Marvel's Wolverine: Big Sales, Split Reviews for Insomniac's X-Men Debut
Insomniac's long-awaited Wolverine game sold around 2 million copies in days, but its mid-70s scores are the lowest for a big PlayStation single-player game since 2019. What critics loved, what they did not, and what comes next.
Insomniac Games has been one of PlayStation's most reliable studios for a decade. Marvel's Spider-Man scored 87 on Metacritic, Spider-Man 2 around 90, and Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart 88. So when Marvel's Wolverine landed in the mid-70s, it was a genuine surprise.
The PS5 exclusive launched worldwide on September 15, 2026. It now holds 75 on Metacritic and 76 on OpenCritic, and that makes it the lowest-scored big single-player game from a PlayStation studio since Bend Studio's Days Gone (71) in 2019. Yet commercially, it is a hit: analysts estimate it sold around 2 million copies in its first days.
Logan's story
Wolverine is a standalone game that shares continuity with Insomniac's Spider-Man series; the studio has said its Marvel games all take place on the same Earth-1048. It is planned as the first part of an X-Men trilogy.
Logan, voiced by Liam McIntyre, is an amnesiac mutant who rejoins Team X three years after leaving it. He investigates mutant abductions linked to Bolivar Trask and the Reavers, travelling across Canada, the fictional island nation of Madripoor and Tokyo. Along the way he learns that his real name is James Logan Howlett and recovers buried memories.
The supporting cast includes Troy Baker as Dr. Nathaniel Essex, Krizia Bajos as Jean Grey, Nicole Pacent as Mystique, Brett Gipson as Sabretooth and Jolene Kim as Lady Deathstrike.
What critics said
The reviews split sharply. At the top end, Game Informer and DualShockers gave it 8.5/10, and Push Square and Shacknews 8/10. At the other, IGN and GameSpot gave it 6/10, and Eurogamer, GamesRadar+, The Guardian and VGC each gave it 3 out of 5.
The praise is consistent: stunning graphics and cinematics, strong voice acting, and brutal, spectacular combat that finally gives Wolverine's claws the weight fans wanted. The criticism is consistent too: a lack of depth, repetitive missions and a story that many reviewers found weak by Insomniac's standards. On OpenCritic, roughly two-thirds of critics recommend it, compared with well over 90% for most recent PlayStation exclusives.
The numbers
Here is how Wolverine compares with recent PlayStation-made single-player games on Metacritic:
- Astro Bot (2024): 94
- God of War Ragnarok (2022): 94
- Marvel's Spider-Man 2 (2023): around 90
- Saros (2026): 87
- Ghost of Yotei (2025): 86
- Marvel's Wolverine (2026): 75
- Days Gone (2019): 71
Sales tell a different story. Alinea Analytics estimated about 1.9 million copies in three days and more than $130 million in revenue. Ampere Analysis put it at 2.16 million units through September, making it the month's second best-selling PS5 game. It topped the UK physical chart and Switzerland's chart in its launch week, and reached number five in Japan with 20,039 physical copies.
What happens next
Two Golden Joystick nominations, for Liam McIntyre and Troy Baker, show that the performances landed even with critics who disliked the game. The bigger question is the trilogy. Sony's Marvel deal reportedly gives it a long-term lock on X-Men console games, so Insomniac has time to learn from the reaction.
WGC's take: Wolverine is a fine action game held to a very high standard. If you want spectacle and claws, you will get your money's worth; if you expect Spider-Man 2's depth, wait for a sale. For PlayStation's best of 2026, try Saros, and see the full picture in our 2026 AAA year so far.