An iconic New York landmark is missing from the PC version of Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered. For those blessed with the eyes of the metaphorical eagle, the One World Trade Centre is distinguishable in the New York skyline on the original PS4 title screen for Spider-Man. However, in the PC version of Remastered, the Trade Centre is missing.
One Redditor went to work after noticing the building’s absence from the title screen at the end of the PC trailer that debuted during Sony’s June State of Play. There’s a good reason for the omission, though some may find it surprising.
Firstly, despite its appearance on the title screen, the One World Trade Centre does not actually exist in-game. You could swing around for days and never find it. It was simply never there. Secondly, this is not the first time a building has inexplicably vanished from a virtual New York City skyline. Who else remembers the Chrysler Building in Spider-Man: Miles Morales? Or lack thereof, as previously reported by GameLuster in 2020.
Insomniac Games, developers of the hit series, confirmed that the building was missing because of copyright issues. It sounds bizarre, but buildings themselves can be copyrighted. In this case, Insomniac failed to reach a deal with the building owners to recreate it in the game.
The lack of Miles‘ Chrysler Building, then, is not the crafty work of skyscraper-nabbing aliens. As for the new absentee, as of writing Sony has not confirmed if the absence of the One World Trade is due to a copyright issue. This article will be updated when more information comes to light.
The original Spider-Man is available on the PS4, with a remastered port of the game available for PS5. Spider-Man: Miles Morales is available on the PS4 and PS5, with Spider-Man 2, a sequel to the 2018 game, launching exclusively on PS5 in 2023.
