Maximum Carnage

Lore & Background

The game's plot begins with Venom already free. Carnage, already established before the game begins, is on a rampage through New York City. Spider-Man and Venom, despite their rivalry, are forced to team up to stop Carnage. Carnage gathers a group of villains including Shriek, Demogoblin, Doppelganger, and Carrion to attack the city. Spider-Man and Venom assemble a resistance of heroes and confront Carnage's team. After an epic battle, Carnage is defeated and retreats into the sewers. Venom leaves without dialogue, while the Carnage symbiote escapes.

In Their Own Story

Rain hammered the pavement as sirens wailed in the distance. A red shape moved faster than sight, leaving only silence and ruin in its wake. Venom crouched on a gargoyle, tendrils twitching with recognition of kin that had gone mad. Beside him, the web-slinger tightened his fists. They were enemies yesterday, but today survival demanded unity against the slaughter.

Reader's Guide

In this single-player side-scrolling beat 'em up (with a format similar to Double Dragon and Final Fight), the player controls Spider-Man and Venom through various levels to stop the supervillain Carnage and his team, as well as hundreds of criminals they inspire in their wake, from taking over the city. The two 16-bit versions are virtually identical. Other Marvel heroes can be summoned by collecting appropriate items hidden within certain levels. The locations of the power-ups necessary to summon aid are set. Depending on which character summoned them, the summoned heroes may help out in different ways, usually being more effective for whichever character (Spider-Man or Venom) they favor. The game's soundtrack was written and produced by American rock group Green Jellÿ. The title screen theme song appears as the first track on the band's 1994 album 333 as "Carnage Rules". Due to the limited storage capacity of SNES and Genesis cartridges, the soundtrack was not recorded music, but a computerized rendition of the songs. Additionally, an uncredited version of Black Sabbath's "The Mob Rules" appears in the soundtrack, during the boss battles against the supervillains.

Did You Know?

• Maximum Carnage is one of the first video games to be directly based on a comic book story, rather than simply using comics characters in a standard video game action/adventure plot.
• The game is notable for its red-colored cartridge on both the SNES and Sega Genesis, though it is not the only official Sega Genesis game with a non-black cartridge.
• The game's soundtrack was not written and produced entirely by Green Jellÿ; the band contributed the title theme and some music, but the majority was composed by other artists.
• The game's boss battle music is not an original composition by Green Jellÿ; it is a cover/adaptation of Black Sabbath's 'The Mob Rules'.
• Both versions of the game were re-released on the compilation Marvel MaXimum Collection in 2026.