Beating Spider-Man 2 With No Upgrades

I beat Spider-Man 2 on Ultimate difficulty with no upgrades. Here's how it went.
If you want to see the full gameplay from the boss fights go here: • Beating Spider-Man 2 W...
This challenge was brutal. I set the difficulty to the maximum of Ultimate (only unlocked after you beat the game once) and didn't upgrade ANYTHING (except what the game forced me to do). Also no glitches that helped me in boss fights/missions aside from the one I did for the bit. I played through the entire main story and mostly avoided sidequests hence the lack of certain boss fights. Hope you guys enjoy this one, this was a battle to get through.
Rules:
- Ultimate difficulty
- No unlocking anything (Except for what the game forces me to unlock/upgrade)
- No symbiote surge or mega-venom blast.
Ellie only playthrough of TLOU Part I: • Beating The Last of Us...
GTA V With No Wanted Stars: • Can You Beat GTA V Wit...
Be sure to follow me these places too:
TikTok: / epiccakes
Twitter: / epiccakesgaming
Instagram: / epiccakesgaming
Chapters:
0:00 Intro/Rules
0:52 Early Game Shenanigans
4:08 Coney Island Trip
6:18 Peter Steals Medicine From Dying Man
8:27 Pizza Time
8:41 Lizard Fight
10:41 MJ Girlboss Era
11:12 Bully Lowenthal
12:19 Mister Negative Fight
13:37 Kraven Fight aka I die for 6 hours straight
16:07 Peter Strikes Back
17:00 Venom's Night Out
18:01 Post-Venom Separation Anxiety
19:02 Scream
19:36 Venom Heals the World
20:47 Sewer-side Squad Symbiotes
22:09 Venom Final Battle
25:21 The End/Thanks for Watching :)
Music Used:
Carefree Melody by Twin Musicom is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. creativecommons.org/licenses/...
The New Order - Aaron Kenney
Epic « Music by Bensound »
High School Hero - Silent Partner
Modern Heavier Theme #1 Part 1
Fight or Flight - Ethan Meixsell

[@epiccakesgaming]

People have made a lot of good points that I didn't mention/explain well: - You can jump instead of parry during yellow ring attacks. - There's a setting to increase the window of time you have to parry - Dodge/parry timing window on Ultimate is much smaller than on lower difficulties. Like by a lot. - "No abilities/gadgets - I did use the abilities/gadgets that were automatically unlocked by the game, but didn't unlock any additional ones. That's the key difference. Also certain boss fights require abilities so even if I didn't use them, they'd have to be used in boss fights. - You can avoid some of the forced upgrades if you skip tutorials (tbh didn't know that was an option when I started this challenge) - You can spam parry and often it will successfully parry an attack. - I know certain parts make it look like I'm bad at the game but that's because I AM bad at the game. - The footage from the boss fights is here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/bZ-zhaaGdtyAZ9k - Hope y'all enjoyed. I am much better at TLOU1/2 I swear

[@filqkathegamer3810]

And to parry a hit you need to press the button when the ring is red not yellow. That's why it is inconsistent.

[@drks650]

Bro no wonder I was struggling to parry/dodge on ultimate mode lol

[@aminulhussain2277]

Parries also only stun the enemy if you are parrying the last hit in their combo.

[@thegreatacolyt1277]

Ok

[@thegreatacolyt1277]

​@@filqkathegamer3810huh

[@jacobcenter7374]

For those of you struggling to parry, the game outright tells you that you can also jump, which has much more forgiving timing

[@dirtymike1286]

I was screaming this the whole video 😂😭

[@STRICKLE]

Until you die

[@theremnants6807]

You could also press the parry button when you're spider sense turns red. It's much more consistent than focusing on the enemy for the parry.

