I've Got Bats In My Belfry...A Review Of Arkham Asylum (PC)

scotth266

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Jan 10, 2009
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Two years ago, if you had told me that there was a Batman game being made, and it was a possible candidate for Game Of The Year, I would have told you to quit lying to me. A good Batman game? The very idea was preposterous: even the best of the Batman games developed by that point had been mediocre. Two years later, and here I am to gush about how awesome a Batman game is. Who'da thunk it, eh?

But yeah, I just finished Arkham Asylum after a tight 18 hours of gameplay: so let's get this review started with a BANG!



BANG! ...Ok, I won't try to be funny anymore.

Arkham Asylum's storyline starts out with Batman carting off Joker to the infamous madhouse. When you arrive though, you find that you've walked into a trap: Joker has had a small army of thugs under his control transferred there from another prison, and his partner in crime Harley Quinn has taken control of the security systems. Joker's army promptly takes over the asylum, and the Clown Prince of Crime goes and frees several of Batman's worst nemeses to boot. You're left to try and take the asylum back, with a utility belt full of tools and Batman's infamous ninja-like martial arts skills. The plot of the game is well-done, with quite a few twists and turns that manage to keep the narrative flowing at a good pace. The over-arching storyline has Batman rescuing hostages, beating down thugs, and capturing supervillains all the time: but thanks to the well-thought out level design, this three-part system never gets old.

Rocksteady went to town when designing Arkham Asylum, and it shows in spades. The infamous isle's unique character has been lovingly rendered in both design and atmosphere. Arkham has always been looked at by the comic books as being a horrific, traumatizing place: and the developer's rendition enforces that viewpoint in spades. Everything about Arkham gives you the feeling of being in a decrepit, aging facility for madmen: most of the buildings are old as dirt and reek of a horrible past... though there are a few newer-looking sections that enforce a very dark, Nazi-prison-camp-like motif. This is, from minute one, NOT a place that anyone sane would want to be, and as the game progresses you start to wonder about whether Arkham is really there to help rehabilitate the prisoners, or just torture them.



Why, hello there! Are you lost?

The level design is one of the best I've seen in a long time. At first, many areas of the isle are inaccessible to you: but as Batman collects various gadgets he can make his way into new areas by blowing up walls, getting to high-up ventilation shafts, and crossing enormous gaps (think Metroid, but Batman style.) There's all sorts of hidden nooks and crannies built into the island's facilities to explore, and doing so is encouraged thanks to the hidden trophies, psyche evaluation tapes, and other goodies scattered about by the Riddler as the most entertaining side-quest ever. There's not only collectibles to grab though: the mad genius has quite a few puzzles in store for you, which you must solve by taking a picture of an object that answers his riddle.

However, the design of the levels doesn't just shine when it comes to exploration: it's good for the combat elements as well. In the stealth sections, the level design and the paths/behaviors the enemy AI will take force you to get creative and use everything around you to take down the goons: particularly when the enemies have guns. These segments play like what I thought a Splinter Cell game would be like gameplay-wise: it's very open and non-linear, and you can use whatever method suits you to take on the thugs, whether it be setting explosive traps or swooping down from the ceiling to deliver a boot to the face.

There are situations where you're forced into open conflict, but these are just as fun as the stealth segments thanks to a simple, yet deep, control system. Batman's main attacks are all done by hitting the X button (he attacks in the direction you move the left stick), while Y is for counters, and B is a stun attack that temporarily confuses enemies (but does no damage.) It sounds simple, and rather boring to boot, but thanks to magnificent animations and the superb AI, it never gets old. While you do hit X a lot, you never feel that you're doing something repetitive, because as you switch between attacking Joker's thugs Batman will mix between punches, kicks, elbows, and all sorts of martial arts maneuvers. There are also special thugs with weapons that you MUST use certain moves on, and combo bonuses for using lots of different attacks, so you can't just use one strategy the whole game if you want to do well.


