Know before you start reading our review that we’re not really into game spoilers, so we’re going to stay away from most of the plot elements, twists, etc. Also know that we're well aware that the game's been out for a few weeks… What can we say, we've been busy :o)
Batman: Arkham Asylum starts out with you transporting the Joker back to Arkham Asylum, apparently without much of a struggle. It turns out that the Joker has set a trap for the Caped Crusader and has taken over the Asylum. It’s Batman’s job to restore order to Arkham Asylum, re-capture the Joker and beat up some bad guys!
If you haven’t heard much about Batman: Arkham Asylum, you must have been living under a rock for the last few months. The hype for the game has been incredible, and even included getting a Guinness World Record.
Taking that into account, and the fact that we’re into comic books, especially Batman, we approached the game with a little trepidation… After all, it couldn’t possibly be as good as everyone’s been saying, right?
Wrong! The game is great! The story is good, the voice acting for Batman and the Joker are FANTASTIC thanks to Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill, and the graphics are amazing.
That being said, we did have a few issues with the game… The game isn’t quite as open as we would have liked. You can get to ALMOST any location in the game, but there are a few that you can’t get to that have us puzzled… For example, you can’t get to the top of the clock tower (by the Mansion) and a few of the cliffs that you visit outside of the Batcave. The grappling gun is a little tricky at first as well… You would think you can point anywhere and fire to go sailing away to your new destination, but it seems to like some spots better then others.
The free-flow combat took a little getting used to as well... Initially it seems like a "button-masher", but you have to time the combos properly for it all to work right and keep your combos going. It's not quite as easy as it looks…
The other issue we had was with the replayability potential… This is probably due to the fact that there’s no multiplayer component, which we’ve grown accustomed to with most games, BUT Eidos has already released one map pack for the Predator and Combat modes and has another one due tomorrow. The map packs have been free so far, so they’re doing a lot to help keep it interesting.
The game is beautiful, but it’s so much easier to see the Joker’s cronies, the Riddler’s clues, etc, while in Detective Mode that we found ourselves running through the majority of the game without getting the full affect…
Other than those few nit-picky items, the game is great and I can see why the critics have absolutely loved the game. Right now it’s at the top of our Game Of The Year list. If you haven’t played it yet, you owe it to yourself to set aside the 10-12 hours it’ll take to beat the story mode (and gather all of the Riddler clues). Be the bat!
Note that we’ve only played the Xbox 360 version of the game, so we weren’t able to play the challenge maps as the Joker (PS3 exclusive, at least for now).
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