Rhino from 'The Amazing Spider-Man' video game
Activision and Beenox today revealed their new incarnation of the classic villain Rhino in their upcoming Amazing Spider-Man video game, based on the upcoming film. Rhino doesn’t appear in the film, but the character’s design follows the aesthetic of the Lizard from the film.
Am I crazy for being mildly encouraged about the game based on what I see here? Movie tie-in games are usually so notoriously awful, it’s become a cliché. But there have been a few exceptions (mostly games based on recent Pixar movies like Toy Story 3 and Cars 2, although I recall one of the games based on the Sam Raimi Spider-Man films rating very high among fans due to its open world gameplay). I know the chances of getting something really good are virtually nil, but we can hope, right? At the bottom of this article you’ll find the trailer, so you can judge for yourself.
Rhino from 'The Amazing Spider-Man' video game
Beenox’s character profile for their Rhino makes him sound like a very conflicted, tortured individual that you can almost sympathize with. That’s certainly an interesting new take both on this character, and video game villains in general. Aleksei Sytsevich is a low-level Mafia thug transformed into a human/rhinoceros hybrid against his will by an illegal biochemical experiment.
Rhino faces off against Spidey from 'The Amazing Spider-Man' video game
But even more telling is what the profile reveals about the movie — and its aftermath:
Unlike all of the other cross-species, which were created after Curt Connors terrorized the city as the Lizard, Rhino was the result of a pet project belonging to a corrupt Oscorp executive with access to Connors’ research. Abusing this access, he applied this top-secret knowledge to black-market dealings.
So it almost sounds like the film sets things up for future movie villains to follow in Connors’ footsteps, in becoming human/animal hybrids. Rhino is probably not on the list of potential movie adversaries, since he appears in this game. But there’s still Man-Wolf, Scorpion, and Vulture…