Batman: Arkham Series

[Leo656]

So I know this series has been talked about a lot here before, and probably had its own thread at one point, but I frankly can't be assed to look for it. Whenever it was had to have been ages ago and it would take me forever to find it, so whatever, deal.

Anyways, I recently got around to playing "Origins" for the first time, finally, and wanted to talk about it at-length as I usually do with most games I play. About halfway through my first playthrough, I decided I may as well just run through the entire series in storyline order, giving my thoughts and reviews as I go. And I figured other people would probably have their own two cents to drop in. So rather than do it in the "Currently Playing" thread, I figured I'd just do a new one dedicated to the series as a whole. Sound good? Good.

So first up, Batman: Arkham Origins (Xbox 360). Been on my shelf for years, never played it until about a month ago. What I think happened was, WAY back in the day I stopped playing "Arkham City" once I beat the main Story mode because I had a ton of Riddler Trophies left to find and just couldn't be bothered, even though I know I will "have" to get them eventually because I have a bit of a compulsion about leaving things "unfinished". Since then, whenever I've been tempted to play any Arkham game, all I think of is "Riddler Trophies" and it puts me off of the idea, and then I play something else. Not cool, I know, but it's how my brain works sometimes.

To jump ahead a little bit, SOME of that fear was indeed warranted, as once again hunting down the Riddler stuff ("Data Packs", this time) was by far my least favorite part of this game by a mile. I don't hate the idea of it by any means, and in each game I've played there's some fun to be had and some of the methods for finding them are indeed clever. But there's WAY too many of them in every game I've played, and even though I use a Guide to get them all as quickly as possible it still makes the game about three times longer than it needs to be, and it's very blatant padding. Way too many super-hero games do this sh*t. Like, 50-100 Riddler collectibles, okay, fine, but HUNDREDS of them in every game? Now you're just jerking off.

The dirt-worst is when I'm just about to get one of them and get taken out by a sniper I somehow didn't see. Nothing like getting killed during a completely pointless and arbitrary side-quest that feels like it should've been about half as deep. Especially when almost nothing in the Main Game is all that difficult or likely to kill you.

So anyways, yeah, this game has some problems compared to its predecessors, and I'll get those out of the way first, but to me the Riddler stuff was the worst, just because it's SO needlessly bloated. I DO love the concept of it, though, and I like how Riddler (or "Enigma", this time) was done in these games, I like it quite a lot. He doesn't really "fit" the tone of these games otherwise but I'm glad they found a way to include him. It works. There's just way too much of it.

I'm aware that this game has a reputation of being sort of the "black sheep" of the series, since it was made by different people than the other games, and apparently launched with a bunch of bugs and glitches and other things (most of which seem to have been patched out; I had a few bugs including once or twice where I had to restart the game but nothing major at all). But I honestly liked it a lot, way more than some of the reviews had me expecting to. That said, there ARE some things that bothered me, and like the Riddler stuff, it's not so much in the concept as the execution of certain elements.

Stuff That Bugged Me:

- For example, the "Dark Knight" Challenges, specifically the stealth or "Worst Nightmare" challenges. When I first saw it, I was like "Oh, cool!" Getting little upgrades and rewards for playing the game a certain way, mastering certain techniques, it makes sense. But I HATED how they forced you to get them done in a certain order; for example, by the time I'd gotten to the "Stop a random crime in each district" Challenge, I'd already done that about five times over just by playing through the game, but obviously did not get credit for it because I didn't do it when the game decided I "should" do it. But it's only REALLY a problem with the stealth challenges, specifically because some of them can only be done in certain rooms and therefore you get only one or two chances at them, AND since they need to be done in order it becomes almost impossible to do some of them until you're on New Game + or "I Am The Knight" Mode, which by default makes getting them a lot harder.

On my first playthrough, I'd gotten all of the other Challenges done and about half of the stealth ones done. I had to do the rest of the stealth ones during New Game +, and I don't mind telling you, a couple of those were among the least-fun and most frustrating things I've ever had to deal with. A lot of them were still easy, but some of them were made more difficult than they had to be since enemies on New Game + either wear armor (thus making them immune to Stealth takedowns you HAVE to do in order to get the Challenge credit) or else don't end up going near where they need to go so you can get the proper takedown. Rooms I'd whipped through in two minutes the first time through, I'd spend an hour retrying over and over just because nobody would go near the wall I needed to smash through, or wouldn't go near the propane tank I needed to blow them up with, or some nonsense. Too many times they'd just ignore the Sonic Batarang or whatever other tricks I'd use to try and lure them into position and do whatever they felt like. It was SUPER annoying. Once I finally got them all completed, it was one of those "Thank GOD I never have to do this again for the rest of my life!" moments. So yeah, this could've been done better; either the criteria for the Stealth challenges could've been less strict, OR they just could have let you complete the various Challenges in any order you wanted to, and in either case it would have made things far less annoying.

- The Deadshot mission wasn't bad altogether, but there were a few times that it glitched and I lost automatically. Like I didn't notice that his Health was already super-low and so I'd go to beat him up after a takedown, only for him to immediately kill the hostage before I could even make any effort to hide (like he would "warp" to the hostage regardless of where we'd been before and immediately kill them), and a few times I was behind him and the Takedown button simply wouldn't respond and he'd "see me" (even though I was behind him) and kill the hostage. I looked it up and saw that a lot of people had similar "automatic fail" issues on that mission, and was relieved it wasn't just me. Apparently it was much worse before the patch. Regardless, good idea overall but hurt by some bugginess.

