Ethiopian Review

It’s easy to understand why Batman is such a compelling character. We’ve all thought that with the right amount of money, training, and some slightly science-fiction-level gadgets, we too could fight crime. Batman turns into kitsch when he has items in his utility belt that seem custom-designed for whatever random situation he finds himself in; the best writers understand that Batman works best when he relies on his wits and a small number of tools. If you’re lucky enough to punch Batman, he bleeds—this is no superhero. He has simply spent the majority of his life making sure you never get to throw that punch.

The Batman portrayed in Arkham Asylum is everything that’s great about the character. He’s not blessed with a dozen gadgets that get him out of every scrape; the Joker caught him oddly flat-footed when he took over Arkham and set this collection of super-villains after the world’s greatest detective. “I’m not sure I can stop him this time,” Batman says wearily at one point in the game, and it’s an unusual moment of vulnerability. His suit is ripped, he’s underarmed and underprepared, and his number one advantage—planning—has been taken away from him. This game puts you into Batman’s suit in the rare circumstance where he may very well be in over his head.

The Joker does give our hero one final shot before he sets his trap in motion. All Batman has to do is kill him, and all of this will be over. Arkham will be back under the control of law. No one will die. Batman goes free. The Dark Knight fights his own nature for a moment, but he doesn’t take the shot. “So predictable,” the Joker sneers, and the game is on.

It was wrong to move the Black Gate inmates here

This isn’t a tie-in to any of Christopher’s Nolan’s films, and it doesn’t operate in the same world as the animated series. It’s not even in lockstep with the comics. This is unique take on the characters and the setting of Arkham Asylum. Written by Paul Dini, it’s a very mature look at Batman, no matter what the Teen rating may have you believe. People die. The language is coarse. Batman may not kill anyone, but his style of combat is based on brutalizing his opponents until they can’t get up.

There are two forms of combat in the game. The hand-to-hand fighting is limited to one button for attacks, but the action is far from simple. You’ll have to continually attack while careening from one target to the next, all while countering their attacks and dodging blows from pipes and knives. It only takes a moment to understand the combat, but mastering it will take quite a bit longer. The more I play the game, the more elegant I find the combat, and it never becomes tiresome.

The second type of combat comes in the Invisible Predator areas where you have large spaces to terrorize your opponents. As the game continues and you unlock different attacks, you’ll be able to quickly snatch enemies from above, glide down and land with both feet on their chests, or string up the baddies from your perch. As you take down your enemies one by one they become increasingly scared, agitated, and erratic in their motions. This is when you feel like you have become Batman; in any fair fight the Joker’s henchmen would beat you easily. It’s your challenge to make sure the fight is anything but fair.

You can soften up enemies with batarangs, you can take one down before zipping away and making another pass, or you can simply jump in slugging and brawl your way out of the situation. The combat is open to your own ideas on what it means to be Batman, and finding all the different ways to inflict pain on your enemies is an absolute joy.

Fighting the demo

Many gamers became skittish after playing the demo, which was both short and linear. The real game has more than a passing resemblance to Metroidvania games like Shadow Complex in that you visit different locals around the island of Arkham Asylum, and the more you explore with each new power, the more you can find and collect. Not only are you struggling against the grand designs of the Joker to break both your body and your mind, but you’re also constantly taunted by the Riddler, who has hidden any number of puzzles and collectibles around the Asylum.

You can collect Riddler statues, you have to find different items in some rooms based on vague or misleading clues, you collect audio logs from interviews with the villains, you can smash certain amounts of the Joker’s chattering teeth you find around the levels… there is a lot to do in order to unlock content from the game. You can fly through the game and ignore all these diversions if you’d like, but revisiting old rooms knowing you can now get to a previously unexplored area with a new power stretches your play time significantly. The game is relatively linear, but you’re given the entirety of Arkham to explore and tackle at your own pace, and the island does not give up her secrets easily.

The power of character

It’s hard to single out what makes Arkham Asylum such a great game. The voice acting is amazing, although Commissioner Gordon and the Riddler are a little bit less polished than the other characters. The writing is top notch, and follows through from the dialog to the Joker’s crazed rants over the Asylum’s PA system to the inmate interviews you find scattered throughout the game. The world is absolutely jam-packed with inside jokes and references to the lore of Batman and the characters that surround him.

Listen to the Oracle describe a series of e-mails the Joker sent to a character he was trying to intimidate. She lists the bad jokes, the pictures of dead babies, and she finds references to a wheelchair darkly amusing—the Oracle was paralyzed when the Joker shot her one evening and now operates as Batman’s eyes and ears from her secured location.

These are characters with histories and relationships that may not be spelled out for those who haven’t read the comics or watched the television shows, but they are all written with that context in mind. If you go in with a broad knowledge of the Batman world, you’ll appreciate the attention to detail.

When certain characters are revealed they become almost sympathetic, even though we know they would kill anyone who stood in their way. This isn’t a game of black-and-white motivations, and we slowly find out that those who run the Asylum may have given those in their care a good reason to strike back. Batman: Arkham Asylum features storytelling on par with the best comics and even films.

Heath Ledger may have put a very deep and impressive stamp on the Joker, but when Paul Dini writes for the character and Mark Hamill voices him, for many of us it’s the definitive take on the clown prince of crime. In this game the Joker is violent, scary, and completely unpredictable. In contrast, Batman is calculating, cold, and very human. Their battle of wits and wills inside a madhouse is the stuff of legend, and here it’s treated with the respect it deserves.

In conclusion

This is the part of the review where we dig for some flaws so as not to appear to be gushing, so here goes: the aspects of the game where you track your prey in detective mode are lame. There! I feel better.

If the main game wasn’t enough, there is a series of Challenge Rooms for you to practice your combat and go for the high score, and they are way more fun than they sound and should make for some great times passing the controller back and forth between your friends.

This is a completely satisfying experience from start to finish. I’ve been up for 15 hours grinding through it and writing this review, and my main thought is how much I want to be done so I can continue playing it. This is one of the standout games of the year, licensed or not. There is a lot to do, multiple ways to do it, and one of the most popular characters of all time finally gets a video game worth his name.

The Good

• Excellent combat
• Top-notch writing and voice work
• This is the closest you’ll ever get to actually becoming Batman
• Grand selection of enemies and boss battles
• Strong love of Batman lore and the stories behind the characters and enemies
• Just the right amount of gadgets
• Compelling mixture of competency and frailty in our hero
• Completing the Riddler’s challenges adds another layer to the game

The Bad

• The detecting aspects of the game are rather weak
• It seems somewhat un-Batman-like to have to skulk in so many vents
• The Riddler could have had a stronger voice

The Ugly

• All the flame wars over which system you should buy the game on, after a screenshot is posted showing a plant is a little blurrier in one version

(By Ben Kuchera | Ars Technica)