Batman: Arkham Origins Dev Met "Resistance" at "Every Level"

[FPLOON]

Moral of the story: Hold all negative criticism until the finished product... Just because your negativity is "publicly" known on the internet beforehand does not mean the developers are not taking it in harder than you realize...

I'm happy that they were able to make an Arkham game that can stand with the other Arkham games (especially City) without their fear of it not being "as good as" or "worse than" the other Arkham games get in the way of that... I think we have all learned a lesson this day...

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...and did anyone forget that lesson just now? (Just curious...)

 

[TsunamiWombat]

Having played the game about a quarter through, I can't shake the feeling they DID bite off more than they can chew. The game is solid, easily a B to Arkham City's A- (and I mean this in the conventional collegiate sense, not the skewed videogame sense where anything lower than a 90/100 means you failed and your employee's don't get paid).

They improved in the area of enemy variety and the boss-battles. The game's detective sequences do make you feel like an actual detective, even if they just boil down to "scan this thing and watch a video of the crime". They've also made the combat system more punishing, and tactical observation and judicious usage of gadgets and entry attacks is necessary to win fights - batman can no longer just enter a room and punch everything to death. However, in tightening up the combat system they've pulled several buggy flaws out of it that was covered up by the looseness Rocksteady's system had afforded it - often times slight variances in distance will cause combo's to fail or not follow up as they should, Batman will occasionally attack the wrong enemy, Batman's range has been reduced, sometimes you bug into terrain etc.

In fact, little niggling issues and bugs plague this game. I've already encountered a game breaker that will make it impossible for me to finish the Riddler side quests until it gets patched, because Batman cannot grapple-then-climb into vents due to clipping. This bug is exclusive to the PC version, I am led to understand.

More important though is a sense of style. Scan riddles are gone, replaced entirely with gadget puzzles ala the trophies of Arkham City. Gotham in general seems reduced in scope from Arkham city, it is packed with fewer nods to fans and despite the fact that criminals (and no civilians or cars) are everywhere, it feels empty and desolate. Pacing seems skewed, and over all the game feels like less of a Labor of Love than a product to be manufactured.

I suggest everyone buy and enjoy this game, because we can expect sequels at an increasing pace from here on out - and this is like as to be the last "stellar" example of an 'Arkham' style game until Rocksteady's next project (assuming the rumors about Silver Age Batman are true).

 

[F'Angus]

I really want to love this game..but I can't even get into it because of framerate issues on my ps3... Not sure if it's actually my console.

It's made my game pretty much unplayable at the moment. Will have to wait for patch.

 

[CaptainMarvelous]

See, it's kind of a mixed bag, I wish Gotham wasn't empty of anything but criminals (because that kinda stretches suspension of disbelief a bit) but the fight with Deathstroke was awesome because it's the first fight in an Arkham game where I felt the enemy was genuinely better than Batman. The dialogue after the fight ruined this somewhat but the absolute struggle to beat down Wilson was kickass.

As for the equipment, at least one of them is a precursor to a BETTER version in Arkham Asylum and the rest are things you need to nip back to the Batcave to grab (which is something I like, it removes some of the gruelling survival deathmatch vibe but it does feel like Batman playing the game somewhat so he has the best odds)

I like the game but it feels kinda... there's something off but I can't pinpoint it yet, maybe after a few more hours...

 

[Kal'Shen Ra]

I am playing the game on the PC. And two minutes in I knew it wasn't better or even as good as the previous two.

In Arkham Asylum(AA) and Arkham City(AC) I never fought the game. Everything just worked. In this one, during the first mission there are some very poorly implemented "cinematic moments" that just don't work (specially during the boss fight at the end). And I also found the first bug ever in a Arkham game (at least for me) that blocked my progression. The vent from the comm tower in Burnley.

The optimization isn't that good either. I played AC without a single problem on default settings at 1900x1080 px. For this game I had to reduce the resolution to maintain a steady frame rate. Another first are the "loading screens" I get if I travel too fast around the city. My PC is somewhere between minimum and recommended specs.

