Batman: Arkham City

Blog Post: The Best Game I'ver Ever Played, But Nothing Is Perfect.

Alecsander Morrison — Mon, 13 May 2013 02:26:00 GMT

I played this game's story mode 3 times (not including the bonus mode or the DLC's) and I'm still blown away by how incredible it is, I love the challenges and free-roaming Arkham City however if I had to pick something that was disappointing in the game I'd have to say it was kinda short. Lets face it, a real gamer will sit down and play for hours straight to beat the storymode, but once I beat the story there were only 3 or 4 mini missions to do after (some were even just teasers for the next game!). My advice is: Buy Arkham Asylum and play that before playing Arkham City, it'll show you just how incredible the game stepped up in just 3 years.

Blog Post: The Dark Knight May Have Returned, But It Seems The Joke's On Us

Paradigmthefallen — Sun, 17 Feb 2013 21:12:00 GMT

This hurts you a lot more than it hurts me, Batbrain.

You know, when I first played this game, and saw the demos, I was on board with everyone else. It looked great, it sounded great, and it seemed like we'd get a bonafide hit. Instead, what we got was a mess of questionable ideas but with enough gameplay and content that convinced most people (apparently) to overlook the gaping issues in Arkham City. As a result, I'm purely devoting this review to what is wrong with the game, since GI and many user reviews have spent plenty of time praising it like crazy.

First, the story is crap. Yes, it is crap. Pure grade, brown crap. The amount of misogynist undertones and oddly pro-guy on guy vibes seem to be making their best effort at making every female character in the story feel irrelevant. Frankly, sexism is an issue we deal with in a lot of games, but I thought Paul Dini wrote this. He's always been about empowering female characters while not making them be Mary Sue. Was he only allowed to write some side missions? I mean, come on, his work with Catwoman and Harley was far better than this stuff, and similarly, they had to rip from Batman Begins and bring in Ra's Al Ghul? We don't need to see Ghul's daughter's ass, we don't need for Harley to be made to seem like a manic-deperssive stooge with no personality, and we sure as hell don't need Catwoman wearing an already ridiculous get up even more stupidly than before.

Her voice actress deserves better than this -- this is the woman who voiced Brianna in KotOR 2 for crying out loud!

Gotham City Sirens somehow managed to get Gotham's leading ladies very provactive yet also empowered, so why this game couldn't is beyond me. And if you're wondering why I'm focusing on the female members of the cast, it's because there's not much to say about the other characters -- they are that bland. Penguin is the only exception, and in fact may be in his best incarnation ever. Nolan North soars as Penguin, and hope they bring him back in later entries with just as much bite and dark, bitter humor. Joker isn't even that interesting anymore, sounding my like Batman's ex-girlfriend than anything else.

Alright boys, get at him!

Next up on the list of issues -- there's such a thing as "too much" content. Yes, I know, in this day and age of DLC and cut content and short campaigns, it feels odd to say that, but it's true. The various gadgets, scenarios, riddles, and enemies eventually become so copied and pasted that it stops being surprising. It goes from feeling like a game to feeling like busy work -- and I say that as someone who's used New Game + in Dead Space easily 20 times across both entries. Who cares about using an area of effect ice bomb over using a single guy ice bomb that works exactly the same? Add to the fact that now the new "special" enemy types break up the flow of combat and stealth rather than adding challenge, and we've got a case of congestive gameplay failure.

But even if those two arguments stop you from getting the game, keep this in mind. The DLC adds practically nothing, except for some endless combat rooms, and a few piece of cut content and last minute ideas to lengthen out gameplay. For around 7-10 dollars, each piece of content, at best, offers only a few hours worth of new content. Compare that to the highly replayable and fantastic Deus Ex: Human Revolution: The Missing Link, and it almost feels insulting.

You're running out of legs to stand on, Bats!

In summary, Arkham City is more or less coasting on the fumes of Arkham Asylum, a far more congruent and sensible game. Yes, some minor tweaks here or there improve City, but if they had patched them into Arkham Asylum, you'd have no reason to get City. The beginning is far better than this middle, and if the story and excessive content is any indication, the finale for Arkham may not be worth getting either. Stick to what works. If you want this game for the challenge rooms and can get it for about 20 or less, then maybe it's worth your while, as those are entertaining. But keep in mind that after about fifteen hours in, this game is going to stop having any new twists, and you're going to be left wondering what the point of it all was.

Tick tock, Batman. Your time is at an end.