- Both fights with Bane were made more annoying than they had to be, particularly on New Game +, by all the random dorks the game drops on you while you're trying to fight Bane. Especially when he does that stupid "bull charge" move, which is already annoying enough because so much of the time he "magically" hits you even when you dodge at the right time. I lost track of how many times I jumped far out of the way, only for him to be drawn to me like a magnet and run me over; this usually ended up with me pinned against a wall, where he'd do the same thing and I'd lose all my health in five seconds between him ramming me and the other idiots dogpiling me. There were times when it seemed like every single time I'd stun Bane, three other guys would attack me at once before I could even hit him, and then he'd charge and I'd be unable to dodge in time. Again, not terrible, but could've been tightened up. The normally-stupid enemy AI was magically super-aggressive during the Bane fights and it was aggravating.

- Magic Snipers. Seriously, there's a bunch of times when they absolutely should not be able to see you, but they do, and then you're dead in two hits no matter how much you upgraded your armor. The enemy AI is basically very inconsistent, being either brick-stupid or magically flawless, and the snipers are a good example. It got to the point where if the snipers spotted me, I'd just restart from the last checkpoint rather than try to run away or fight them.

- Graphics "pop-up" or "draw-in". It's minor, but I can't get over how when you go to select one of the alternate Batman skins, it starts out all blurry for a second and the game has to "draw" it in front of you. That feels sloppy and unfinished.

- Robin being Multiplayer Only. Why bother even having him playable? This was super-annoying, because the character skins look great and I would very much like to be able to at least play as him on regular Challenge maps, like Bruce or Deathstroke.

- Unobtainable Skins/DLC. This is GARBAGE whenever companies do this. Having a skin locked behind something like "WBID", which you can't even use anymore, is ridiculous and never should have been done. Likewise, I wasn't aware when I got the game that the PS3 version of the game had exclusive Knightfall skins and Challenge Maps, along with the Adam West Batman skin. I can see it being a limited-time "exclusive", but at some point it should have been released for the 360 as well. Preferably for free under Season Pass, but even if it was like $5 paid DLC that would be acceptable. Better than just "you can never own this unless you bought the PS3 version". I like the game a lot, but I'm not buying it again just for that. Even if I had bought the PS3 version instead, the fact that stuff was never made available on 360 is unacceptable. Companies need to stop doing that sh*t.

(Cont.)

[Andrew NDB]

I didn't get far into Origins. It was a birthday present years and years ago. I played it a little bit and then never again. Then I got to a certain point in Arkham Knight where I'd get killed right away by 12 thugs and just sort of gave up on the series.

[Leo656]

Things I Liked/Loved:

Pretty much everything else, but I'll do a few specifically.

- The graphics/overall look of the game. That's consistent with the entire series but bears mentioning again. I really liked all the character designs.

- Boss Fights. Really creative and well-done. Deathstroke and Copperhead stand out in particular. I laughed my ass off at the Electrocutioner "fight"; that was unexpected and very clever.

- "Most Wanted" Side Missions. Great way to include some of the various villains who weren't part of the main plot. The Anarky stuff was cool, good use of a relatively minor character. Yeah, some of these felt a little like padding - Go Here, fight bad guys, blow up this thing, repeat - but it still felt organic to the storyline and the gameplay.

- World-Building. This series has always been great for that. I love the little ambient conversations with the random grunts scattered around the city, and how they'd react to events from earlier in the game. It really goes a long way towards making the city feel real and lived-in. A lot of the dialog repeats after a while, but it's no big deal.

- Combat. Again, maybe the thing the series is most known for. It admittedly doesn't feel as "tight" here as it did in Asylum and City, but still very good. I love the dynamic physics where depending on where you are your attacks might see you DDT a guy into a wall, smash their face into a railing, or what have you. Very brutal. I also love how Batman will finish someone off after he interrogates them, some of those hits look brutal, like when he drops a knee across a guy's face for example. Good stuff.

- Bruce Wayne and Deathstroke DLC. The Challenge Maps have always been a fun addition to keep people playing once the main story is done, and these are a great addition. I liked that Bruce's were done with their own mini-Story for them.

- Roster of Villains. Some great picks here, including Shiva who seemingly never gets any love. And everyone they included made sense for the story and felt like they fit perfectly. Nobody felt like they were there just to be there, except for Electrocutioner for obvious reasons.

- Unlockable/Downloadable Skins. I'll be honest, I'm never going to use most of these, and I wish that they'd instead gone with some of the ones that ended up being used in other Arkham games, instead. But I love that they even bother to do this stuff at all. I just wish that when a new game came out, they'd still keep the skins that came with the previous game(s) and simply added more new ones, rather than most of them only being in one game and not the others. Also, this game needed a "classic" Neal Adams-inspired skin, the blue-and-gray with the "yellow oval" Bat-logo. Seeing as how they included the First Appearance skin - which looks way better in this game than it ever did on the printed page - it's kind of unforgivable that we don't get a "classic" Batman skin as well. Especially since the Adam West skin, the closest to that design, is PS3-only.

As is, I mostly play with either the First Appearance skin or the "Long Halloween" skin, with the latter being a fairly decent compromise (even though I hate the long "biker shorts" on Batman), but c'mon guys. They knew everyone would want the "classic" skin, and it feels like it was excluded for no reason than spite.

- The Story. I'll be honest, my opinion might shift when I play Asylum and City again, but I *think* this might be my favorite Story in the series thus far. As far as stories regarding Batman's first meeting with the Joker go, this is definitely one of the better ones, to me. It's pretty straightforward, nothing shocking or incredibly unexpected, I just think it was well-done on the whole even if it wasn't especially groundbreaking. I got a kick out of the Joker's Red Hood flashback sections as well, along with little things like Batman's Red Hood bulletin board in the Batcave which foreshadow Joker's eventual involvement in the story later on.

