Batman: Arkham Asylum…does it live up to the hype? Is it as good as everyone says it is?? There have been a lot of bad Batman video games made (and movies, but we will not mention there names). Is this the exception?
Short answer: yes!
The Pros
The Fighting System
For once a game takes seriously who Batman is supposed to be: a martial arts master. From the very first minutes of of the story line, you’ll see Batman demolish two or three Joker goons with an array of punches, kicks, and take downs. Throughout the whole game in fact, Batman will have no trouble handling individual thugs. It’s easy to execute flashy slow-motion “finishing moves” on bad guys, and to do so it’s not really a matter of button mashing, but more an issue of timing. This lets experienced and newbies feel satisfied without seeming as if the game controls were dummed down.
But since Batman can polish off a thug or two without breaking a sweat, the real awesomeness comes when you have to fight, 6, 7, 10 guys at one time. You can execute a series of bone-crushing combos with what the game calls it’s free flow combat system. It basically let’s you chain together unlimited combos, seamlessly. The most awesome parts of which get close-up cinematic slow motion shots. Let me tell you, no matter how many times you unleash the Bat-fury, it never gets old. Eventually you’ll have to fight groups of baddies who have knives, can pick up metal bars to hit you with, and carry electrical shock poles; for them you’ll have to use more advanced fighting techniques.
The Predator System
Part of what makes Batman so awesome is that he’s just a man. No special super powers, no alien heritage. He’s just a regular dude. Well, a regular dude who’s trained his body to unholy perfection and carries a bunch of high tech gadgetry to challenge the lowliest low-lifes of the criminal underworld. Ahem. But besides that, he’s just a dude.
The bad part of being just a dude is that bullets can hurt you. Many times you’ll come across a room full of thugs and they are all armed with machine guns. If you try to take one of them down directly, the other thugs will hear you and gun you down in short order. Enter the Invisible Predator. This is where the game really shines. You must instill fear and act unseen in order to beat the bad guys. You must become the night.
This is also where we see the AI in the game really step it up a notch. In the scenario we mentioned before, a room full of goons with machine guns, you’ll need to take each guard out silently so as not to alert the other guards. At first they’ll brag and yell insults at you into the air about how they’ll take you down and make short work of you. But then you start silently taking them down, one by one, picking them off. Should you glide kick a foe from a high ledge? Perform a silent take down after sneaking up from behind? Throw a batarang to incapacitate them and then finish them up? Use explosive gel to blow the floor out from under them? You’re starting to get my drift.
As you methodically eliminate them the guards will get nervous, yelling that they know you’re out there, sometimes frightened enough to start shooting into the air at nothing. They start to stick together in groups knowing that you’re coming for them. But it won’t matter. You’re the Batman.
The Storyline & Graphics
The story line and voice acting by any account receive an A+ in this game. The same guy who wrote for Batman the Animated Series writes here – in fact, many of the voice actors from the series reprise their roles (Mark Hamill as the Joker is pitch perfect). After Joker takes control of the island he’ll appear on the closed-circuit TV’s and intercom systems. He’ll verbally spar with Batman and taunt the guards with witty and often hilarious dialogue. In addition to that, while the combat portion of the game will get a lot of attention, players will spend a big chunk of their time in “detective mode” using Batman’s sleuthing skills to track down baddies or rescue hostages. In this aspect, you really get the all around Batman experience, using not only his extensive gadget and martial arts arsenal, but the detective and problem solving skills that make Batman such a force to be reckoned with.
Of course, with a video game you have to talk about the graphics. They’re stinking beautiful. The game really sets the mood with a dark and gritty atmosphere. So much attention was spent to detail, often with the video sequences you’ll just be sitting there dumb-founded about how realistic everything seems. I mean, just check out the opening video sequence:
The Cons
Well…there aren’t any glaring errors or problems with the game really. But if I had to choose some…
You face a lot of A-list Batman foes in the game, but there are some pretty big hitters you don’t get to fight. There are a lot of nameles, hapless thugs though that you do have to face. It would have been nice to face some more B-list enemies instead of so many goons.
After you beat the game, you really have beat it. You can still explore the map and do some things but you don’t get to fight any one. I mean, you can definitely do that starting a new game, so not a real big complaint.
The final boss showdown was a bit of a let down. I expected more of a fight. I found the fight right before the final boss to be harder than fighting the final boss! But the final video sequence afterward was so sweet it quickly distracted me from any unsatisfaction.
The Final Score
So there you have it folks. Let’s take a look at the score board:
Story Line: 9.5/10
Gameplay: 9.5/10
Graphics: 10/10
Do you have to do anything after you beat the joker?
There are a couple of things to do:
1) You can solve the rest of the Riddler’s riddles. Not a lot happens after you do that, but you do have to solve them to unlock some other weapons & challenges of the game.
2) Beat the rest of the challenges. These are battles that are very similar to certain key points in the story line. You need to beat them in certain ways and/or times to get certain rewards. Haven’t finished this one yet, but it’s fun to fight some of your earlier battles equipped with all of your bat-weapons and your mastery of batman’s moves.