Blog Post: batman arkham city reveiw

GONE — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 00:51:00 GMT

Rockstar and DC comics have made another great batman game. batman arkham city upgrade almost everything from the last game. the story is very long and if you want more theres side missions. the graphics are just amazing i was blown away by them. the sstory coninues from arkham asylum which is *SPOILERS* joker is infected by titan and he is dying and you are infected and looking for a cure *SPOILERS OVER* its not as boring as it sounds you get to upgrade your gadgets and the enemys get harder to kill you get to meet alot of the batman characters and viliians there is a load of dlc avalible for this game the game gives about 30 hours of gameplay for me to get the campain and all the sidemissions done not the dlc or challange maps and thats my review if you dont like it tell me why in the comments

Blog Post: Batman's finest moment

silver6kraid — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 08:36:00 GMT

So, here is the game that I looked forward to the most out of all these. I LOVED Arkham Asylum. It was one of the best games of 2009 and the best super hero game ever. The key word is was. Batman Arkham City didn't just surpass my expectations, it blew them away. The game's story is one of the best Batman stories I've ever seen. As good as the Dark Knight I would say. It's exciting, emotional at times and always interesting. It does start abruptly and the second act seems a bit scatter brained at times, but those are nit picks really. Overall it's a truly amazing single player. The voice acting is some of the best I've seen in games period. Mark Hamil turns in his best performance as the Joker to date, Kevin Conroy is the God damn batman in every way imaginable. (He oozes manliness!) and Corey Burton is chilling and foreboding as The game's primary antagonist Hugo Strange. The rest of the cast also does an excellent job. They portray the characters exactly how I imagine them to be. In fact, that's how Batman plays, exactly how I imagined he would. The combat is just as great as it was in Asylum, the new gliding system is just amazing and so much fun, and all his gadgets, new and old, are a joy to use to take down enemies. Playing as Batman has never felt so good. Same with Catwoman (buy this game new just for her, I'm serious guys!) Who has a very distinct play style that's different from Batman. The biggest and best aspect of Arkham City (outside of the incredible story) is Arkham City itself. The map is huge, detailed and alive. At first it's daunting how big it is. I had a hard time processing it all really. It looks great, feels great and just is great. Graphically The game uses the Unreal engine 3 to it's full potential, character models are detailed like the rest of the world and animations are top notch. Arkham City is gorgeous. Another great aspect of Arkham City is that the side quests are so well flushed out. Each one of them feels like it is part of the main story rather than just a diversion, especially Riddler's storyline, which is truly superb. Over all I have no gripes about Arkham City. I can't say anything about it that isn't positive. Rocksteady truly knocked it out of the park and straight to outer space this time. It's a perfect Batman game, Hell, the it's one of the best games ever made.

10 out of 10

Blog Post: The most disappointing game of this gen. Asininely overrated, with an atrocious storyline and use of characters. Period.

ZANIACK — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 17:53:00 GMT

Arkham Asylum is the undisputed greatest comic book/superhero/licensed game of all time, it's meager sequel isn't even mildly comparable overall. Batman's cape is semi dark purplish blue. He was very illegitimate in many ways anyway, but the blue cape invalidates his character more than anything else.

^irrefutable fact^

The default batsuit we're forced to play as is seriously off putting. Batman's cape was blue in AC and is still blue in HQR... WHY? I mean come on. Rocksteady's Batman design would be way more bad@ss, intimidating, and foreboding if he had a black cape and cowl. I understand that in the comics he's been both blue and grey or black and grey, but maybe that's why the cape and cowl are blue, and the boots, gauntlets, and 'man panties' are pure black.
I mean, wouldn't this:

(black cape and cowl mod for PC version)

[url]http://i42.tinypic.com/1zlqfqu.jpg[/url]

be a massive improvement over the original default?

[url]http://i40.tinypic.com/jawas7.jpg[/url]

Arkham City took most of the excellent aspects of Arkham Asylum and flushed each down the sh*tter. The all too evident blue caped batsuit is merely the tip of the iceberg for delegitimizing the integrity of Batman's character.

And guess what? His cape was blue in Arkham Asylum too, that game just happens to be a genuine Batman experience. At least it gave the illusion that Batman was dressed in solely black and grey in most environments at default settings. Arkham Asylum was fantastic, a sincerely crafted gem. One of the most satisfying and compelling single player experiences. Was it a masterpiece? No, it had a handful of notable flaws, all of which were not remedied in the sequel. Hell, they were amplified.

I want to elaborate on why this game just doesn't do the Batman universe justice. Batman didn't act like Batman should. His dialogue was often sketchy and dumbed down, and he wasn't the selfless, intensely devoted vigilant he should be. Batman was a much more flat, shallow character in Arkham City. He's supposed to be the ultimate human, but he's not very admirable. He's either an unreasonable @sshole or a p*ssy. He'd rather choose to save the life of an underdeveloped phony love interest, Talia, than do what the real Batman would do. Him cradling Hugo Strange in his arms was absurd.

Granted, Arkham City didn't convey a meaningless amount of effort was put into it. It's not a sequel that coasted on the success of its exponentially superior predecessor, but unfortunately it still attempted to replicate Arkham Asylum too often.