Great. Now after watching that, I want to play again.



That's not to say that Arkham Asylum does not have flaws though: there are some, and thanks to the overall awesomeness that the rest of the game exudes, they're all the more noticeable.

The boss fights in Arkham Asylum aren't handled very well, when they're handled at all. You never get the feeling that you're actually taking on most of the supervillains you meet: rather, you are fighting the environment around you or the villain's underlings. For instance, the game has a long segment leading up to a fight with Harley Quinn, but when you reach it you're only allowed to fight waves of the same old baddies: the actual capture is done via cutscene. The same goes for almost all of the game's villainous cast: you're never in direct conflict with them, or when you are, it feels half-baked. It's still fun most of the time, but it's definitely not as cool as it would have been to take these villains on in head to head combat.

There's also issues with times when you're talking to other characters in the game. When you ask guards about things, there's three problems: the character models are so inexpressive that they break the immersion, the minor characters have voice actors that can't portray emotions correctly, and Batman seems to not really give a shit about them in the first place. When he talks to Oracle, Gordon, or the villains, Batman's voice actor does a fine job: but give him a hostage and he sounds like he's phoning in his performance. Here's an example of how dialogue with the minor characters sounds:

Terrified(? Maybe giddy) Hostage: Oh, thank god you're here! Those guys were gonna kill me!

Batman: Where did Harley Quinn go?

Hostage: Er, I dunno... but there's some other hostages that you have to rescue, man!

Batman: I'll get right on that. But first: to the Bat-Cave for coffee, doughnuts, and a few Vicodin.

Hostage:....




1)When Joker appears on the monitors around the asylum, the video feed isn't synched with the audio feed, leading to watching the monitors giving you the feeling of a Godzilla movie. GOJIIIIRA!

2) Rarely (about three times over the course of my game), when you pick up tapes/scan Chronicles, the audio doesn't play for them. Ever. You have to reload a save, or you can't listen to them.

3) The Riddler acts smug when you take his maps(cheat sheets to locations of stuff)... even when you've got all the crap they point to.

However, all of these things are mostly insignificant gripes in the end. The overall atmosphere, the level design, the combat, the excellent voice castings: all of these things group together to overwhelm the few complaints that I have about the game. This is a true blue work of art that anyone, even people who only like Batman a little, can enjoy. I purchased it off of Steam for $50, and I regret not a penny of it. Now that a good Batman game is out though, I have only one hope: that someone rescues his friend/rival in hero-dom, Superman, from his gaming grave. If Bats can make it as a game character, Supes can't be far behind, right?

[HEADING=3]Editor's Notes:[/HEADING]

Let's just hope that all the game devs out there have forgotten the stigma associated with the character of Superman and gaming that goes back to a certain Nintendo 64 title, eh?

I didn't play this with a keyboard by the way: I used my 360 gamepad.

I had to gloss over a few things in my review so that I wasn't writing a goddamn novel. First off, the musical soundtrack: it's good. If you liked the tracks from the Dark Knight movie, these are very similar. The goons are also hilarious to listen to, because they react to things around them. They start out arrogant and posturing, but after you start picking them off, one by one, they quickly become terrified: they'll group together in pairs (safety in numbers), start spinning around randomly because they think they hear something, and quickly turn into trembling cowards as the Joker mocks them for their failure and drops one-liners about the decreasing head count in the room.

Oh, and if you thought the characters in the trailers looked too beefy, fear not: only the Batman is really chiseled in the game. Everyone else has fairly human proportions (though there are a few cases of Chris Redfield's refrigerator arm syndrome, it's generally unnoticeable.) And after you beat the game, if you want to test how manly you really are, there are several challenge rooms that test your gaming skills. Come prepared for a fight though: getting a three-batarang rank (the equivalent of a gold medal) is no easy task.