[@XtheminerproX]

​@@theremnants6807doesn't it damage you still

[@jacobcenter7374]

@@XtheminerproX you can tap it multiple times if you pushed it early and it'll be a full parry still

[@alphadoge8639]

Honestly the parrying makes this games combat soooo much more complex and interesting compared to the last game

[@Whiffs]

"I Tried Beating Spiderman 2 WITHOUT Taking DAMAGE" check out the video

[@McGilm342]

i will say this for the dodging the dodging mechanic hasnt grown inconsistent, its just a LOT more unforgiving compared to the first game you have to dodge/parry ONLY when your spidersense or rings around the enemy appear, and being just a second too early or too late is whats getting you hit i struggled with fights like this for a long while too, until i kinda retrained myself to only dodge/parry when prompted to, and that became a lot more consistent with avoiding damage

[@epiccakesgaming]

Oh absolutely. Rewatching the footage (and you can see it in a lot of the clips I included) I was definitely getting to a point where I would just spam dodge to an extent. I think the timing window on Ultimate where you CAN dodge is just so small I would start trying to anticipate it and dodge early because other times I would be way too slow to dodge.

[@SOK39]

Requiring a full bar to heal is bullshit to me I prefer the first game’s healing

[@craigjuniormorrison4008]

Same

[@Scout819]

Yeah, I'd just come from Miles Morales when I played SM2, and it was something that definitely saved my butt numerous times in that game.

[@craigjuniormorrison4008]

@@Scout819 Same

[@zage932]

More of a challenge to save your bars for style or efficiency.

[@jimnicholls5215]

Omg, that Turn Off the Dark joke had my jaw dropped

[@MegaManXPoweredUp]

The stuntmen dropped more than their jaws.

[@SpeedDemon55]

The dedication in this video is next level. I fully upgraded my symbiote abilities today and looking back I feel bad for you. I still find the Scream boss fight hard even with loads of abilities and gadgets.

[@Whiffs]

"I Tried Beating Spiderman 2 WITHOUT Taking DAMAGE" check out the video

[@JewishDonutz]

It’s crazy how you never miss with videos they’re all bangers

[@Whiffs]

"I Tried Beating Spiderman 2 WITHOUT Taking DAMAGE" check out the video

[@SYKA2K]

The transition at 2:25 was insane

[@Boredrimed]

Yessir… it has arrived 🙏 BTW, the lizard fight on ultimate difficulty is litteraly impossible

[@anoldweirdo7084]

it was difficult at first but over time i could do it taking almost no hits

[@epicfilmer2474]

Idk man I thought it was easy, but to be fair immediately before this game I played Witcher death march and platinumed both the other Spider-Man games so I might be biased.

[@Boredrimed]

@@epicfilmer2474 yeah I just beat it the other night

[@pifontofr6053]

I beat the Lizard today in Ultimate Difficulty and I know what you mean Idk if you're still stuck on it or not, but I recommend just not using the Symbiote abilities (other than the Surge) and just switching back to Peter's Mechanical Arms, they're way more OP than the Symbiote abilities

[@redwhiteranger6270]

This has inspired me to do only og Spider-Man abilities, punching, dodging, web shooters and throwing stuff around the map.

[@KronosCason]

my first video of you and i already love this

[@sebastianmorin9780]

Wraith and Venom were the only ones to give me trouble during my Ultimate Run (No Upgrades) it’s funny how lots of ppl like to torture themselves in/with video games 😂

[@Whiffs]

"I Tried Beating Spiderman 2 WITHOUT Taking DAMAGE" check out the video

[@GMKGoji01]

The only game that allowed me to torture myself is Star Wars: Rogue Squadron. Since then, I stopped torturing myself in/with video games.🙃

[@mora9954]

The “ I missed the part where that’s my problem” got me

[@user-oe5ow8ov7o]

Just as a tip for next time you do another challenge for this game: Don't do that Brooklyn Visions mission where you save the teacher. It is not required for the main story of the game. And I love this video, I haven't seen any of your other vids, but I am probably going to watch more of them!

[@ryderschroeder-theoret6345]

The way you just played thus is the exact way I played it my first time cause I forgot about the upgrades. But I still use the surges

[@Aspect985]

"R.I.P Jeff, I knew you would've loved og fortnite" Had me DYING

[@kore.ez25]

i actually did this, in my opinion this game takes 3 steps forward and one step back in terms of combat. I felt like it was too easy and did an immediate second run the same way you did.

[@MegasXRL]

Dude on spectacular difficulty if you rush main story don’t getting most of skills and upgrades the game does provides a nice challenge (thats how I played first time) I was doing some side stuff but almost all the Hero tokens i let for post game so i got stucked at low suit tech specs and low gadgets. Struggled a lot in the boss fights with only one focus bar and 100 health bar

[@matthewdadamio4512]

First + Spider-Man 2 throwables only

[@epiccakesgaming]

Throwables only in this game would genuinely be impossible so this is a great idea!