Rocksteady failed to deliver in any way that isn't almost entirely superficial. More heart? More devotion? More genuine passion by the developers? F*ck no. The story and characters are so shallow and implemented so poorly that it was bordering on being a downright perversion of DC characters. Batman himself is a pathetic self contradictory neanderthal. The story was half the length of Asylum's, and in some ways was incredibly uninspired and vulgar yet deviated far too much. Every attempted plot twist near the end was either utterly trivial or predictable. When I finished the game I thought: "This is the game that has a 97 on metacritic? Did I get a spoof copy of the game?"

Of course Batman has been dressed in partially blue costumes, depending on the artist. I know this, but I never liked it. Batman should vaguely resemble a bat. That's it.

The two plot lines had so many plot holes it was utterly pathetic. Not what I expected from veteran writer, Paul Dini. Granted, I believe Dini is slightly overrated. My humble opinion on most of his work is merely sufficiently good, he's transcended that in a few cases. But overall, he sometimes "pulls punches" and can be a bit pretentious.

The only things that are objective improvements from AA that fit AC is

1. The ability to grapnel in mid glide

2. Simultaneous counters

That's it.

I find it hard to believe that I'm the only one who caught the blatantly lazy, unintentional foreshadowing of Clayface early on in the campaign.

But what's the most crucial part of the vast majority of games? Gameplay. Arkham City delivered in this area, not without flaw though.

Arkham City bashed us over the head with those unlockable exposition stories, that weren't even remotely as well done as Arkham Asylum's character bio and Amadeus Arkham vignettes. And the damning thing is, there's still a lot of senseless and unexplained events. I'm an avid Bat-fan, I'm invested moderately in the comic book and graphic novel mythos, and there were points when I didn't know what the hell was going on. It seemed like reviewers were really being ignorant, and just made the assumption "well this must follow the source material, it's from Rocksteady so it's gotta be great".

Ra's Al Ghul does not have supernatural powers. Hugo Strange threatening to reveal Batman's identity went absolutely nowhere. Solomon Grundy isn't Cole Mcgrath, he doesn't need electricity to retain energy. The God D*mn Batman doesn't need his butler to prod him to do the noble thing like a f*cking babysitter.

I'm not exaggerating when I say the only redeemable characters in the game are Mark Hamill's Joker, and to a much lesser extent, Nolan North's Penguin. I don't recall who voiced Hugo Strange, but he was awesome, but had infinitely more potential.

Arkham City would have been a better game without the League of Assassin's(Ra's and Talia Al Ghul). Why? Because it would have forced Dini and Crocker to actually come up with something... Slightly creative. Seriously, the last thing they should have done was place the entire game's premise as Ra's Al Ghul's crusading genocide. WOW it f*cking angered me how incredibly uninspired and vulgar the choice is to have Ra's 'God like powers' and 'limitless resources' making him the mastermind behind protocol 10. Can't that God damn sh*t spewing @ss leakage let someone else have the spotlight? So yeah, utterly expected. I predicted Ra's to show up and take credit for the whole thing a while before it happened. Watch Batman Begins and the genocide plot is essentially the same thing.

A brilliant aspect of Arkham Asylum is it's subtle plot points and dark undertones. Arkham Asylum, the game, took inspiration from the graphic novel Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth. It conveyed how much of a farce the Asylum really was. The Arkham staff have no intention to help the inmates, with a misguided few being the exception, the Warden and doctors are deceptive and insincere. If you've seen The Dark Knight film, you should know how cynical the Joker is. That's been the Joker's essential motivation to wreak havoc since the 1980s. His obsession is that every person can fall to greed, desperation, arrogance, or anything that degrades the alleged 'civilized society'. This part of his character is perfectly purveyed in the game, and we uncover that the Joker is spot on in many ways, but this is all done so subtly. There are very few games that attempt, let alone succeed in, incorporating subliminal messages that fit so perfectly seamless in context of the narrative. This is completely absent in Arkham City, there's nothing 'deep' about it.

Do I even have to mention the first two Scarecrow sequences? The parts of AA that flawlessly displayed Batman's motivation for his intensely selfless, noble devotion.

I'm not a staunch fanboy who needs to have everything in the game to match my preferred vision. No. No. No. My opinion isn't an uncompromising, narrow minded viewpoint. Hell, varying interpretation is always the factor that keeps characters from getting stale. It's not that the great characters are unrecognizable, they're just written and implemented so underwhelmingly.

Even though the outer Arkham City environment isn't a redundant copying and pasting(Infamous 1), much of it blurs together. Arkham City fails to capture the impeccable art direction of its stellar concept art or Arkham Island.

I was really disappointed with Two Face's involvement with the game, and I was also letdown of the lack of interaction between Batman and Catwoman, and to lesser extent, Batman and Robin.

Catwoman's missions added nothing to the game, if anything, they just made the overall status/rating of Arkham City drop. The gameplay was clunky, here 'thief vision' had very little visibility, her missions came up through the story in very strange intervals, and her parts added nothing to the overall story.

