The Therapist Gamer

It's pretty much an internationally accepted fact that video games based on movies or superheroes always suck.  They're cash-grabs by publishers that don't actually care if the game is any good or not - they just want that Harry Potter game out at the same time the film comes out. The fact that so many awesome concepts have such crappy video games is one of the biggest disgraces in the industry (seriously, a well made Harry Potter series would be amazing!).  There is one exception to this rule: Batman.  Specifically, the Batman: Arkham series.  A development studio called Rocksteady released Batman: Arkham Asylum in 2009 followed by Batman: Arkham City in 2011.  Though there were technically other games released in this series, Arkham Knight is the third Batman game released by Rocksteady.

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There was a lot of industry buzz around Arkham Asylum and I liked it a lot.  The combat was just awesome - you felt like Batman as you beat up the baddies, effortlessly blocking punches and throwing elbows to the face.  The combat mechanic is actually quite simple (you just press a button to punch and another button to counter an attack) but the fluidity of it all was unprecedented at the time; many games have since copied it.  There were some interesting story mechanics to the game, and the Joker was a great villain (voiced by Mark Hamill - one of the industry greats.  Yes - Luke Skywalker himself).  The developers payed so much attention to detail that the environment itself told part of the story.  The first game takes place entirely within an insane asylum but the sequel takes place in the whole of Gotham City.  Despite the huge environment there was still intricate attention to detail.  You could glide around the city and grapple to the rooftops.  Most critics and gamers really loved these games.  Their response was basically "Holy crap!  This is the greatest thing ever!" whereas my response was "Yeah, that was a good game."  I'm not totally sure why, but I didn't like the first two games as much as everybody else seemed to.  I liked them, but I didn't view them as some of the greatest games ever made.  With Batman: Arkham Knight, though, it finally all clicked for me.  The game is incredible.

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There are a lot of issues with modern open-world games, and Arkham Knight manages to avoid most of them.  There aren't a billion map markers to tirelessly hunt down like in Assassin's Creed, and the huge amount of quests don't get boring.  There is some repetition, but it seemed like the developers were keenly aware of that issue and mostly curbed it.  I was interested in virtually every main quest and side quest, and nothing felt bloated.  The Batman franchise has been around for so long that even random, small side quests had interesting villains and stories.  There are an insane amount of upgrades and gadgets to unlock.  It's almost too much to keep track of and you will likely settle on a few of your favorite techniques, but there's ample room to try new ways to approach virtually any situation.

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The core combat remains excellent.  I think the main reason why the combat feels so great is because it's so responsive.  I'll try to explain.  In most games, once you start an attack animation you are unable to do anything else until that animation is over.  In Street Fighter you have to wait for Ken to land from his uppercut before you can do another move.  In Dark Souls you have to finish swinging your sword before you can swing again.  In Batman, you can stop a punch "mid-punch" and block another enemy.  You can start to block an enemy but then instantly jump over their head.  Since Batman responds immediately to your button inputs it just feels more responsive and satisfying.  This type of combat isn't appropriate for every game - Ken shouldn't be able to do a spinning kick in the middle of his uppercut - but it works perfectly for Batman.  I'd regularly get in fights with large groups of enemies even if there was no gameplay reason to do so - it was so fun to fight them! 

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Maybe I'm wrong about this, but it seems like they also loosened some of the "combat rules" a bit with Arkham Knight.  Here's what I mean: if you come up to a knife wielding enemy you can hit him like normal but you can't counter his attacks - you have to dodge.  In past games you couldn't hit knife guys at all without first stunning them or flipping over them.  Overall the combat is more forgiving and I appreciated that - in past games it felt like a chore to fight certain enemies because there was only one prescribed way to defeat them.

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You can drive the Batmobile and it feels fast but burly - if you take a corner too tight on a city street you'll just smash off part of the building.  They nailed the controls of the Batmobile and it's simply fun to zip around the streets of Gotham in your insane tank.  It has a secondary mode where you can move the car in any direction.  This mode was cool but there were a couple of parts in the game where you needed to navigate narrow areas with the Batmobile and frankly these parts just felt weird and a bit forced.  Slight criticisms aside, the Batmobile is an amazing addition to a game already overflowing with fun gadgets.

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The story has a neat twist: (spoiler alert for Arkham City) since the Joker dies at the end of Arkham City he can no longer be the villain, right?  But, due to a story element I won't spoil, Batman essentially hallucinates the Joker all throughout the game. So even though he's dead we still get a double dose of Mark Hamill's exceptional voice performance as the Joker.  It sounds a bit contrived but it isn't at all and it's actually one of the best parts of the game.

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One last thing: getting around in Arkham City is simply a joy.  You can fling yourself up into the sky with your grappling hook and then immediately launch into a glide with your cape.  While gliding you can dive down and then swoop back up.  You can pretty much move anywhere throughout the city without touching the ground, and it's fun to try.  I couldn't really get a grip on these mechanics in Arkham City but they just work in Arkham Knight.

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Batman: Arkham City is a game I would pretty much universally recommend.  The style of the game might not be everyone's cup of tea, and the sheer scope of everything can be a bit much at the beginning, but it's just such a good game that I think just about anyone will like it.