During what was supposed to be a routine inmate drop off, The Joker gets loose and turns Arkham Asylum into his own personal theme park with a little help from his friends. Quickly subduing Commissioner Gordon and the other inmates, it is up to Batman to stop the riot and save the remaining doctors and guards still alive. Little does Batman know that Joker is planning something bigger than a simple inmate riot.
Starting with the aesthetics, the graphics are really great. The design of the game combines the industrious elements of Nolan's films and the gothic elements of Burton's with the voice cast of Timm's cartoon most notably Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamil as Batman and Joker respectively. So many, including myself, consider them the definitive voice of their characters. Arleen Sorkin, the voice of Harley also returns.
The story is well-paced, and you get the feeling that the villains were chosen for what they bring to the story instead of forcing the more popular rogues into the movie. Noticably not present are the likes of Two-Face, Catwoman, and Penguin, but all the villains used are used very effectively except for maybe Killer Croc, which I think they could have used better.
The gameplay is great. As with any Batman game, you get a mix of batarangs and grapples to work with, all of which update as the game goes on as you would expect to happen in a video game. At times it seems like push-button fighting, but the high number of thugs and the use of batarangs, counters, and jumps make for an almost ballet-like fight scene that allows for some strategy to get involved. There are even stealth strategies you can use, making the game feel like the next-gen versions of Metal Geat Solid and Splinter Cell. Detection mode is an interesting addition, allowing key items to stand out and forensic tools to be used, allowing the gamer to see things only Batman would.
The high point of the game were the Scarecrow scenes. Occasionally being hit with fear toxin led to Silent Hill inspired scenes into Bruce Wayne's worse nightmares. They were eery and atomospheric, truly some of the better scenes in the video game.
The Riddler was also fun. Throughout the course of the game, Batman patches in to Oracle, former Batgirl Barbara Gordon. The Riddler hacks into the line from time to time to taunt Batman with riddles and side missions that are entertaining to say the least, but easily skipped if you want to focus on the storyline.
Like any game it is clearly not perfect. Batman's facial hair and suit damage stay throughout the game, which on paper seemed great, but I ended up with 2 big tears on my cape. The camera being afixed the way it is meant I was staring at them for a little under half the game. It was annoying and destracting. The final boss battle against the Joker was very anti-climatic, and may have been one of the easier fights in the whole game. I was also unhappy to see that Bob Hastings did not return as Commisioner Gordon. His voice in my opinion has become as iconic to the character as Conroy, Hamil, and Sorkin's. I was also surprised to see that the majority of the cells were empty, and the opportunity for cameos was never taken advantage of. Although Scarface, Clayface, and Ra's Al Ghul make intereting cameos if your are paying attention.
Good Batman video games are hard to come by. They have been infamously bad even though most elements of Batman should adapt well to video games. This game finally does that. Written by Paul Dini, one of the minds behind the critically acclaimed cartoon series, it captures everything great about Batman and makes an incredibly fantastic video game regardless of its faults.
9/10