The story wouldn't have been bad if it wasn't for the hinting, and completely giving away of the plot twists in the end of the game. The way Rocksteady hinted at it so much, I either predicted/foreshadowed right or just flat out knew exactly what was going to happen. I knew that Ras Al Ghul was Hugo Strange's master when you first entered the main gate area where Hugo Strange reveals who he is working with, I knew it was Ras Al Ghul then.

And I knew that there was a Clayface Joker as soon as Batman woke up after being gassed and Joker dying was predictable in of itself. Anyway, the only thing that was even close to a surprise I got in the story was from Talia dying. I don't think Arkham City's story ever had the potential to be truly great anyway, but the plot points could've been executed a lot better which would've made Arkham City a much better game.

Hitler and Stalin could've been lesser d!cks to each other than Freeze and Bats, it just seemed so unwarranted. Their confrontation at the Museum and GCPD just felt so forced just to set up the boss battle(a good one though, by far the best in the game)

And I thought a lot of the boss fights were pretty "meh", the Grundy and Two Face boss battles made the Titan Joker boss battle look great.

There are many glitches in Arkham City. Audio glitches are consistently prevalent at times, aiming the batclaw will produce an annoying static-y sound. The cape(Batman and Robin's) sways in awkward ways that it's not intended to do, like when Batman is sitting on a gargoyle inside of a Predator room. Some glitches have been retained for Arkham Asylum too, pop in textures are present much more(In AA, pop in only occurred the first few seconds after starting a challenge map or just continuing the story), but what is absolutely inexcusable is the ground and pound glitch that hasn't been fixed. The playable character will hit downed enemies in the a$$ or groin instead of the head half of the time you try the ground takedown.

I thought that the combo Bat swarm and combo multi takedown shouldn't have been implemented the way they were, or just taken out of the game all together.

I loved the hell out of Arkham Asylum, and it everything in the game wasn't absolutely perfect. But I was so satisfied with the feeling of being 'The God Damn Batman' that I easily overlooked any of its few shortcomings. I was anticipating AC so much, that I had unreasonably high expectations. I wanted it to be better than AA, I thought it would be better than AA, but once I seen the end credits roll I thought. "Did I get a 'spoof' copy of the game? Is this the game that's getting an unbelievable amout of praise?"

Here's many of the plot holes, exposed:

I actually have to spell out Arkham City's plethora of plot holes and things that contradict the established characters? Really?

Batman waited until a genocide was initiated to go after Strange? What was stopping him before? Because Strange knew his identity at the beginning of the game? Going after ol' Hugo near the end seemed so redundant. Why do you procrastinate, Mr. Wayne?

Batman goes by Catwoman's claim "rumor has it" that Joker's somehow involved with Strange. She knows that how? And when Joker tries to blow Selina's head out of her cat ears, Batman makes a lucky guess by firmly stating it was Joker? So he knew because Joker's laser projection sight of the sniper rifle was green? Who knew the world's greatest detective relied so heavily on speculation.

The actual Joker is "deceased" when Batman scans his for his current condition, yet shortly after Batman's gassed by Clayface, but Joker almost immediately starts moving and watching in his chair even before Harley first hits Batman with a bat. This is fully revealed only during the cutscene in the Monarch theater.

In Penguin's museum, there's no underwater tunnel or any passage to the area in the story where you fight one of the one armed Russian twins and free Mr. Freeze. So how did anyone get over there?

Penguin wants to find out Batman's identity and have his body stuffed in a trophy case as "the jewel of his collection", but if his shark nabbed Batman what would Penguin put on display? Shark****?

What's stopping the inmates from building makeshift rafts and attempting to escape? What if it wasn't middle of winter? They could just safely swim away to Gotham.

Ra's Al Ghul prodded Batman to kill him, thereby replacing him as the Master of the League of Assassin's on the eve of protocol 10? So then Batman would be Strange's boss? LOL
And that brings up another point. Ra's and Strange planned to build similar super prisons in other DC universe cities? First off, obviously Batman wouldn't condone that if he was the head of this massive convict purging operation. And second, wouldn't the consistent slaying of "rioting" inmates for each prison raise suspicions?

Gotham's hospitals have Joker's infected blood stocked and in use, therefore many patients are at risk of death.... Yet no cure remains... Huh... Sucks to be them.

Ra's Al Ghul is a truly supernatural being? Batman was imagining Ra's being in the Demon Trials hallucination? And he didn't bring about Batman's second acid trip when the imaginary sand poured into the Lazarus Pit room and the boss fight ensued? It seemed like Ra's had spiritual and mental super powers with the help of the blood of the demon. Remember, Ra's voice was heard in the room with the blood of the demon even before Batman's drank from the "chalice". And he's dead yet undead? WTF?

Mr. Freeze's body is 9 feet tall when he's in the suit. Damn, gives new meaning to an outfit being 'slimming'.

A Joker thug is stabbed by an assassin, and she leaves her sword in the guy? How does anyone else other than Batman travel through the tunnel of Wonder City entrance when it required that the doors only part via the REC gadget?