The Steam version DOES support Games For Windows Live, so you can earn Microsoft Achievements. I can't though, due to GFWL hating my college's internet provider.

The load times and framerate were excellent most of the time. There were one or two moments that things slowed up a bit, but it promptly smoothed back out. I also did not get to try the PhysX engine gameplay out, because Nvidia is jerking me around by not giving me the correct updates to my video drivers. So I can't comment on how awesome PhysX is, sorry :(

My next game review will probably be GTA4. Don't expect me to be nearly as sycophantic to that game as I was to this one though.


Space Seige [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.143924]
Jade Empire [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.119321]
Mega Man 9 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.119167]
Deja Vu [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.117801]
Braid [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.110777]
Max Payne [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.110027#1897580]
Indigo Prophecy [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.108202#1817369]
WarCraft 3 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.107685]
Fallout 3 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.105151#1683250]
Mirror's Edge [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.102291#1586312]

Manga Mashup #4: To-Love-Ru Isn't Quite True Love. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.135795]
Manga Mashup #3: Dance of the Loli. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.132642]
Manga Mashup #2: Prepared to be Schooled. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.115803]
Manga Mashup #1: Attack of the A's [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.111313]

Webcomic Review: Awkward Zombie [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.128483]
Hooray For the New Blood: An Unofficial Article. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.117338]
 

TriGGeR_HaPPy

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May 22, 2008
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A very thorough and insightful review. You now have convinced me (moreso) to get this game at some time soon.
Good work ^_^

Of course, now I'll be looking extra hard for the flaws you've pointed out, but it should still be pretty good. :p
 

Asehujiko

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Feb 25, 2008
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I'm interested in your system specs and whether or not the physics actually work now that the patch is out.

On my 2.66Ghz dualcore, 4GB of 667Mhz RAM and a GTX260XXX, the store bought version ran at 35-40 fps and the pirated version at 45-55, both of them with notable stuttering.

I also greatly disagree with your point that the level design is good. The exploration is halted by incredibly obnoxious and obvious get item X before entering Y doors instead of any real originality and the graphics are Unreal Plastic to annoying heights. Except for batman being in it, the environments are completely interchangeable with a few UT3 maps and i have the niggling feeling that some textures are directly copied from there. And no, i didn't bother manually sifting through them all before selling it to somebody else because i found the game to be severely lacking.
 

TsunamiWombat

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Sep 6, 2008
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Damnit I wanna know how the PC version controls with PC CONTROLS.

The level design is good. Haters just... give up, the game is great.
 

scotth266

Wait when did I get a sub
Jan 10, 2009
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TsunamiWombat said:
Damnit I wanna know how the PC version controls with PC CONTROLS.
I looked up the manual: the movement controls seem fine, but the combat controls look a little too weird for my tastes. Left Crtl + Right Mouse Click = Ground Takedown? Ugh.

Asehujiko said:
I'm interested in your system specs and whether or not the physics actually work now that the patch is out.
Actually, I already had the patch for PhysX. I just can't try it out because Nvidia insists that my operating system is something it isn't, and thus gets me a wrong update. Hence, I can't try it out.

------------------
System Information
------------------
Time of this report: 1/9/2009, 12:49:47
Machine name: HUGHES3T61P
Operating System: Windows Vista? Ultimate (6.0, Build 6001) Service Pack 1 (6001.vistasp1_gdr.080917-1612)
Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
System Manufacturer: LENOVO
System Model: 6457B64
BIOS: Ver 1.00PARTTBLx
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU T9300 @ 2.50GHz (2 CPUs), ~2.5GHz
Memory: 3054MB RAM
Page File: 1807MB used, 4504MB available
Windows Dir: C:\Windows
DirectX Version: DirectX 10
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
DxDiag Version: 6.00.6001.18000 32bit Unicode

---------------
Display Devices
---------------
Card name: NVIDIA Quadro FX 570M

And I had only a few mild instances of stuttering. And odds are that if I had adjusted the settings, I could have gotten rid of it completely.

