I think part of the reason the Arkham Batman games and the Insomniac Spider-Man games both pull off the fantasy of *being* their respective heroes so well…

Is because they both understand that, for a superhero, momentum is completely different from a non-superhero character.

Both their combat mechanics revolve around momentum, but in different flavors.

In the Batman games, you tend to root yourself down in a given area, a fighting ring almost, and deal with any enemies that come to you. Sure, you move around, but only ever to take advantage of the battlefield. Sure, you're on the offensive, but there’s a bigger focus on being untouchable through redirection as opposed to repositioning. Batman’s gadgets are hard-counters to be used against specific enemy types or situations.

In Spider-Man, if you’re not moving constantly, you’re doing it wrong. There's a much bigger focus on speed and attacking from multiple angles at once. You don't move to take advantage of the battlefield, moving *is* your advantage. And you don't have to worry about redirecting attacks because, literally a second later, you're 5 feet away from danger. Spider-Man’s gadgets are a toybox meant to manipulate the battlefield into something you have complete control over.

Both combat systems empathize that what makes a superhero effective is how they weaponize momentum, and they do it in a way that can’t be conveyed in any other way but ‘you feel like a superhero’.

Because they don’t just give you the heroes’ powers or gadgets, they teach you how to *think* like the hero in motion.