Penguin uses a detonator to destroy the floor in the Iceberg Lounge, so why is there a floor there whenever Batman comes back? When you uppercut penguin and he falls to the floor. Batman goes from being on a balcony to standing on an iceberg which penguin blows up. Furthermore the balcony Batman was standing on had had two hostages that just disappear, we don't know if the die or what. Furthermore, no parts of the iceberg (or the hostages) are visible at the bottom of the lounge where we face Grundy.

Is Grundy basically a giant zombie version of Cole Mcgrath? He absorbs electricity and he rejuvenates his health? Why does Grundy need to that room and its electricity to have power? After all, you destroy the mechanisms in the room to weaken Grundy.

I just don't understand if Robin, and Azrael broke into Arkham City how can not some of the smarter inmates do the same and escape like they did? Hell Hush escaped! Robin and Hush going in and out completely cheapens Bruce getting captured in the beginning. Bruce partially wanted to get captured so he could have some face time with Strange but given how easy it was to get in and out it almost seems unnecessary. Couldn't he have just invaded AC and conducted an investigation? What if Strange simply kept Bruce in holding instead of releasing him? Seems like too risky a plan just to see Hugo in the flesh.

Strange never revealed Bruce's identity, yet threatened him with it the entire game? But at the climactic conclusion nothing was mentioned of it.

And need we forget the final nail in the coffin? The utter blunder that occurred an hour in the game that completely, unintentionally spoiled Clayface impersonating Joker. I was playing on a SD TV during my first playthrough, why didn't anyone else notice?

Bottom line, everything outside the core gameplay is meager at best.

And here's a comprehensive article comparing the two Arkham games:

[url]http://whatculture.com/gaming/batman-arkham-asylum-vs-arkham-city-which-game-is-better.php/2[/url]

On a more superficial note, fingers crossed(probably in vain) for the chance that the actual God damn Batman will be featured in it.

[View:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1rlRKbvqms]

Blog Post: The most disappointing game of this gen. Asininely overrated, with an atrocious storyline and use of characters.

ZANIACK — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 17:43:00 GMT

be a massive improvement over the original default?

[url]http://i40.tinypic.com/jawas7.jpg[/url]

This game is nothing more then a senseless, vulgar, clusterf*ck.

Forum Post: Re: Arkham City: A perfect 10?

ERockstar5 — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 01:14:00 GMT

Ok Batman Arkham City i can see why it could be a 10, and i'll admitt i'm a huge Batman fan and thinks this game should have beaten Skyrim for GOFTY, I think Arkham City could have been a bit bigger than it was but the reason why some give it a 10 is because the story is near perfect, it's dark with twists and turns, great characters Voice Acting is top notch like the previous one, the gamplay is smooth and and make you feel like such a bad a$$ after you beat a huge group of thugs, sometimes the combat is bit delayed but thats being picky, and the graphics are just incredible, breath taken, and really help with the tone that the game is trying to convey. the execution of the game was done so well i mean let's be honest if you compare this game to the other 10 out of 10 games you listed which is better Arkham City or COD4? Guns of the Patriots? Metal Gear 4? in my personal i think arkham is better than these at least, i think we can safely say that it's close to a perfect game if you want to nitkpick but the Arkham series is one of the best series today and it's understandable why some would give it a 10 it is that good because of the look of it, the feel of it, the twist and turns that keep you guessing threw the story, and it really takes in, it's either close to or just a perfect game.

Forum Post: Re: Do you think there will be a third Arkham game?

ERockstar5 — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 01:01:00 GMT

without question, the Arkham games are one of the best of their kind today, GOY notations, they will be more trust me

Blog Post: Asininely overrated, with an atrocious storyline and use of characters

ZANIACK — Tue, 18 Sep 2012 04:53:00 GMT

be a massive improvement over the original default?

[url]http://i40.tinypic.com/jawas7.jpg[/url]

Bottom line, it's a shame gamers are blindly infatuated with a meager clusterf*ck like Batman Arkham Sh*tty.

And here's a comprehensive article comparing the two Arkham games:

[url]http://whatculture.com/gaming/batman-arkham-asylum-vs-arkham-city-which-game-is-better.php/2[/url]

On a more superficial note, fingers crossed(probably in vain) for the chance that the actual God damn Batman will be featured in it.

[View:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1rlRKbvqms]

Blog Post: The Dark Knight Rises to New Heights

Doctor Apozem — Fri, 31 Aug 2012 03:04:00 GMT

Sequels are always an interesting challenge in gaming. They usually don't have the same spark of creativity as their predecessors, but the gameplay tends to be a lot more polished.

Batman: Arkham City is definitely a game that falls under the "more polished" category. The sequel to 2009's surprise hit is a noticeable improvement in every way. This is a hell of a feat considering that Arkham Asylum was a lot of fun. So how do you top something that's already good?

