Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 will pit players against the dreaded Lizard, and developer Insomniac looked to some of nature’s own scale-covered creatures while bringing the reptilian villain to life. Spider-Man has faced many iconic enemies across countless Marvel comics, movies, and video games, and Dr. Curtis Connors remains one of his most memorable and tragic foes. Connors was once a well-meaning scientist who aimed to regenerate his missing arm using reptilian DNA, but instead mutated himself into a monstrous Lizard that often clashes with New York City’s resident web-slinger.

Insomniac’s Peter Parker has already battled the Lizard before the events of Marvel’s Spider-Man, as noted in one of the many collectibles players could find in the open world of Manhattan. Dr. Connors himself later made an appearance at the end of Spider-Man: Miles Morales, where he is assisting Norman Osborn in treating his son Harry for a deadly illness using what appears to be the infamous Venom symbiote. He remains the key to saving Harry in previously shown Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 trailers, but he suffers a relapse and grows into an even more powerful Lizard that Peter and Miles must chase and battle in the sewers of New York.

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Jacinda Chew, senior art director at Insomniac Games, recently discussed the process of crafting Spider-Man 2’s version of the Lizard in a PlayStation.com blog post. In addition to the classic Marvel comics that the Lizard first appeared in, Chew and her team looked to real-world reptiles while designing his scaly green skin. “The thing about lizards in real life - their skin’s actually really dry,” Chew noted. “Most people who looked at our Lizard kept initially saying ‘he’s not slimy enough.’ But I think it’s a nod to what people expect a lizard to look like - he’s got that lizard skin, but it’s actually much shinier than what you’d see on a real lizard.”

Design-wise, Chew and her Spider-Man 2 design team took inspiration from prehistoric reptiles, as more modern species often look too “cute” for what they were aiming for with the Lizard. “I was looking at spikier, more snake-like, more aggressive references,” Chew says, adding that her crew also researched how cat eyes reflect light to give Connors a more menacing appearance. Chew also revealed that the Lizard will have two forms in Spider-Man 2: a more traditional Lizard who wears a tattered lab coat and can communicate with Peter and the larger, feral, and spike-covered beast shown in past trailers.

Jacinda Chew also dove into how the PlayStation 5’s cutting-edge technology helped in creating Spider-Man 2’s version of the Lizard, especially when he sheds his skin and transforms into that more animalistic second form. “Again, we also looked at what that looks like in real life,” she stated. “Our artists used a program to simulate how the skin might move fluttering in the wind.” The Insomniac team ran muscle simulations to capture the Lizard’s body language, which Chew says is a cross between the low-to-the-ground movements of real lizards and the more upright, bipedal posture Connors has had in past adaptations.

Insomniac seems to have taken out all the stops in bringing the Lizard to life in Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, including researching the reptiles of the real world for inspiration. Fans will soon get to see the fruits of that labor when they face off against the Lizard in Spider-Man 2, which is set to finally swing onto the PlayStation 5 after a nearly three-year wait next week.

Marvel's Spider-Man 2 releases on October 20, exclusively for PS5.

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Source: PlayStation