[@CRYSTAL_CUSTOMS]

​@@epiccakesgamingyou can web up smaller enemies and make them throwables

[@Fgamer-ri1pg]

I’m your biggest fan I watch every one of your videos and streams 😊

[@okkikjrm2]

Great video!

[@DaTiredOne]

18:22 I love how spider-man use a gun 😂😂

[@Jtb1122own]

Now beat it on ultimate with no upgrades and not taking a single hit 😈

[@LIGHTNING1381]

5:30 is basically a big ol' " Is there a lore reason Harry didn't try to bend the bars? Is he stupid??".😂😂 18:53 Ouch. Sick burn bruh😂😂

[@Benthedoomslayer]

6 hours on kraven , just wow , just earned yourself a sub

[@BobThePenguin.]

Im pretty sure they didnt go for mysterio cause there was no way theyd be able to keep him contained while letting him have his illusions. Not to mention those illusions definitely arent gonna be doing anything to Kraven

[@Darkninjaneo]

New upload nice have to wake up the kids in the basement for this

[@twogamers777]

ngl this was a very well made video

[@harrypullin4109]

Finally someone else who does this

[@stelakucerova8740]

Love youre videos❤

[@epiccakesgaming]

Thank you! :)

[@AyanAhmad18]

Hahaha i remember being in the crowd during the spider man show where the actor fell , funny reference given that u were in times square

[@jackmorris4326]

That bite of 87 part actually made me laugh out loud😂😂😂😂

[@JuanVillalobos]

23:40 I would’ve just thrown the PS5 out the window oh my god

[@epiccakesgaming]

Oh trust me I almost switched to a different challenge but I convinced myself if I could get within one hit then I could beat it and it only took me a few more tries. Still the worst choke in any of my challenges I think 😭

[@user-gh8fx5wq2v]

After seeing that video I has to try it myself It was definitely the hardest challenge I have ever tried More of this is depression because I can't use the symbiote surge Thx for the idea :)

[@JOCAeNUNO]

If you want a little hint, just pressing the parry button will have spiderman raise up his arms and block making you take almost no damage

[@wheattoast1971]

I did little to no side stuff my first time playing, got my ass kicked at ever boss. But that was with abilities on and on Amazing difficulty. You are absolutely mad doing that on Ultimate with nothing.

[@jacob-612]

Bro at 2 minutes and 20 seconds had me rolling

[@user-jj3js9cw2y]

I also did this challenge and it was the most difficult challenge I have tried so far . I only had a hard time with wraith boss( it was my first boss on this run so I had no idea how consistent I had to be), kraven part 2, venom part 2 and 4, and the subway fight with all the symbiotes. I will try segmented no hit run next ( it shouldn't be that hard segmented , because I can reload checkpoints )

[@Kohcreed522]

I played this game on the hardest difficulty as well but I upgraded and used gadgets as well but I was stuck on lizard for awhile too.

[@imronnyy7700]

bro had so much trouble with the green symbiotes when all he had to do was shoot a singular web at them😂

[@The_BEST_Rookie_Cop]

You can change the Parry timing settings in the gameplay option settings

[@epiccakesgaming]

Correct (and tbh I recommend doing this) but for the purpose of this challenge I didn't want to make anything easier lol

[@LegitBabySnuts]

"19 inches of Venom..."' 💀💀💀💀💀💀

[@andray310]

I also did an Ultimate with only traversal suit tech. Combat is fun because you have to focus and actually get good. But you’re a masochist for no skills and abilities.

[@kronos_uhhhh]

Any tips for venoms 2nd phase? Im also playing with no upgrades and have been stuck on his part for ages

[@Gordon_Freeman1838]

“just my self and 19 inches of venom” - epiccakesgaming 2023

[@JazFizs]

The time where Herry fell from high place got me laughing 😂😂😂😂

[@ShinnyShinnShinn]

holy shit man this deserves so many more views! fucking love the editing for real. great video!