The story however is good. It's almost as good as AA(which is better than AC, in my opinion). Yes, one or two plot twists are pretty obvious, but I like it. Oh, tdylan, I just finished a big part of the missions that involve the Joker and I can tell you this. That horse still has some life in it. It takes a few leads from The Dark Knight and adds a few thing that ,in retrospect, would've made that movie even better. And I haven't finished the main story yet.

Now that I think about it, I knew this game will be lacking when I realized that the reviews would be online only when pre-orders couldn't be canceled anymore. And the small glitches in the gameplay trailers that were released.

 

[Dominic Crossman]

I didn't like aa and was meh about ac, I just found the games lacked the fun factor for me personally and while the combat was polished the shield goons can suck my balls for breaking my combos, I mean seriously there are 5 goons in direction my analog stick is facing and the game takes that as punch the one guy that won't work against.
So yeah, the games where frustrating and "not fun"
Because of this I look forward to playing this new studio's interpretation of it, they may just put in that x-factor that has been missing for me.

Really? I found that even on PC, with digital movement buttons to direct attacks, I had 0 trouble attacking the enemy I wanted to every time. I think I had my combo 'broken' a grand total of like 5 times in the entire game of City outside of messing with gunners when I shouldn't have been. Had even less trouble when I tried it with a controller. Seemed extremely accurate with the direction you aim with the sticks, so it would always select the correct bad guy.

Scout's Honor. I would specifically take out shields first simply so they couldn't fuck up my combo later, they royally pissed me off.
Don't worry about it though, I seem to dislike beat em up genre anyways, just to much pissing about with combos for my taste.

 

[Chaos Marine]

I'd love to be able to weigh in an opinion on whether the game is as good as the first pair but unfortunately it's so buggy, I can't even get it to start up the singleplayer mode. Just the multiplayer mode which I couldn't care about any less if it were possible. And just to check for yourself, check what must be one of the largest threads in any Steam community about how glitchy it is.

 

[1337mokro]

As long as you bring out a patch asap that fixes the Radio tower bugs then we're all good.

Preferentially next week on Monday.

Also, for your next game how about another villain than the Joker? Maybe convince DC to do a team up game with Superman and explore the founding of the JLA and then make another game where we fight intergalactic terrors?

 

[thewatergamer]

I can honestly say I like this game a lot, if it weren't for a few bugs and crashes that exist in both multiplayer and singleplayer it would be just as good as the original two, heck I honestly can say that when the bugs are ironed out it will be better than either of the original 2

I'll admit like many others I was skeptical and a bit concerned, but I think the devs did a great job

 

[marioandsonic]

I've only played Arkham City before Origins, and after playing Arkham Origins for a while, I honestly didn't even notice or realize that the game had different developers.

I still find it quite enjoyable...though the fact that it's a prequel dose kinda damper any kind of threat or urgency.

Oh no, Batman might get killed! Oh wait, no he won't.

 

[Talvrae]

Yeah, I had no confidence in their capabilities either, for the same reasons: they aren't Rocksteady, development teams who switch in rarely deliver the product that fans have come to expect from the old team; when they do deliver something similar in style and tone, its often of worse quality. But I kept my mouth shut about it because you never know. I'll wait for more reviews and watch some videos before I commit.

There is some rought edges, some bugues who neeed to be fixed asap, and don,t bring much new to the table, but it's a good game...

 

[Quiotu]

I really want to love this game..but I can't even get into it because of framerate issues on my ps3... Not sure if it's actually my console.

It's made my game pretty much unplayable at the moment. Will have to wait for patch.

No, it's not your console. The game runs likes trash honestly, especially with a game they basically took the engine and map from Arkham City and tweaked it. People give them a lot of patience but I don't get why. If this game was released when patching wasn't possible, it'd be crucified. It just screams either lazy or incompetent coding on their part, like they just bypassed all beta testing to get the game out.

Maybe it was rushed by the publisher, but you don't rush a game out that the fanbase is already questioning. If your game is just shy of unplayable on 8 year old hardware using an engine two better games were made from... you suck. There's no getting around it.

Then again, people didn't call out Bethesda enough for using a broken engine on PS3 games three or four times in a row without fixing the save bug, so some people are just masochistic I guess.