- "Cold, Cold Heart" DLC. I played through this after beating New Game +, and I really dug it. Again, not a ton of new wrinkles on the classic Mr. Freeze origin story, but I'll take "simple but well-done" any day. I liked how with the environmental changes and so on, it made revisiting parts of the map you'd already played through in the main game feel fresh. I also liked the beginning section where you played as Bruce in Wayne Manor, even though it felt a bit derivative of the stages in the "Batman Begins" game where you did essentially the same thing. But altogether it was a great addition to the main game.

- Voice Acting. I'll be honest, I think I prefer Batman and Joker's voices here over Conroy and Hammill. At the very least, they were similar enough so as not to be distracting. Not a popular opinion, I know, but as "iconic" as those guys are I've always been annoyed by how people insist nobody but them can do the roles any justice.
-------------------

So yeah, "Origins" has a bit of a mixed reputation but I think it holds up just fine alongside Asylum and City. It definitely has some problems, but what I think hurts those parts the most is how easy they'd be to have fixed. It very well could have been the best game in the series with just a little more polish. As it is, I still think it's really good.

One thing I couldn't help but think of while playing this game, was how badly I wished they would have done a game where you had Batman, Robin, and Nightwing as playable characters and could switch between them GTA V-style. That would have been amazing.

I'm also aggravated that Robin and Nightwing have such minimal presence in this series as a whole, to the point where you could kind of remove them from existence completely and the series would not be very much different. With an eight-year gap in-story between Origins and Asylum, there's still plenty of fertile storytelling ground where you could very easily cover all the Robin stuff, and I'm annoyed that they didn't bother. It comes off like, "Well, we put them in a little bit because we put everything else from the mythos in there, but we're rather embarrassed of Robin and only did so at gunpoint." You really get the feeling that the writers wished they didn't have to touch on Robin/Nightwing at all. That's a shame. Especially with how strongly Origins leans on "Batman can't do it all by himself" as a point. You'd think a game where they covered Robin's origin was a no-brainer. But again, I have a strong feeling they only did anything with Robin because they were "forced" to.

Anyways, great game, barring a few annoying parts. More to come as I'll be covering each game individually as I go along. Feel free to add whatever.

[IMJ]

Love the first two. Loved 'em. Never bought Origins because my gaming was tapering off more and more by that point and I had read some believably negative stuff about it (couldn't tell you what that was at this point).

Wanted to play Knight on the PS4 because it looked like City but amped up - I guess you could drive the friggin' Batmobile in it. But by that point I had two or three PS4 games in the shrink wrap and never bough it. I still have "The Sunken City" untouched in my collection. LOL!

But the Arkham games were great for my hand in them. Asylum was a very tough Platinum. I think it came down to doing some of the combos for me to get it. To this day I'm probably still like 80 or 90% of the trophies on City.

[Sumac]

I've completed all 4 games few years ago and can say, aside from the Asylum all others had their problems in one way or the other. My minireviews of them:

Asylum - rare example of a perfect game, with amazing gameplay and setting. Story is whatever, but characters represented in amazing way. Battle system is cool.

City - bloated and boring. Story is whatever, but bad. Gameplay is somehow become worse and feels slower. Setting is boring.

Origins - next best thing to Asylum. City feels dead, but at least game has new types of enemies, which make fighting system more interesting to use and proper boss fights. Story is not bad, but could have been better, if it didn't had certain villain.

Knight - amazing controls and not much else. Gameplay feels like a downgrade from Origins. Batmobile segments are cool, but feel like they were meant for another game. Story is **** and lack of boss battles, except for one single optional boss battle, makes it a rather messy experience. It is not a bad game, but very lackluster for the final game in the series. Its like Rocksteady didn't know what to do with it.

[Andrew NDB]

I LOVED Arkham City. I got everything I wanted and more from it. Everyone was perfect in that except for Bane.

Arkham Knight... such a slog to get through. The Batmobile bits were cool for like the first 4 or 5 times then it became a chore, especially the ones where the Batmobile figures into the little geographical "puzzles" you have to solve around you, by bringing it to you or over a certain way.

[ProphetofGanja]

Originally Posted by Andrew NDB

The Batmobile bits were cool for like the first 4 or 5 times then it became a chore, especially the ones where the Batmobile figures into the little geographical "puzzles" you have to solve around you, by bringing it to you or over a certain way.

Yeah, freaking same. I took longer to get through Knight just because some of the batmobile bits got so tedious and frustrating.

I remember liking Origins a lot when I played it, I borrowed a friend's copy after playing Asylum and City. I can't remember too much else about each game specifically though, been a long while since I played.

[Leo656]

Since I'm going in storyline order, last night I started on Arkham Origins: Blackgate - Deluxe Edition (Xbox 360). Never played this one before, heard a lot of very mixed things. So far it's... okay. Like it's not "bad" and some parts of it are actually rather impressive, but on the whole it's a bit underwhelming. I'm not very far into it, so far I've just hit each of the main areas in the prison just far enough to get the weapons I needed to progress - the Explosive Gel, Bat Claw, and the zipline thing - and stopped just before the Penguin boss fight since it was like 4am by that point.

Same format, I'll get the negatives out of the way first so it doesn't seem like it's all gripes. I like to end on a positive note, generally.

Things That Bug Me:

- Combat. It's admirable that they managed to condense the combat almost in its entirety from the main games into a 2.5 side-scroller, but right away it feels very "off". I do not especially recommend playing this game immediately after Origins or one of the other games in the series; you hit the same buttons to do the attacks and counters, but it does not feel right at all. The hits lack weight, the timing for counters is way off, and the physics feel wrong. Bad guys go down like they're made of cement, and it lacks the satisfying feeling of taking them out in the main games, where a well-timed uppercut or spin-kick would send a guy flying through the air like a rag doll. Here, they just kind of crumple, and again, the hits don't feel like they connect as solidly as they should in the first place.

It's nothing you can't adjust to, but it feels like it should've been easy enough to fix and they just didn't bother. Given how essential the combat has always been to the Arkham series, this might be THE most unforgivable sin this game has.