[@yungzay500]

This video funny asl😂

[@Guardianlover495]

With the bear guy, I hit him into a tree and he died instantly lol bro didn’t want honey

[@lost_moss_head8393]

For the kraven with the sniper part literally just hide behind trees and it won’t hit

[@lookatmehector822]

Just so we're clear because i want to do this challenge for fun. Am i allowed to use the abilities? I assume i am because i saw you did in the video the only things not allowed are mega venom blast, Symbiote surge, buying skills and gadgets or upgrades right? Please correct me if i am wrong

[@lonniecoomes2567]

On any phase of Mr. negative you can just wall trash him until he loses, and to do this I would recommend venom dashing him into the wall

[@mrrhythm5711]

Where in the hell is the fun in that though

[@KR_ANIMATES]

Pro-this is easy Me-ADD SKIP FIGHT BUTTON

[@Sandy-ik1ic]

I really feel like dodging and parrying would be easier if during the white/yellow dodge/parry window the indicator didn’t even appear and only the red ones did for the perfect dodge and parry indicators. As soon as I see an indicator I reflexively respond, and it always messed me up in the tougher fights on ultimate

[@mrrhythm5711]

Well yes, it would. But that's why they did it, to make the game more challenging. If you want easier gameplay play on Friendly Neighbourhood 😂

[@Black34879]

The only indicator I struggle with is the blue one Due to the fact I instantly go for parrying when I see indicators I’ve played too many games this year that simply rocked that feature Souls games,RE:4,Witcher 3 etc Became an habit at that point lol

[@SonicHedgehog1991]

"to pay homage to Spider-Man: Turn off the dark, I also turned off fall damage." If I rember correctly, the spider-man actor died or something

[@viqeteq]

Today i fought kraven on hardest diff and thank god im not only one who got mental issues because of that sniper

[@epiccakesgaming]

Yeah Kraven’s sniper is insane. Without that I think the fight would be significantly easier. I did a test and might make a short on this, but on Ultimate you literally have 30 frames/half a second to dodge from when the spidey senses appear to when you get shot - hence why I was so jumpy and dodged early so often lol.

[@viqeteq]

@@epiccakesgaming i feel less stupid reading this, not only one with these problems 😭🙏

[@sil-o-tron7950]

2:25 clean transtion.

[@shadowninja22suborelse.56]

I finally found someone who also had trouble parrying like me

[@ShashinGeoD]

I learned that the bear guy in the Emily May Foundation could be killed with stealth

[@Derek_Games-Films]

I went through my first playthrough on normal and didn’t get any upgrades until I beat the story, and it was fine.

[@owenguyy]

yea, on normal

[@castedsp1ders]

​​@@owenguyyit's easy on ultimate but you'll be dying alot without increased parry dodge timing turned on

[@sausejr0578]

I beat the game without using suit tech or buying any of Peter’s skill tree so I didn’t realise the suit tech acc gave u an extra bar so I was struggling with 1 bar of focus on hardest difficulty against venom was quite painful but got there eventually

[@yourefatmom6159]

I did this also until I found out I didn’t have one of the symbiote abilities in the new threads mission as I forgot skills and gadgets were even in the game I was having too much fun with the story and gameplay

[@castedsp1ders]

Ngl I can't go without the wall kick move and web slam also bouncing them off the ground and grabbing their weapons, once I unlocked those it became impossible to play the game vanilla style

[@speedyminccino9341]

With the mini, shield boss where kraven rang the bell you can just hide from him for a bit and he forgets you existence and you can one hit stealth kill him

[@JJ-xt2di]

Thank you Freddy Fazbear

[@scytheproduction7667]

Beating the game without any upgrade is bassicaly what I did first time because I speedrun through the entire story without doing any side missions. God knows that 25378/20 for a single upgrade is big

[@whrench2676]

29th, and how about, just to torture you, spectacular difficulty (ultimate if u want) but you can only use the l1 abilities to attack and defeat people, no regular attack Also no parry cause those might possibly do a little bit of damage

[@Goatlover2451]

The game burned my house down lol

[@O9Man]

thanks frady

[@maddoxgamer8956]

15:32 Introducing Sniper-Man 2

[@Pickle-guy]

First time I played I was confused as to why I couldn’t get a second or third focus bar and after beating venom I realized I just had to upgrade suit tech

[@-boondoggle-6134]

10:08 they got Peter hitting the chad stride😭

[@mochii813]

Ngl I kinda hate how the bossfights are in arena type areas

[@megascpetile4488]