Concept Batman takes on a whole city of villains	Graphics The city looks fantastic. Character models are top-knotch as well	Sound Mark Hamill is the only person who can voice act. Everyone else is awful
Controls Excellent, especially the new quickfire gadgets	Technical Works, but no advanced sliders to adjust graphics. Also, Games for Windows Live. No.	Replayability I'd be shocked if anyone finished this game quickly

Rocksteady's answer to that was to add even more awesome content on top of everything else we already loved about the first game. The gameplay and experience is essentially the same, there's just more of it, and it looks cooler.

Take the change of scenery. In the time since the first game, Arkham Asylum closed in favor of Arkham City. The Gotham city government basically cordoned off a section of the city and turned it into a free-for-all playground with some seriously homicidal villains locked inside. Things go about as well as you'd expect. By the time Batman arrives, Arkham City is a warzone of competing factions and serial killers and psychopaths.

The prisoners' bad luck is the player's good fortune though as Arkham City is a massive open world ready for exploration. Using the grapple hook and glide abilities, you can navigate the city and explore its many nooks and crannies. I haven't seen a game world this detailed since Grand Theft Auto IV's rendition of Liberty City.

The city is packed with things to do. You can hunt a sniper, try to stop Zsaz from killing civilians, or save political prisoners from the more violent thugs. The biggest sidequest is the Riddler challenges. The Dark Knight's green-clad enemy scattered hundreds of trophies across the city. Collecting all of them requires solving a number of surprisingly creative puzzles that should prove to be a challenge for even the most experienced player.

That's not the only challenge returning Arkham Asylum veterans will face. Even if you were good at stringing together combos in the first game, new complications like knives and riot shields will present a challenge. At least enemies are a lot easier to take down with the new group counters. Try countering four guys at once, it's awesome.

The other awesome addition to combat is the ability to quickfire gadgets. Instead of digging through the d-pad menu and selecting the right tool (nigh impossible in the heat of battle), you can press a trigger and a button to quickly drop some explosive gel or disarm an armed enemy with the Batclaw.

What hasn't changed since Arkham Asylum is the core gameplay of combat. Fighting thugs is still about mastering a rhythm of attack-counter-gadget. Rocksteady did well not to change something that worked. Fighting groups of thugs as Batman is still incredibly cool.

Even cooler are the sadly infrequent stealth sections Taking down a room full of armed thugs without being seen is the highlight of this game. I loved stealthily taking down thugs because it really made you feel like Batman. Setting off a detonator while jumping out of the floor to take down a guard nails the immersion of being a superhero like few other games do.

Unfortunately, the immersion is completely broken when the Dark Knight opens his mouth. For the second game in a row, Batman sucks. Either make him silent or give him some genuine personality. As it is, he's a boring cardboard cutout and a poor excuse for a character. He barely shows emotion and never breaks from a grating monotone.

Catwoman isn't any better. Instead of suffering from a lack of personality like Batman, she falls victim to overwriting. Lines like "This kitty's got to pur" are painfully bad. Please, Rocksteady, just stop.

It's a shame the two protagonists are so dismal, because the general story quality in Batman: Arkham City is quite high. This is a game made by people who dearly love the comics. The whole city is steeped in Batman lore. Look at the villains lineup. In addition to the usual cast of Mr. Freeze and The Penguin, there are a few obscure names like Deadshot and Calendar Man.

The strangest part is that the villains are great. Rocksteady's renditions of Batman's foes perfectly toe the line between the new gritty theme and their comic book origins. Hell, they even make Calendar Man intimidating.

Don't let my complaints about the poorly-executed protagonists put you off this game. Batman: Arkham City is a ton of fun. There are so many cool things to do that it's hard to list them all here. Exploring the city, beating up endless waves of thugs in challenge mode, taking down guards in extra-difficult stealth missions... the list goes on.

Batman: Arkham City is a great sequel. It takes everything the first game did well and improves it. The only real flaw from its predecessor (not enough to do after the main campaign) is totally obliterated in this game. Batman fans will probably be playing this for a long time.

If only there was some DLC where you got to fight Calendar Man, this game would be perfect. Kidding. Sort of.

Blog Post: Review: Batman: Arkham City

Erin Fusco — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 21:57:00 GMT

Batman: Arkham City is the second iteration of Rocksteady’s highly praised take on the Batman franchise. Arkham City expands on the gritty yet plainly comic book inspired tone of the first, only this time rather than escorting a criminal to the loony bin Bruce Wayne finds himself incarcerated in the walled penal colony that lies at the heart of Gotham. The player almost immediately has the freedom to travel anywhere within the bounds of the city. The locomotion of the previous entry makes an admirable leap forward to accommodate open world exploration, but I missed the claustrophobia of the asylum and soon returned to the critical path.

