Marvel's Wolverine Review: Insomniac's Bloody, Nuanced Take on Logan
Insomniac Games delivers a brutal, character-driven Wolverine adventure with standout performances and satisfying combat, though the action wears thin over time.
Insomniac Games has traded Spider-Man's web-slinging for adamantium claws, and the result is a Wolverine adventure that leans heavily into bloodshed and surprisingly nuanced character work. Marvel's Wolverine, released for PlayStation 5, puts players in control of James «Logan» Howlett as he investigates reports of missing mutants, a mission that sends him across the globe and into confrontations with old allies and enemies alike.
The game opens a few decades after Logan first met Nathaniel Essex and was taken into his mutant community, where he became a crucial member of Team X. Already an experienced hero, Logan is sent to investigate scientist Bolivar Trask amid reports of missing mutants. The story hops around the world, taking him to new places rife with danger and old haunts that stir up buried memories. It is standard superhero fare, with a couple of predictable turns and some genuinely fun moments in its closing hours, but the narrative struggles to tell its story effectively through the action within missions, reserving real moments of consequence for the cutscenes that bookend them.
That uneven cadence — joltingly stopping and starting rather than flowing gracefully — is one of the game's more noticeable flaws. Yet the character work at the center largely compensates. Liam McIntyre's performance grants Logan a personality to match his trademark blades: a sharp, surprising hidden depth housed in a bulky, blunt instrument of a body. He delicately balances the shadows of his past with the future of mutantkind, all while managing his Jekyll and Hyde nature as animal instincts sometimes break through the compassion he strives to show.
That emotion comes through not just in his voice but in how he has been designed and animated. He moves around social spaces with a hunched back that reflects a vulnerability clashing with his biological makeup — a physical manifestation of a dark past weighing him down. It is a microcosm of Insomniac's detailed rendition of Wolverine, which has instantly become one of the more memorable depictions of the character.
The supporting cast adds further texture. Reflective moments in a Madripoor bar with Mystique, a snowy cabin rendezvous with Jean Grey, and the tension between Logan and Victor «Sabretooth» Creed stand out. Krizia Bajos is particularly fantastic as Grey, anchoring much of the emotional weight of Wolverine's tale and often preventing it from veering into run-of-the-mill comic book storytelling. It is a shame, then, that outside of Logan and Jean, few other characters are given room for their own arcs to develop. They have little to do outside of briefly crossing Wolverine to hinder him or offering him a few words of wisdom from the other side of a bar.
Combat is where the game initially shines. Wolverine's basic attacks are well-honed tools that sink smoothly into flesh and steel alike, with devastating combos delivered through rapid presses of the square and triangle buttons. It is incredibly responsive action, with modern staples like dodges, parries, and special attacks to tear through each enemy. The system is not complex and is ultimately quite forgiving. A quick press of triangle makes Logan leap to an enemy within range, and the more you stay on the front foot, the quicker your rage bar fills up, allowing for critical hits to rip through foes with ease and the safety blanket of a revive in your back pocket.
His healing factor also means he regenerates over time while in combat — a smart, lore-appropriate decision that means you never have to scramble around arenas in search of health packs. The animation work is outstanding throughout. It really feels like after years of making sure Spider-Man did not let anyone fall to their death, Insomniac has reveled in all the ways Wolverine can end someone's life. Brutal finishers, from sliced-up limbs to stabs up through jaws, are employed for a variety of gory outcomes.
Yet for all its visceral appeal, the combat wears thin well before the conclusion. The initially slick and satisfying action lacks the depth to sustain its lengthy campaign, and the story is tasked with doing most of the heavy lifting. Even that solid character work cannot quite carry the weight it needs to. Marvel's Wolverine, much like its lead, is built on a firm skeleton, but what is crafted around it is not nearly as strong. It is a game that understands who Wolverine is — a sharp, surprising hidden depth housed in a blunt instrument — but struggles to build a consistently engaging experience around that understanding.