 

[Therumancer]

Truthfully my lack of support for the game has had less to do with them not being Rocksteady, but because I generally dislike prequels. Had they done a sequel I would have probably picked this one up, but right now I'm waiting for a deep discount to even look at it. I'm sure fans of this game (and there are many) will tell me I'm insane, but that's been my thoughts all along.

That said it is interesting to hear their comments about the pressure they were under.

 

[Milanezi]

Also they could have totally not done a MP section at all and spent the time polishing the game.

Haven't played it yet, but this MP idea seemed totally out of place, from the reviews I saw it's a "piss-poor third person shooter"... I'm getting the game somewhere next week anyway, and am currently playing Blackgate on the Vita (YES! every twice a decade I use that tiny bit of investment! ), which I must say is pretty amazing with some nice pacing. I'd recomend for anyone who enjoyed Shadow Complex.

 

[Kungfu_Teddybear]

I'm loving the game so far. I'm playing on the PC and so far I haven't come across a single bug, the worst issue I've come across was a shitty camera angle at a part of Mad Hatter's side quest that caused me to keep falling at what should have been an easy jump. I'm liking the new features, especially the new detective mode. The enemy variety has been improved, as well as the boss battles (the Deathstroke fight was brilliant) and the combat feels tighter overall. I certainly recommend the game to anyone who enjoyed the previous two Arkham games.

 

[DjinnFor]

I feel like i might be quoting Yathzee a bit too often, but why would you do anything for fans?

I don't know what you're referencing, so I'll ask this: is that question meant to be answered on its face? And from the perspective of the developer or publisher? If yes to both, then you do it because the purpose of a sequels is to reap additional value off of your existing market share.

If you weren't planning on targeting your existing fanbase, what possible reason do you have for identifying it as a sequel? You're influencing potential players purchasing decisions by implying that they're going to get more of what they enjoyed before, then shooting that expectation in the foot and poisoning the value of your brand as a developer and publisher when you fail to deliver on that implicit promise.

If you wanted a spinoff designed to be different in both tone and execution, identify it outright as such; you don't get the free profits from your existing fanbase, true, but you also don't ruin your brand and cause those same people to never buy another sequel of your IP.

When a game switches Dev teams, typically it's for the better when the developers don't try to 'live up' to anything, and instead do something new and interesting with the series. Reading the reviews, it's pretty clear which route the Arkham Origin devs went.

It's only for the better when there's some fatal flaw in the original such that coming at the game from a different direction is warranted. Merely providing a different game for no reason at all both kills your IP for existing fans and gives no guarantee that your product will be of sufficient quality to capture enough new ones to compensate.

 

[r0seyp0m]

My only real beef with this game are the many, many bugs. Some even gamebreaking(I still can't finish Enigma Most Wanted because of the bugged comm tower ventilation shaft)

 

[Simon Pettersson]

My biggest issue is that they can´t keep The Joker out of the games. Go on with the story what would happen when he doesn't have The Joker to fight against....

Oh and the bugs ... my god the bugs in this games made me wonder if I had a pirated version like the first games bathook bug ....

 

[Guitarmasterx7]

I mean I've seen lukewarm reviews and one review from Jim Sterling which gave it like a 3.5 out of 10. The impression I got was that the game was rushed and reused a lot of resources from city. But emulates the experience passably but slightly off, like a "treyarch is making call of duty now" sort of deal.

Look, I get that this probably contradicts why games get outsourced in the first place, but I think if you're going to change developers, give them a bit more time and resources so that they can get comfortable enough with making the game that they can develop a worthy sequel. Anyone would be nervous if they had to create a sequel in someone else's critically acclaimed franchise in a year, but even if you pull it off, the chances of actually being able to satisfyingly top it (as a worthy sequel should) are very slim.

Though I doubt the publishers give much of a shit about that. Regardless of whether it turned out good or not, how many people bought it without a hint of trepidation just because it was a new arkham game? As long as it's got a familiar name, people will buy it, and as long as it's passable, people will like it. they can do a better job on the next sequel.