- Movement in general. Batman is SO stiff, and playing this game on it's linear 2.5D plane immediately following Origins is jarring. You keep feeling like you should be able to go to places you can't go because you're on a fixed plane and can (mostly) only move left and right. But you'll still be trying to move around and explore the levels in a more free-roaming style because that's what you're used to. Again, it's something you can adjust to, but it feels very stiff and clunky immediately after playing Origins, and it also feels more stiff than most other Batman side-scrollers historically have been.

- Storyline Repetition. I like the idea of being confined just to Blackgate; it hearkens back to the first game in the series with Asylum, and it fits the more scaled-down approach (since this was originally a handheld game). But ANOTHER riot at the prison? COME ON. Two in one day during Origins was already kind of flimsy, the the point even that game sort of poked fun at it a little bit. Now three months later there's ANOTHER riot? It's not really this game's fault, it makes storyline sense and in a vacuum it's a great way to go. But again, it feels incredibly redundant immediately after Origins. I'm not sure what else they could have done but it definitely feels a bit lazy.

- Too Much Backtracking. I'll be blunt, I'm never a huge fan of "Metroidvania"-style games anyway because to me, they feel like they're almost entirely padding. They always feel like there's a couple hours of solid gameplay, drawn out to needless length by forcing you to revisit places you've already been to multiple times because "This upgrade is hidden behind a destructible wall; this door they show you during the first hour of the game only opens after you beat a Boss about three or four hours later," and stuff like that. I don't hate that stuff, but it's definitely not my favorite and it NEVER feels organic at all. At some point those games become mind-numbing, to me.

It's worse in this game because...

- Lack of Enemies/General Emptiness. So far, there's hardly any enemies to fight (as mentioned, I'm about a third or halfway through each of the three areas of the prison, and haven't done any Boss Fights yet besides Bronze Tiger), and they don't respawn. There is a TON of backtracking in this game, which means that most of your time is spent (stiffly) running down empty hallways, vents, and corridors. This gets very boring and tedious. It does not feel like a "prison riot" scenario, at least not yet. It just feels like there's a few guys hanging out in an otherwise-empty prison just waiting for Batman to show up so they can very lazily try and fight him. Maybe it gets better near the back half, but so far the game just feels more empty and lifeless than it should. Origins felt so vibrant and full of life by comparison that playing this one right after feels like a huge step back.

I'm allowing for technical limitations since this was originally a handheld game, but it still doesn't feel quite right, and going back through areas you've already cleared is boring as hell.

- The Map. It's terrible. It's hard to tell which icon is your current position, it's very hard to tell where you're actually going as the map is at an odd angle which does not correspond to the direction you're facing ("Left" is not Left on the map, for example), and sometimes it looks like you're in the right room to find that one switch or collectible when in truth it's on the floor above or below you. The maps in the main series are so simple that I can't imagine why they went with this style for this, it's needlessly cluttered and complicated. They should have just used the exact same map style.

- The comic book-style cutscenes. I don't hate the idea of them, but I hate how they're drawn. They don't look anything like the in-game characters, which is especially jarring when it cuts from one of these to an in-game cutscene featuring the actual graphics engine. Really bad, needed someone much better on art duties here.

Things I Like:

- The Story (Mostly). Again, the prison riot scenario is redundant after Origins, but in a vacuum it's fine. Having Black Mask, Penguin and Joker each take over a section of the prison is a neat idea, and continues the story from Origins in a cool way since those three all had huge problems with each other by the end of that ordeal. I like the consistency and I like how it moves things forward from Origins in a nice way. Having Catwoman and Task Force X as part of the plot are also nice touches. Again, the only really "bad" thing about the plot is "We literally just had TWO Blackgate riots in the last game".

It does reinforce the series' narrative that Blackgate simply isn't equipped to handle these guys, which is why Arkham Asylum is necessary, but by the end of Origins I feel like we'd already made that point pretty f*cking clear already.

- The graphics. The in-game graphics do a nice job of recreating the look of the main games, and it looks a lot better than I expected. A lot of the prison looks a bit too bland and similar, except the section where Joker took over, but it definitely all feels consistent with the main series and much better than I'd expect a 2.5D side-scroller to look, just in general.

- Effort, if not Execution. You can tell they really did try to squeeze as much from the main games down into a handheld game as they possibly could, and I think they mostly did an okay job. It definitely needed to be tightened up, but again, it's not a bad attempt. Just should have had more time in the oven.

- Voice acting. Again, consistent with the main games, very well done.

That's about all I have to say about this one right now. I'll have more to add once I play through the rest of it later on tonight. I'm aware it's not very long, I just started it really late last night so I only played part of it. I think you have to play it three times to see all the different endings and get one of the unlockable costumes; not sure if I'll bother but if the second half of the game picks up a bit then I might.

In summation, so far I don't think Blackgate is "bad" but it definitely could have been a lot better without a whole lot of work being done to get there. In some ways, that annoys me more than games that are just plain busted. Especially since this "Deluxe Edition" came out way later than the original handheld ones did, you'd think they could have just fixed some of this stuff. As it is, it feels a bit unfinished.

[Leo656]

Wow, was not actually expecting so many responses already. Nice.

Couple things...

- Yeah, it's annoying to a point how in Origins, once AGAIN the Joker ends up being the main enemy (I'm not worrying about f*cking spoilers in a decade-old series, I'm just not ). But like I said, as "first encounters" go I felt like it was one of the better ones, so I forgive it. It is annoying how they blatantly lied by setting up Black Mask as the main villain during the marketing, but I felt like the way the game executed the twist made sense.

