365//365: Day 065 – Batman: Arkham Asylum (360)

Batman has had a bit more luck in the video game world than most other super heroes. Batman on the NES didn’t follow the first Batman movie completely, but was a challenging and extremely gratifying game. You can view my review on Batman Returns at THIS link. There were a few snafu’s along the way, most notably Batman: Dark Tomorrow on the Xbox, which was nearly unplayable thanks to a god awful control and camera scheme. It’s been a while since we’ve seen a truly good Batman game, with the fond memories of the NES and SNES games seeming like nothing more than a tease for older gamers such as myself. When will I be able to take the caped crusader for a brand new adventure, one that doesn’t suck?

Enter Batman Arkham Asylum. Enter, and you’ll never want to leave!

Mark Hamill reprises his role as the Joker, spearheading an audio performance rarely seen in video games.

Rocksteady developed a brand new story, with no relation to the comic series nor any movie release. Featuring the voices of Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill from Batman: The Animated Series, the story, featuring Joker escaping captivity and taking over Arkham Asylum, flows to a near flawless pace. The voice overs throughout Arkham Asylum are some of the strongest you’ll ever hear in a video game, with the exception of a masked thug here and there. It perfectly sets the mood, and brings out the story in a more memorable way, offering a myriad of different emotions throughout your adventure.

As you try to take down the Joker, you encounter quite a significant amount of Batman’s rogue gallery, from the bubbly Harley Quinn, to the man that once broke Batman’s back, Bane, and so on. There are random ski masked gang members thrown into the mix, a ton of sneaking around and some hand to hand action to be had. Dispatching those no named thugs can be done in multiple ways. You can sneak in and silent take-down a lone thug, glide take-down, or just jump into a pile of enemies and take them out all at once. Combat is so seamless and silky smooth, that it’s the ultimate definition of poetry in motion. You can attack with one button, hit another to throw out a stun, attack another enemy once the first is down, parry and counterattack when an enemy gets a spider sense looking alert above them, and so on. It does take just a little bit to get fully accustomed to the system, but if you need to take multiple enemies out at the same time, the combat system is at least fully competent and quite satisfying.

Arkham Asylum has been carefully detailed in every aspect, from Batman's outfit, right on through to the environments around you.

Fighting bosses, however, is a completely different beast. There’s a bit of strategy needed to get through boss encounters. Scarecrow has some Metal Gear Solid-like sneaking portions, where you have to avoid a lot of creepy things, while Bane requires dodging, batarangs and quick attacks and evasions. Each boss fight is a different experience, and pushes the envelope of creativity and gratification. After beating these bosses, you unlock more of the story progression, which leads to either enough experience points to “buy” new skills, or coming across new sub weapons, which can help open up more of the game. A lot of Arkham Asylum is not directly available to you, but finding some of the sub weapons, like the Bat Claw, which pulls open grates that blocks your progression, help unlock more of the island.

Arkham Island, Batman, Gordon and every enemy you encounter look incredibly detailed. The details all around you is beyond stunning, with excellent shading, tons of minuscule details abound and some of the best character models seen in a video game. It’s one gorgeous game all around. Every attack, location and enemy looks painstakingly detailed in ways that most other games could never have dreamed to reach before it.

While the main story has a good length to it, and there’s really no way to plow through the game, there’s still quite a few goodies to keep you coming back for more, even if you defeated the main game. There’s 240 Riddler Trophies hidden around Arkham Asylum, which in its self unlocks little goodies here and there, as well as lots of different things that add life to the world. You can find Patient Interview tapes, getting a better clue at the mental state of mind of each villain being interviewed, Character Bios of the various people, friend of foe, that you may come across, and so on. There’s a lot to experience in Arkham Asylum, and you’ll appreciate every little tidbit you come across and learn.

The combat system feels a bit clunky at first, but after a few battles, it actually functions exceptionally well, and compliments the gameplay in all the right ways.

There are a few bright lights that blind the bat somewhat. First, be patient with the early hour of the game. It’s heavy on story building, and the story is captivating, with an emphasis on getting accustomed to your attacks, how to get around and how to sneak around, by and to enemies. There’s also an overall emphasis on stealth and detective work, in the form on deciphering puzzles, finding clues and looking around your environment to see what can or can’t be used to your advantage. One thing that aids you with this, is something that puts a lot of the game into easy mode – Detective Mode. This lets you see areas highlighted in orange that you can interact with in some form or another. This also lets you see enemies through walls, making it easier to sneak up on then,, find high ground to pass them or get the drop on them. This really dummies down a significant portion of the game if you abuse it, though not everything is revealed to you through this vision mode.

Although Arkham Asylum is a visual marvel, there are a couple of minor oddities that come up. For one, the rag-doll like physics when defeating a normal thug. Occasionally, they just fall over and drop is some uncharacteristic ways, almost defying any sort of laws of physics. The other minor oddities has been seen before in a couple of other games, namely Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune — there’s too much of a gleam on a lot of the environment pieces, as well as some of the characters faces. It’s a bit more of an eyesore in Arkham Asylum than Uncharted for the simple fact that this is supposed to be a dark, grimy and gritty setting, and the gloss and shine detracts from this on occasions.

Nevertheless, there’s a ton to love about Batman Arkham Asylum, and not much to really be dissatisfied with. This is as close to being Batman as any of us will ever get, without having your underwear outside our pants. An epic story, commendable voice acting and scripting, a fully realized world and plenty to experience during and after the main story help propel Batman Arkham Asylum to heights never seen before in regards to comic book related video games. A definite “must play” if you still have not had a chance to get your hands on this beauty.

Rating: 9.4