The villain who orchestrated your arrest knows that Bruce Wayne is the caped crusader but more alarmingly he has something planned for Arkham City called “Protocol 10”. The dark knight is soon thrust into a race against time and for his very life. Several villains that were conspicuously absent from the Asylum have set up shop in the city as well as a couple familiar faces. Combat returns as either the counter heavy brawls or gargoyle peek-a-boo of the last title, that may sound reductive and pejorative because there are more systems in play but that is the bare bones of it. Yes, there are new and old gadgets so you can look flashy or clever but dislocating joints and choking baddies out usually expedites the process.

The main storyline was engaging and I wanted to see what happened next although at times I felt like I was going to the next plot point just to see another character cameo. The Joker is alive and not so well in Arkham City and is injecting his special brand of chaos into the events and his part in the narrative is probably the best story arc of either of Rocksteady’s games. Sidequests are fairly abundant but they held little interest for me. Riddler trophies and Joker teeth are still available for completionists although I had little patience for either. Overall the title is a worthwhile evolution of its predecessor and continues the pattern of being a licensed game for fans and non-fans alike. The game takes inspiration from the gritty Christopher Nolan style Dark Knight but retains its comic book sensibilities that leave room for the fantastical.

Blog Post: batman review

batmangamer — Mon, 13 Aug 2012 22:11:00 GMT

This game is better than the previous game in every way.

Wiki: Batman: Arkham City Guides

Anonymous — Fri, 13 Jul 2012 19:56:00 GMT

Guides for Batman: Arkham City

Wiki Page: A Complete Guide to Earning Achievements in Batman Arkham City: Update #2

John Wrek — Sun, 08 Jul 2012 22:25:00 GMT

(This guide will feature all 70 of the current Batman Arkham City achievements, as well as how to get them. Although you may have noticed that I currently only possess 1410/1500 total gamerscore for the game thus far, the only ones I do not have are most of the medal related achievements- thus I can safely tell you how to get all of these pretty little gems. Last Updated: 7/8/12.)

Story Related Achievements:

I'm Batman: Simply complete the "tutorial" entrance to Arkham City and begin your crazy adventure in order to earn this achievement easily.

Acid Bath: For your first "rescue mission" of sorts, you must stop Two Face aka Harvey Dent, from executing Catwoman with extreme prejudice. Beat up his goons, interrogate Dent, and save the damsel from a sniper's bullet- all in a day's work.

Savior: Once you come to an old church/cathedral during the story, in order to find out where the sniper's bullet that was meant for Catwoman originated from, you will meet up with some old acquaintances- preferably Harley Quinn and her goons. Take them out and rescue the ward staff holed up inside before investigating the belltower with some...explosive results.

Chimney Sweep: While exploring Sionis' Industries in the continuation of one big drawn out story mission, (the company owned by the man known as Black Mask)- you will have to find some way inside to sneak past the many guards and patrols on lookout and bust up the Joker's wonderful party. Couldn't be that furnace's chimney could it?

One Armed Bandit: One inside Sionis' Industries, you will consequently have no choice but to break up the grand reunion party. How about demolishing that big huge Joker/Titan goon with that giant hammer? Looks familiar, does he?

Non-Story Related Achievements:

Forum Post: Re: Becoming disappointed in the GI ratings of late. A 10 for Arkham city?

jktmowell — Sat, 07 Jul 2012 17:49:00 GMT

It's as close to a 10 as a game could get for me but probably a 9.75 would be more accurate

Blog Post: The Dark Knight Excels Again

Cloud 9 — Fri, 29 Jun 2012 04:39:00 GMT

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The incredible game Batman: Arkham City is almost over for me. I decided to write this review now because it took me this long to get 100% of the main story and side missions completed. Though it only took me two days to complete the main story of AC, I’ve spent the majority of those in-between months cowering over the 440 (counting Catwoman) Riddler trophies and riddles I had to rack up. I was even left in shock when I completed the main storyline and the statistics said I was 26% done with the game. THAT’S AMAZING! There were just an incredible amount of things to do in this game from saving political prisoners to meeting characters who I believe hint towards a third game.

To start off I will say how much of an improvement the fighting mechanics were from an already smooth and easy to handle system. I couldn’t have been happier since I could now counter two enemies at once and even had shortcuts to use most of Batman’s gadgets. I’m a big fan of how nimble yet swift Batman is as he just stomps the enemies (sometimes literally). I also enjoyed Rocksteady’s common sense in starting Batman with most of the gadgets you ended the first game with. It only made sense to have things such as the Batclaw and Explosive gel. This way you could easily join the fight and feel like the game never ended after the Asylum.

Rocksteady also did a fantastic job by creating better “boss fights”. In Akrham Asylum the only “bosses” were titan thugs who looked a little different from each other. Now we had enemies like Mr. Freeze, Solomon Grundy, and (maybe) Deadshot. Things were much less repetitive in this game and there were always new types of enemies appearing, be it a Tyger guard or the League of Assassin ninja women. These types of things helped to really round this game out because you always had new challenges to keep you on our toes.