They could just as well have called the entire series "Batman vs. Joker" just to have a little more truth in advertising. But it's whatever, that's the main through-line they chose for the series because "Joker Sells Product". At least the games did still find a way to represent most of the other major Batman villains along the way. I wasn't as put off about it as a lot of people seem to have been. When it comes to Joker being the main villain, they're damned either way. They "have" to do it even though it's redundant, because if they don't they'd just have a ton of "This would have been better with Joker in it" complaints, plus they're forever worried that a game without Joker will sell less and didn't want to take any chances. It is what it is.

- See, I don't remember a ton about City since it's been so long, but I didn't think the city in Origins felt "dead" or "lifeless" at all. It seemed (going from memory) to have a lot more enemies on the map and a lot more ambient chatter than Asylum and City did, which I appreciated. I remember gliding around the map in Asylum after beating the main game and having it feel like there was no point, it all felt really empty. Origins' Gotham feels pretty vibrant to me (allowing for the storyline fact that all civilians were evacuated from the city). But again, when I replay the others I'll have more to say about that, probably. All I can say on that specific criticism in regard to Origins is, "I disagree".

- Yeah, I've heard a lot of bad stuff about Arkham Knight. I still look forward to finally playing it. Again, the lies during the marketing are annoying; anyone who didn't know that Arkham Knight was Jason Todd has never read a Batman comic, and I hate that kinda sh*t. I'm fine that they picked him but that was some "Cumberbatch totally isn't playing Khan in Star Trek: Into Darkness" type stuff. Don't insult people with very obvious lies, and maybe don't rely so heavily on "twists" to sell your product. Especially when everyone can see it coming anyway.

I'll probably like the game more than most people, as that ends up being the case with everything, generally. But I'm prepared to like it the least out of the four.
-------------

I forgot to mention how I really liked the music in Origins. Felt very much in line with the Zimmer score from Nolan's movies, and to me that's a great thing.

[AquaParade]

I remember being a bit deflated when I started the game, coming off Arkham City, which did a much better job at introducing the world and "putting you in Batman's shoes." AC built things up well, so you could feel the polish. I remember Origins of just tossing you into it. First impressions are strong.

Granted, I played this game over a decade ago.

The combat was sort of broken by the shock-gauntlets, but still fun nonetheless.

Last thing I remember appreciating was the winter atmosphere of Gotham and I think the rooftops were higger than in City, for more verticality.

Oh yeah, lastly, I actually appreciated the story, the most out of all the Arkham Games. Despite not having Conroy and Hammil in the roles.

It was a solid entry into the series, imo.

[ProphetofGanja]

Originally Posted by Leo656

Yeah, I've heard a lot of bad stuff about Arkham Knight. I still look forward to finally playing it. Again, the lies during the marketing are annoying; anyone who didn't know that Arkham Knight was Jason Todd has never read a Batman comic, and I hate that kinda sh*t. I'm fine that they picked him but that was some "Cumberbatch totally isn't playing Khan in Star Trek: Into Darkness" type stuff. Don't insult people with very obvious lies, and maybe don't rely so heavily on "twists" to sell your product. Especially when everyone can see it coming anyway.

Even knowing the twist, the story in Knight isn't bad.

But get ready for a fvck-ton of Riddler trophies!!!

[AquaParade]

I loved Arkham Knight. It’s my favorite of the series.

The Batmobile was overused, for sure, but I still had fun with it overall. Frankly, it was worth it, for being able to call the Batmobile whenever you were free roaming. That type of immersion combined with the upgraded graphics, and polish applied to the city, made for such a great experience for me.

My advice with that game is to upgrade all the Batmobile components first, if you’re trying to minimize your required time spent in it.

[Leo656]

Yeah, I can't imagine how tough it must have been to work the Batmobile into a game that was built entirely around the grappling/gliding travel mechanic.

In reading about the series, it seems like from the beginning they'd always hoped to have the Batmobile, but it was a case of "We can focus on one mechanic and do it really well, OR we can have both driving and rooftop travel and have each of them be less than they should be", and in the end they spent the resources on making the grappling/gliding perfect, since that was what you'd spend most of the game doing. Probably a wise decision. Like, NOT having the Batmobile feels weird on a surface level, but then at the same time while I'm swinging around Gotham I'm like, "Yeah, the car would probably break this." Like, by default it would have to be a completely different kind of game, or at the least it would be next to impossible to include vehicles without making the rooftop travel redundant. "Why glide when you can just drive?" Kinda like how in GTA games, once you get the jetpack the entire game is "broken" and you never need cars again. Stuff like that is tricky to balance.

It must have been INCREDIBLY difficult for them to figure out, and I'm not surprised that it sounds like they didn't really nail it. Especially since Arkham Knight was the "last" game in the series and they never had a chance to polish it any further.

Regardless, even though it's not perfect I expect to get a kick out of it. We'll see, it'll be a few weeks before I get there, most likely.
----------

I can't 100% any of these games. Usually because of the Challenge Maps. I think the closest I got was Asylum, but there were like one or two Medals I just couldn't crack. I'm okay with it, I do prefer to 100% most stuff I play but I don't have the patience to spend hours on one map trying to do it flawlessly anymore. I remember in one of the previous games getting within a hair of getting the highest score and then missing the Medal because I'd taken a single punch, or broken a combo too soon. After that I'm like "Eh, if I do it then fine and if not I don't care." I "can't" miss any story-related stuff or main game side missions, but I'm not as strict with myself about Challenge Maps anymore. That's just something I mess with when I'm bored before bed but don't want to stop playing yet.
----------

I want to find the guy who said "These games each need 400+ Riddler Trophies" and beat him into a coma with a sack of oranges. In front of his kids. These games would be SO MUCH BETTER if that stuff was kept to a more reasonable amount. As it is, it's intolerable and makes the games a chore. IF you're obsessive about sh*t like I am.
-----------------

I'm aware there's a spinoff coming out, "Gotham Knights" or something? Am I mistaken or is that supposedly more or less "having multiple playable characters and being able to swap between them", as I put forth earlier? Could be cool, but again, I'd much prefer a game like that with Batman, Robin, and Knightwing, and maybe Batgirl as well but definitely those three at least. As I said, that eight years between Origins and Asylum has so much stuff they could go back and fill in, especially with Robin and Knightwing. A GTA V-style spin would be fantastic if done right.