Of course the game is going to have similar textures to Unreal 3: they were built off of the same engine.

TriGGeR_HaPPy said:
Of course, now I'll be looking extra hard for the flaws you've pointed out, but it should still be pretty good. :p
Eh, just try and enjoy the game before you look for the flaws: I only noticed the problems because I'm a reviewer, and have to notice everything bad about the game to make my work unbiased.
 

Sassafrass

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Aug 24, 2009
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Good review. I brought for 360 and loved every moment, especially anything involving the Joker. I agree with The Riddler maps comment. I'm stupid, how else am I supposed to figure them out? However, I had a small gripe with the combat system. It works for me most of the time, but sometimes it will not counter for me. I press the button when the warning flashes up, and BAM! There goes my combat multiplier. I also disliked when you have to fight the two Titan enhanced henchmen and about 9 other normal guys. But then again, that might be because I was tired.
 

rhyno435

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Apr 24, 2009
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This was a very good review. Many examples and it covers everything. Good work.
 

cleverlymadeup

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Mar 7, 2008
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i think the audio sync issue is something with your pc, cause i never had that with the PS3

other than that good review for a great game. i'm amazed they made such a good game
 

Asehujiko

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Feb 25, 2008
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Mass effect also uses Unreal 3 and it doesn't look like plastic nor does it rip textures. The game seems to be optimized for vista exclusively then, which sucks.
 

scotth266

Wait when did I get a sub
Jan 10, 2009
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sasquatch99 said:
However, I had a small gripe with the combat system. It works for me most of the time, but sometimes it will not counter for me. I press the button when the warning flashes up, and BAM! There goes my combat multiplier.
I only had something like that happen once to me, and I was pretty sure that I had just spazzed and not hit the button in the first place.



rhyno435 said:
This was a very good review. Many examples and it covers everything. Good work.
Thanks for reading!

cleverlymadeup said:
i think the audio sync issue is something with your pc, cause i never had that with the PS3

other than that good review for a great game. i'm amazed they made such a good game
It could quite possibly be my computer. This thing acts up sometimes... but it's a good machine regardless.

I suppose then that I recommend to everyone interested in the PC version to check Google to see if I'm the only one that's had this issue.
 

oliveira8

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scotth266 said:
cleverlymadeup said:
i think the audio sync issue is something with your pc, cause i never had that with the PS3

other than that good review for a great game. i'm amazed they made such a good game
It could quite possibly be my computer. This thing acts up sometimes... but it's a good machine regardless.

I suppose then that I recommend to everyone interested in the PC version to check Google to see if I'm the only one that's had this issue.
My machine just meets the minimum speccs and theres audio problems in the televised Joker moments.

It blows. Guess it's just the PC version.
 

Klepa

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scotth266 said:
It could quite possibly be my computer. This thing acts up sometimes... but it's a good machine regardless.

I suppose then that I recommend to everyone interested in the PC version to check Google to see if I'm the only one that's had this issue.
I only remember TV joker going out of sync once. One of those moments where he's talking to you through a TV set, and his mouth is a bit behind on what he's saying. But it really is a non-issue if you ask me. If you're thinking of passing this game because of that, don't. It seriously happened once, on a ten second speech, that wasn't even a cutscene.
 

scotth266

Wait when did I get a sub
Jan 10, 2009
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oliveira8 said:
My machine just meets the minimum speccs and theres audio problems in the televised Joker moments.

It blows. Guess it's just the PC version.
On the plus side, maybe there will be a patch?

Klepa said:
I only remember TV joker going out of sync once. One of those moments where he's talking to you through a TV set, and his mouth is a bit behind on what he's saying. But it really is a non-issue if you ask me. If you're thinking of passing this game because of that, don't. It seriously happened once, on a ten second speech, that wasn't even a cutscene.
Like I said: minor flaw, great game.