The gameplay is pretty straightforward and something that young and old will be able to easily grasp within five to ten minutes of play. You have your basic skills like throws, melee attacks, and jumping. Then each character has at least two special attacks they can use. For the bigger guys this usually involves some kind of Hulk style ground pounding that does radial damage, but for more sophisticated there are projectile attacks that can do massive amounts of damage. As you clear each level you may unlock special Vs. arenas collect DNA that Spider-Man can use to upgrade his skill tree and unlock new super beings to join you. From this point you teleport back to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s secret headquarters where you can upgrade using those tech point you collected when you defeated those hundreds of bad guys on the character of your choosing.

And that's Spider-Man Friend or Foe in a nutshell. The biggest problem with this game is that it can be completed in a very short span of time. On my first play through of the game I had it beat in around five hours. Were those five hours of play enjoyable? Yes. Could I continue playing even after the game was beat? Yes. But the real question is whether or not Spider-Man: Friend or Foe is really worth the asking price on the Xbox 360. In my opinion it really depends on whether or not you have someone to play the game with. If you don't, chances are this game is at least worth a rental.

I am a bit disappointed that I couldn't develop many of the wonderful characters in this game to the level that I could with Spider-Man. It is my sincere hope that Activision will make a beefier, more robust sequel to this game that is a lot deeper and has the kind of character development found in their other hero titles like Marvel Ultimate Alliance.