Maybe they'll get around to it, I don't know. I just know I'm mad they haven't by now. It feels like a logical next step, since the standard formula seems to have been thoroughly done by the time Arkham Knight came out.

[Sumac]

I feel like they integrated Batmobile in the game, because, they were afraid to mess with core mechanics.

[Turo602]

I actually started up my New Game Plus playthroughs of the Return to Arkham games around October and was surprised to learn Arkham Asylum didn't actually have one. So I played the game on Hard and I was honestly shocked at how amazing it still is. Especially after having completed the final Spider-Man DLC right before which was just a repeat of the other DLCs which is just the same stuff you did in the game numerous times already.

Arkham Asylum on the other hand has such incredible pacing that never devolves into doing the same thing for too long despite its core gameplay revolving around free-flow combat and stealthy predator segments. Both concepts evolve in various ways throughout the game, often forcing the player to broaden their skill set by incorporating new elements and challenges into the regular formula.

But the flow of gameplay is also greatly improved by the Riddler challenges that reward those who pay attention to detail and are familiar with Batman lore. Even the Riddler trophies feel rewarding simply because they encourage you to explore the environment and use your gadgets. But then the game goes the extra mile to keep things fresh with its trippy Scarecrow segments, platforming sections, and Killer Croc's sewer maze.

Yet somehow, Arkham City still completely blows me away by just how much it expanded on the original's gameplay. There were so many things I'd try to do during my Asylum playthrough that I was surprised to learn originated in City. I've also found myself completely missing all the Riddler stuff during New Game Plus. The game just feels incomplete without it and completely robs the experience of its rewarding progression which I greatly appreciated after replaying Arkham Asylum.

I almost regret not just jumping into New Game Plus the first time around like I did with the original release. Especially because you start out with so many gadgets from the previous playthrough and have to relearn everything without the proper context after so much time. The overworld is also just completely barren without the Riddler stuff too.

Regardless, it was still a lot of fun despite mostly running through the story, and the side missions definitely add some meat to the Riddler Challengeless run. I was a little underwhelmed by Arkham Asylum's remastered visuals, but Arkham City is much more noticeably better looking than I remember it being.

I was actually really looking forward to getting back into Arkham Knight after as I only played it once so I could play New Game Plus later. But after having done that with Arkham City, I'm hoping it doesn't impact my experience too much as I actually found the Riddler Challenges to be a huge part of the fun as they often give you that light bulb moment any good Metroidvania does when you acquire a new gadget and return to an area or puzzle you can now solve.

I actually really enjoyed Arkham Knight when I played it. A lot more than most since I actually didn't mind the Batmobile at all. It really was the last piece of the Batman experience that these games have been really nailing and the same is true about the Batmobile. It feels amazing to control and it's such a beast too with how it just plows through the environment so that you never have to deal with it getting stuck on random pieces of geometry which would have really hurt the game otherwise.

So many people harp on how often the Batmobile is used but not enough is said about how well it's used. The tank battles and Riddler Tracks may be unnecessary components of a Batman game, but they're not exactly bad either. As far as video game diversions go, they could have done a lot worse. Not once did it ever feel like a chore to have to be in the Batmobile because it never felt awful to actually use. Yeah, it's a shame most of the boss fights were relegated to Batmobile sections, but that's more a problem with less traditional boss fight encounters than it is having to use the damn thing itself.

I would have loved better boss encounters myself, especially after how well they were done in Arkham Origins, but as far as the Batmobile goes, it was implemented incredibly as it often served as an extension of Batman's arsenal. The whole thing honestly feels overblown, which I attribute to the typical crowd of A.D.D. gamers that immediately get stumped once they're thrown out of their comfort zone in a game and refuse to either learn simple mechanics or simply get better. I honestly thought I wasn't going to be able to play as Batman much or that I'd hate the Batmobile after how much people b*tched about it until I played it myself and saw just how full of sh*t everyone was.

Arkham Knight definitely has its issues, the lack of traditional boss fights being one of them and the underwhelming Arkham Knight character who pretty much just muddles the story up. The tank battles and Riddler Tracks were definitely a stretch as it was obvious they just wanted to get as much mileage from the Batmobile as they could, but it definitely didn't ruin the overall experience nor did it feel like Batman was featured less because of it.

It's easily the best Batman game even if it's not as well rounded as Arkham City. The improvements made to the gameplay and overall experience have been completely glossed over because all everyone talks about is how much the Arkham Knight reveal sucked and how terrible the Batmobile was... It's honestly a shame that Arkham Knight has such a terrible reputation for what an amazing game it is. It was actually the reason I had started replaying the games in October as I was looking forward to revisiting it the most after having beaten it the first time.

Unfortunately, I ended up being distracted by other things around the time I finished Arkham City. I'll definitely come back here though after I replay it to see if I feel any different about it. But I have also recently learned that Arkham Origins is backwards compatible with the Xbox Series X, but for some reason, only the physical version, which I have, but never seeing it available for purchase digitally did certainly lead me to believe it wasn't. So I might get to that before Arkham Knight as it is the Batman game I remember the least about. I just remember really liking the boss fights and new mechanics, but it was also the only Batman game I ever really felt burnt out by from all the padding.

[Leo656]

I love posts like this, and I'd sincerely love to see such in-depth thoughts from more people on the topic. Thanks buddy.

