Insomniac Games

3:43 Marvel's Wolverine was developed by Insomniac Games, the PlayStation studio in Burbank, California that made Marvel's Spider-Man, and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment with Marvel Games. In Insomniac's first featurette, Liam McIntyre calls the studio "the most collaborative group of people I have ever worked with", and Marvel Games says it has been in "a creative collaboration with Insomniac Games and PlayStation for over a decade". The game took five years from its reveal on Sep 9, 2021 to its release on Sep 15, 2026, through a change of directors and a ransomware attack.

This page covers the studio, the team and how the game was made. Every trailer in order is on Trailers, and the studio's other Marvel games are on Insomniac Marvel Games in Order.

Quick facts

Who is Insomniac Games?

Insomniac was founded by Ted Price in 1994 and made its name on PlayStation with Spyro the Dragon, Ratchet & Clank and Resistance. Sony bought the studio on Aug 19, 2019, a year after Marvel's Spider-Man, making it one of PlayStation's own studios. Price announced on Jan 22, 2025 that he would retire at the end of that March after more than 30 years leading the studio, handing it to three co-studio heads: Chad Dezern, Ryan Schneider and Jen Huang. Wolverine is the first game Insomniac released under them.

0:02 The question the studio heard most, in its own words, was whether it would make a Wolverine game "as violent, as visceral as the character in the comics". After years of making sure Spider-Man never killed anyone, the answer was yes, with a new "blood tech" built for it and filters for anyone who wants less (Difficulty Settings and Accessibility).

Who made Marvel's Wolverine?

The game was announced by Ryan Schneider in a PlayStation Blog post of Sep 9, 2021 that named Brian Horton as creative director and Cameron Christian as game director, called it "a standalone game" and said it was "very early in development". Horton left in 2024 and Marcus Smith became creative director, with Mike Daly as game director. Daly is the director who has spoken for the game since launch, in Game Informer's Afterwords interview of Nov 3, 2026.

6:12 The story is written by Walt Williams, the writer of Spec Ops: The Line, whom IGN's previewer calls "one of the best video game writers in the business". McIntyre and Krizia Bajos both praised "Walt and his writing team" at Comic-Con for a story that feels "wholly unique" yet built on deep knowledge of the comics (Voice Cast).

3:28 The cover was made with the comic artist Jock. Insomniac's team says it chose art that "doesn't look like our past games", rough-edged, with "a sense of urgency and forward movement and rage and fury".

How is it different from Insomniac's Spider-Man games?

0:30 Deliberately different. Brian Wyser, Insomniac's senior animation director, told But Why Tho? that the team "definitely wanted to differentiate Wolverine from Spider-Man", and set pillars early: Spider-Man is "form over function", flipping and spinning for style, while Logan is "function over form" and only does something flashy when it is the most efficient way to the next enemy.

5:06 Wyser's goal for the violence was a "little moment of shiver" when Logan hits someone: claws through the chin and out of the top of the head, a stab to the throat, a leg cut off "in ways that make you shiver and realize he is an expert". The team studied tigers, lions and bears for his movement, and moved the camera in closer than in Spider-Man.

9:38 The biggest change is structure. Where Spider-Man has an open New York, Wolverine is linear, a series of levels in a set order. IGN's review notes that Insomniac "intentionally made a very different sort of game" with less exploration, and found it less interesting for it; Daly had called it a "globe-trotting" linear game before launch. How the levels play is on Combat and Rage.

2:41 The performances were captured on Insomniac's motion-capture stage. In the studio's Oct 16, 2026 featurette, a director explains how the motorcycle chase was shot without a motorcycle: the team built a proxy, told the actor when to lean left, lean right and skid, and the animators moved him through space, mixing keyframe and stunt data for each move.

The 2023 ransomware attack

In December 2023, Insomniac was hit by the Rhysida ransomware group. After the studio did not pay a ransom, the group posted about 1.3 million files on Dec 19, 2023, including material from Wolverine's development (Axios, Dec 19, 2023). The attack is an event in the game's history. What the files appeared to contain (dates, budgets, cast lists, plans) was stolen and unfinished, and Vi.ki does not treat any of it as fact; every fact about the game on this viki comes from Sony, Insomniac, the press or recorded play of the released game.

Development timeline

The launch-day details are on Release Date and Launch and the patches on Patches and Updates.

What Insomniac has said since launch

The studio has said little in public beyond patch notes. In Game Informer's Afterwords, Daly explained the most mocked feature, the glowing scent trails: the team wanted to weave Logan's senses "into as many parts of the game as we could", but "we saw feedback from players that interpreted senses as abstract designer guidance", so post-launch patches made the trails more natural and added options to remove the sense cues for optional collectibles. He also explained why constant regeneration was dropped: it "quickly fell apart as it incentivized the player to slow the pace of combat", which led to the Last Stand. As of Nov 8, 2026, Insomniac has announced no DLC, no sequel and no PC version.

We think Wolverine shows a studio choosing focus over size. In our view the cuts that reviewers felt (few bosses, linear levels) were the price of shipping a smaller game on time after a leadership change and a leak, and the fast patches show a team that still listens. We think Insomniac's next game will be bigger again, and that it will reuse Wolverine's violence technology rather than its linear structure; our guesses are on Predictions.

Frequently asked questions

Who made Marvel's Wolverine?

Insomniac Games, the PlayStation studio behind Marvel's Spider-Man, with Marvel Games. Sony Interactive Entertainment published it.

Who directed Marvel's Wolverine?

Mike Daly is the game director, with Marcus Smith as creative director since 2024. Brian Horton and Cameron Christian led it when it was revealed in 2021.

Who wrote Marvel's Wolverine?

Walt Williams, the writer of Spec Ops: The Line, with a writing team at Insomniac.

How long was Marvel's Wolverine in development?

At least five years from its reveal on Sep 9, 2021, when Insomniac called it very early in development, to its release on Sep 15, 2026.

Was Marvel's Wolverine affected by the Insomniac hack?

Files from its development were stolen and posted online in December 2023. The game still released on its announced date; Vi.ki does not use the stolen files as a source.

Sources

• PlayStation Blog, Sep 9, 2021: Marvel's Spider-Man 2 and Marvel's Wolverine revealed
• PlayStation Blog, Sep 24, 2025: Marvel's Wolverine arrives on PlayStation 5 Fall 2026
• Sony Interactive Entertainment, Jan 22, 2025: Ted Price announces retirement
• GameSpot, Aug 19, 2019: Sony Buys Spider-Man, Ratchet & Clank Dev Insomniac Games
• Gematsu, Oct 2024: Marvel's Wolverine creative director Brian Horton moves to Perfect Dark
• Axios, Dec 19, 2023: Insomniac Games breach
• PSU, Jun 5, 2026: Marvel's Wolverine is not an open world game like Spider-Man
• Game Informer, Nov 3, 2026: Afterwords, Marvel's Wolverine
• IGN, Sep 24, 2025: Wolverine - Game Overview Trailer
• IGN, Aug 13, 2026: Marvel's Wolverine Preview
• IGN, Sep 10, 2026: Marvel's Wolverine Review
• But Why Tho?: Creating Marvel's Wolverine, an interview with Brian Wyser
• Marvel Entertainment, Oct 16, 2026: Marvel's Wolverine Motion-Capture featurette