully presented interpretation of Logan, but I wanted the campaign to develop with the same confidence as its protagonist. Great Wolverine, decent game. Logan deserves another outing — preferably one where the gameplay has claws as sharp as his.