I mean, I'll never agree on the Riddler stuff, or at least I will never be as in love with it. Like I said, I like the idea of it and I do think it adds to the games to a POINT. I just think they went completely overboard with it and it's pretty much my least favorite thing to do in the games. It *feels* like Video Game Busywork, to me, whereas "Go blow up all of Black Mask's drug stashes" and "Stop Anarky's Bombs" feels more organically like part of the story. It feels more like "authentic Batman stuff". Whereas I feel like a twat when I'm taking time out of the main game to go chase hidden collectibles in every nook and cranny of the map.

"I know there's a gang fight over there I should be breaking up, and I know there's assassins hunting me, and I know I need to find out who murdered so-and-so... BUT FIRST, let me glide off this rooftop, land on this switch, propel myself over this other rooftop without touching anything, land on this other switch, throw a Batarang through an electric fence, down a shaft and into an electric box, crawl through this vent, then do the Safety Dance while reciting the entire second stanza of the Star Spangled Banner so I can grab this Riddler Trophy. THEN I'll get back to saving the city." It just doesn't feel right at all.

The possible solution would obviously be to save all the Riddler Trophies until the main game is over with. But as I said, I tried that with Arkham City, just grabbing the "easy" ones and saving the rest until after the story was done, and the feeling that now ALL there was left to do in the game was find the rest of them just made me not want to play the game anymore at all. I kinda f*cked myself with that. "The only thing left to do now, is your least-favorite thing, for X hours." I thought I could do it that way, but I got bored WAY too fast and never touched the game again even though I loved playing it.

With "Origins", I made it a point to collect every single Data Pack that I could along the way, before completing the story, since I knew I'd have to replay the game on New Game + for things like the Dark Knight Challenges anyways. That way, on the second run all I'd have to worry about was the "real" stuff, the main story and the side missions. And I gotta say... the second run was a LOT more fun, for me. Not only because I had all the upgrades but because every second of the game felt "real", like I was "really" Batman going around doing stuff and every bit of it felt like it was vital to saving the city. I never felt like I was a rat in a maze jumping through arbitrary hoops to pick up meaningless collectibles, and thus my immersion in the game was never broken at all on my New Game + playthrough. Basically, New Game +, not needing to worry about the Data Packs, was the game I actually wanted to play. It was harder, but infinitely more fun and never for a moment felt like a chore. I was happy that you still had to disarm Enigma's towers and beat up his informants, though, so there was still a little bit of him being involved. But again, even that stuff felt "real" whereas the Packs/Trophies just feel VERY much like "Video Game Bullsh*t".

I'm not in any way trying to invalidate your experience, by the way. I can totally understand your opinion, especially in how you've explained it. This is just how it comes off to me, and why they're my least favorite parts of these games. For me, they're tedious and they ruin the immersion.

BUT, that's not to say I completely hate them or that they have no purpose at all. I agree that they can give you a reason to see more of the game's map (it kinda doesn't matter to me since I typically go around exploring every inch anyways, but I can see the value in it in that regard). And they can teach you some mechanics that might come in handy later... although oftentimes, they don't. Like the ones that force you to glide a certain way, or hit switches in order without touching anything but the switches, stuff like that... you NEVER "have" to use the skills they're forcing you to use for that stuff in the main game proper, and so again it just feels like Video Game Bullsh*t. Like, ideally, if you needed to use a complicated mechanic or series of moves in order to get a Trophy, it's because that skill will be necessary later on during a Boss fight or something and the game is "forcing" you to learn it so you'll be good at it later. And SOME of them are in fact that, but a lot of them aren't, and those cases just feel like the game screwing with you.

I don't know. Like I said, I understand why they're in there, a lot of what you said about their value and function is actually stuff I agree with to a point... I just feel like they overdid it for most of the games. It took me less than half the time to complete Origins on New Game + than it did the first time around, meaning that I spent way more time on my first run chasing collectibles than I did playing the "real" game. I can only sigh at that. It will forever feel unbalanced to me.

But hey man, the great thing about these games is there's a lot to do and a lot of variety. So if the Riddler gimmicks are some of your favorite stuff, then I'm happy for you. I'm getting old, and my backlog is getting bigger every day, so to me, it all just feels like very transparent padding that keeps me away from other things I'd rather do. But that has nothing to do with you or anyone else's experience.
---------------------

I really am looking forward to playing Arkham Knight, even though I've read the Wiki and had the whole thing spoiled for me and I think I'm gonna sigh at the ending pretty hard. I imagine my experience will probably fall more in line with yours than with some other folks. Despite my reputation for being a crab-ass who "hates everything", it's really more like I just have a laser-focused hatred towards very specific things, and that when I hate something it's deep and it's permanent. But I'm actually very, very forgiving about most things, compared to most people. It takes a LOT to annoy me... it's just that when something does, it becomes a nuclear f*cking hatred.

So yeah, even if Arkham Knight isn't my favorite in the series I can't imagine I'll be as harsh as some people are. We shall see!

With regard to Jason Todd, I can't help but notice that game was in the middle of the huge "Put Jason Todd in everything" push across various DC media; I think that's partly why the "big surprise" was so easy to see from ten miles away - "How can it be anyone BUT Jason Todd when DC is cramming him down our f*cking throats lately?"

But I gotta say, aside from the lies it doesn't bother me. I sincerely don't care about "surprises" at all, and I'm on record as feeling like if something relies heavily on a "surprise" then it probably lacks substance. From what I've read, even though the character is a bit extraneous to the main plot of the game it still makes some logical sense, and at least they found a place for him in the series. I'll probably be fine with it.
----------------

I'm surprised they didn't retrofit a New Game + Mode onto Arkham Asylum for the remasters. That might have made me buy it again. As it is, I'm still fine with my original copies of Asylum and City. I'm not in love with the idea of doing everything AGAIN just to play the games in HD.

