While the look of the series was new, the stories had what fans have come to expect from a Spider-Man tale - nerdy teen Peter Parker had gained the powers of a human spider after being bitten by a radioactive spider while on a high school science trip. The series took place several years after the incident and focused on Peter's difficulties in balancing his crime-fighting duties as Spider-Man with the challenges of his everyday life. As usual, he struggled to pay his way through college as a science major at Empire State University, his education suffered from the demands of his nightly webslinging activities, and his love life was complicated by the fact that he had to keep his superhero identity secret.