I did the inverse, I said that I would play it again on new game + whenever that would come out to find that it wouldn’t until 2024 (The year I write this) so I said “Screw it” and decided to do a fresh 100% run on Ultimate as the game goes. That would entail me doing everything possible between main missions and it trivialized the game in certain areas, especially bossfights. That’s why I think that it would actually take a while for NG+ to come out especially considering those like me who 100%-ed the game would actually use their best file to do a NG+ run, which would kind of flatten the experience considering that I was basically spamming the Lizard and Venom with special abilities left and right with absolutely no pushback at the rate I had completed the game. So I’m thinking that Insomniac would first have to dust themselves off and do some rebalancing for NG+ like God of War does. Speaking of which: for some god-forsaken reason I am currently doing the same with God of War: Ragnarök simply because of the holidays and those are the only games I really have specifically for my PS5

[@RETARDED_MONKEY]

i think the spider man hair suit looks dope 4 miles

[@renamamiya2279]

Peter & Miles: "No upgrades? 🥺"

[@slushiesoldier]

I find that spamming the party button during that fight works pretty well

[@simpae2731]

I did this on my first time for spectacular difficulty and wow it was muncher harder than part 1

[@kosei8338]

I completely forgot to upgrade so i never did. Now i understand why this game was so hard 🤣

[@Black34879]

Tip for parrying if you have shitty timing You can just spam the parry button rlly fast and it will parry 90% of the time Or just increase the parry window on settings

[@flipp9594]

YES

[@questions_r_confusing]

15:37 the dodging part there is quite hard even in friendly neighbourhood

[@CEOFuturistic]

So True!

[@epiccakesgaming]

Exactly

[@Kohcreed522]

I didn't really use my gadgets except my regular web blasts

[@Awesomeman-qu6mx]

When I get this game I will do this challenge

[@user-pu5mu1kc2b]

He sent u flying bro-13:55

[@whatyoustareingat978]

Omg I just realized the armed and dangerous trophy is also a name of a juice wrld song does this mean something?

[@Benthedoomslayer]

Just beat the game on ultimate , I found it mostly fine apart from the kraven fight and the last stage of venoms boss fight , plus I hate the new parying mechanic

[@trashygamer7014]

The reason parries don’t work when you get the timing is because the enemy is doing a combo and the game won’t let you stun them till the final hit

[@poohharvey2154]

Fun fact you can actually ignore the venom blast part for miles. I was doing my second playthrough and I used my venom jump as soon as the enemies showed up and I used venom jump instead of the venom blast

[@Spoky_Pun]

Even though I raged a lot, this game was definitely my GOTY. Story was great, most of the suits were nice, my favorite part was Coney Island, followed up closely by the MJ sections, they remind me of TLOU a lot. Combat was definitely improved.

[@Whiffs]

"I Tried Beating Spiderman 2 WITHOUT Taking DAMAGE" check out the video

[@Spoky_Pun]

@@Whiffs Why?

[@Whiffs]

cuz its a good vid@@Spoky_Pun

[@Spoky_Pun]

@@Whiffs *cough* self advertising *cough*

[@ethannagioff7584]

You must have worn out the circle button to death

[@myanperera5570]

The hunters had a tracker on the lizard serum

[@Kohcreed522]

18:00 wtf is the bite of 87

[@Samsgm]

20:24 "Miles original" was so bad I thought it was a glitch, On god

[@biggestoppW]

16:58 got me crying

[@q_rid1275]

11:30 the best part

[@Jungleali]

8:07 when I played him I actually jumped away because of low hp but he forgot I was there and I got the option to web strike takedown Also to avoid some attacks that can’t seem to be dodged you can press x and just keep jumping

[@jasonmejia2688]

So you're saying, Spider-Man two is not good when it's game of the year😂

[@Arachknight-productions]

Can u do a challenge of spider man 2 but without venom abilities

[@PointingouttheObvious]

The parry thing is pretty simple you only stun enemies in a perfect party anything else is a block that reduces damage. It’s pretty forgiving so all you have to do is pay attention

[@PointingouttheObvious]

So yeah you struggling was just a skill issue it’s all about timing if you miss the timing you fail simple as that

[@PointingouttheObvious]

Brother you suck at dodging holy shit most of those where you dodging too early objectively. The timing is not that hard lmao