From what I recall, no New Game + was one of the few complaints a ton of people had about the first game, to the point where they announced right away that Arkham City would have one. I loved Asylum, but it would definitely be a blast if you could play it over with all the upgrades. That would really add some replay value.

As is, I'm wrestling with whether or not to go for the Riddler Trophies again when I replay Asylum or just rip through the Story. All the games that have New Game +, I plan to do what I did with Origins - one "tedious" playthrough where I hunt all the collectibles, then a "straight" playthrough on New Game + not having to worry about anything but the story. I'll probably just get them all again in Asylum because my conscience will nag me if I don't. But man, I'm not in love with the idea.

[Leo656]

-------------------

I figure we can talk about other Batman games, too. Why not? It's my thread and I have never been a stickler for "the rules".

- I still love "Batman Begins" and I still feel it has value and is a lot of fun to play, even though all the Arkham games are "better" in just about every way from an objective sense. That was by far "the best Batman game ever" until Arkham Asylum came out. I don't think anyone expected Asylum to be the amazing piece of work that it was. But I don't feel like Begins is obsolete just because other, better Batman games exist. I still pull it out for a run every couple years or so and I always have fun with it. Especially those killer Batmobile missions! I feel like it's been unfairly ignored, even before Arkham came out, simply because as a movie-based game it had a stigma. But it's easily one of the best movie-based games ever made, regardless.

Like if I want a huge, sprawling, totally immersive Batman experience with near-total freedom, I play an Arkham game. If I want a simple, tight, straightforward game and only feel like being Batman for a weekend in between other games, then Batman Begins hits that sweet spot perfectly. I find great joy and satisfaction sometimes in "weekender" games. I don't always need an epic.

- One Batman game I own, never played, and have heard an incredible amount of negative stuff about is "Dark Tomorrow". I've never seen anyone here talk about having played it; is it really THAT bad? I think I paid like $10 for it. I've had it for over ten years but I just never bothered with it yet.

In reading about the development of it, the fascinating thing seems to be that on paper, they actually had all the same gameplay ideas as what ended up going into the Arkham games... but either the technology wasn't there yet OR the developers just completely botched the project, OR it could have been "A little of A, a little of B", I guess. I see it constantly on "Worst Games Ever" list. It *looks* okay, graphically I mean; not "great" but perfectly acceptable for the time it was made. Not having played it I can't speak to how the gameplay might be. But when I see stuff like "2 out of 10" it makes me wonder. Few games are honestly THAT bad, so I admit that I'm curious.

It sounds intriguing with the storyline, being based on the comics, all that. BUT, on the other hand, it was made by the same people who made the "Superman: The Man of Steel" game for Xbox, and that game was... flawed. Now, I didn't think that game on the whole was AS bad as people said, but there were definitely a few individual parts that had me ready to break my TV in a rage. So I wouldn't be shocked if the Batman game those same people made is not great, but I'd be a little surprised if it truly is "2 out of 10" bad.

Maybe I'll force myself to play it after I do the Arkham run. "That was some awesome steak, now I'd like some crap, please."

[Andrew NDB]

This thread inspires me to try them again. Does Origins have a remaster, or just the Rocksteady trilogy?

[Leo656]

No remaster, sorry. But I wouldn't let that stop you.

I'll say this much, and I came back because I forgot before to say this to you, specifically: I know how much you love Bane - the real Bane - and you really should try Origins again for that reason if nothing else. He's all over Origins, and he's presented properly for a change. They still "ruin" it by the end by having him get all hyped up on TN-1 (the precursor to the Titan "Super-Venom" in the later games) and turn into a 'roid monster, BUT the final fight with him is rather creative and not a rehash of the other games where you fought him, it's totally different even though it's not mind-blowing. And the TN-1 bit makes sense in-story; he's trying to cure himself of his addiction to Venom by creating a permanent one-shot solution, but it's too volatile. He only ends up using it in the game as a last resort at the very end of the game after already losing to Batman twice. "You leave me no choice... MISTER WAYNE." It actually feels logical in-story when it happens, and it kind of explains why he's a bit dumber in the other games (TN-1 causes permanent brain damage; something Bane knew but was willing to risk in his desperate final attempt to kill Batman).

There's little bits of Knightfall sprinkled into it, and Bird shows up as a side mission (even though he's physically unrecognizable). But honestly, I think you would LOVE Bane in this game. It's really, REALLY close to the comics version, far closer than has ever been done in any media. Like, they nailed it, it's pretty much perfect. He even hits you with the back-breaker if you're too slow to counter it during a Boss fight (although you can escape it if you're quick enough). But his smarts, his cunning, the whole thing where "Joker's the main villain but Bane is openly declaring that he's letting Joker play his game because it's going to lure Batman in so Bane can kill him instead, after which he plans to kill Joker anyway for being a nuisance"... it's VERY spot-on.

The only thing you'd maybe not like is the very final bit where he gets hyped on TN-1 and becomes The Hulk... but again, in-context it makes sense so you may find it forgivable. Especially since the rest of the game does a very good job of showcasing "the real Bane".

Like legit, I kept commenting out loud to my wife as I was playing, "I f*cking love Bane in this, they actually did him right for once." No smoke. He's all over the story, and you fight him three times (although two of those are nearly-identical).

I know you're very picky about Bane's presentation, and I actually thought about you specifically quite often as I played through it. "I bet Andrew would dig this part." Hopefully, you will. I *think* you will, anyways. I sure did.

[Andrew NDB]

OK, I'll check it out. And just did for a few minutes. It's getting late, but I was able to install it for free on my PS5 via PS Now streaming... so it probably actually looks worse than the disk version if I were to just play it on a PS3. But still playable.

Sadly, as soon as Batman arrives in the Batwing in the snowy compound... it freezes and I have to kill the game. Hopefully this is just a one off thing and not a sign of things to come. I'll try it again tomorrow.