Possibly my favorite aspect of AC is the expansion of the entire free-roam map. Arkham City was a ridiculously large map that gave me tons of reasons to always be exploring in the darkest corners I could find. The world had just as much vertical playing field as it did horizontal due to all of the sewers and subway tunnels involved. Luckily Batman could now use his grapple gun to launch himself high above the rooftops so he could easily soar from one end of the map to another. This was a very handy and important gadget to have and implement because you could avoid enemies on the ground and move much quicker. Also, the map was unbelievably helpful when it came to finding some of the locations because of the height some parts of the map had. Things occasionally got confusing when I would not know whether a Riddler trophy was on, above, or below the ground. The map did have the same feel to it as in Arkham Asylum because you could look wherever you had been and were even able to get a close-up view on the larger buildings that you could enter into.

Now even though Batman is my favorite super hero, I am far from knowledgeable about what kind of friends and enemies he has gained and encountered throughout his lifespan. I did feel the game was lacking in that aspect, but I really enjoyed seeing all of the (what I call) main super villains in the same game even though they hated each other. I had hoped to see a bit more of the Black Mask because he seemed to have a lot of firepower and gave the Joker a place to stay in his Sionis Industries steel mill. Though two characters I was glad to not see were Killer Croc and Scarecrow. Both characters did have easter eggs hidden within this game, but I feel that they are going to have an important role in the next Batman game. I did enjoy being able to see a lot of character files for enemies that weren’t in the game because it was a learning experience. Memorable ones were Scarface and reading about the Joker’s escape from the Asylum. Another fun thing that they continued from the last game were the tape records with interviews between the villainous inmates and Hugo Strange himself.

I know I could go on for days explaining my enthusiasm for this game and all of the things that Rocksteady got just right, but I hope by now I have conveyed that this kind of game does not come often. Once you turn this game on, it becomes very hard to stop and you will always have something else to do; be it the campaign, New Game +, predator challenges, combat challenges or even the new Riddler campaigns that combine both predator and combat challenges. So if you are any type of Batman or superhero fan, then this is the game to get because Rocksteady and Warner Bros. have given him all of the credit and awesomeness he deserves all in one great and long lasting game.

*****This was my first review so any type of criticism is accepted. I could really use tips because I’m an awful writer.*****

Blog Post: Single Greatest Game of all Time...so far.

Proprietary-Windmill — Thu, 28 Jun 2012 17:33:00 GMT

Let me start out by saying Batman: Arkham Asylum was one of the best games I have ever played, It not only successfully made me feel as if I was controlling the Dark Knight but had actually became him. Whether I was prowling through the halls of Arkham Mansion, preying on Joker's thugs like the witless criminal scum they were, or fighting amounts of henchman that would make a normal man squirm in his boots, Arkham Asylum was not only the best Batman game ever made but also one of the greatest games of all time. So with this amazing experience with Rocksteady's first Batman excursion, my expectations were immediately raised whenever Arkham City was announced, and when the day of October 18th rolled around I picked up my copy of the game and eagerly put it into my PS3 and once I was let loose in the Sprawling mega-prison my expectations were not only met they were completely blown out of the water batman arkham city was so much better than its predecessor a feat I had previously thought impossible. Arkham City delivered on so many levels be it the huge and beautifully detailed open world or the huge amount of Riddles and Riddler trophies there were to collect, the combat that was improved over Asylum's already perfect system, the new gadgets or the amazing amount of batman's infamous villians included in the game. Arkham City is simply the greatest game ever made if you are a Batman fan and have not played this or asylum...I have but one question for you. Are you freakin' insane?

Blog Post: Perfect

TheSpaniard013 — Tue, 19 Jun 2012 17:36:00 GMT

This is truly the best game I have played. Gameplay is tight, story is deep and twisted, graphics are gorgeous, I really can't complain about anything. The only time I ever have an issue with the game is when I fail to execute on something. Really the only faults I have with this game is my lack of skill.

Blog Post: New Trailer And Screens For Harley Quinn's Revenge

Joe Juba — Fri, 11 May 2012 16:29:00 GMT

One thing about Batman villains is that they always keep coming back for more. After the events of Arkham City, Harley Quinn takes on the caped crusader yet again in this DLC pack. [Excerpt]

During this story-based mission (which Warner Bros. claims lasts over two hours), players alternate control between Batman and Robin. Harley Quinn's Revenge is also the last DLC installment for the game, though players can get the complete package on May 29 with the release of Arkham City's horribly boxed Game of the Year edition. If you just want the Harley Quinn content, you can download it for $10 on May 29.

Get an idea what you'll be buying with these screens and a trailer:

[View:1634147465001]

Blog Post: New Trailer And Screens For Harley Quinn's Revenge

Joe Juba — Fri, 11 May 2012 16:29:00 GMT

One thing about Batman villains is that they always keep coming back for more. After the events of Arkham City, Harley Quinn takes on the caped crusader yet again in this DLC pack. [Excerpt]

Get an idea what you'll be buying with these screens and a trailer:

[View:1634147465001]