You know, if I’d found the time and energy to write a post or two about Batman: Arkham City whilst I had been playing it I might not have been so kind about it. It’s fair to say there were points during this game that I experienced annoyance. It was stuff like there being stacks of armed guards hanging around in between locations, meaning trying to collect stuff or do the AR challenges meant having to engage in lots of fights with armed people, taking them out in time-consuming fashion.
Fair enough having such encounters in the main game, but having them as re-spawning enemies on the main map is just irritating. Either have them there to be taken out and stay taken out, or don’t have tough villains in great numbers hanging around at all.
That’s my major rant. My other rant was how finding things could be annoying. Like you’d set a waypoint on the map and then get to it, but because there was no sense of depth with the indicator to tell you if you’re above or below your intended destination (just a small up or down arrow would have done) you can spend ages hunting for, say, a dead body, or a door. Again, annoying, and needlessly so. A petty inconvenience that could have been easily remedied.
So, rants over, and them withstanding I can still state that Batman: Arkham City is a wonderful game. It is magnificently-well put together, with maddening attention to detail, faultless characterisations and terrific atmosphere. It’s telling that I’ve finished the game and a number of the sidequests, including Catwoman’s stuff, and there’s still about 45% of the game remaining. You certainly get value for money, and that’s just the main game – there’s the challenge maps and campaigns in the mix, too. It all amounts to a great package that more than makes up for the lack of multiplayer (which I struggle to imagine there’s any need for anyway).
If you haven’t played the latter stages of the game, and in particular if you haven’t finished it and seen the amazing ending (really, it’s quite special) then there are SPOILERS abound that will ruin this game for you. Stop reading. Go away.
So last time I posted I was just about to tackle the Penguin regarding his capturing of Mr. Freeze (whom I needed to make me an antidote to cure the disease I was carrying, phew!). The Penguin fight wasn’t really troublesome, just annoying in trying to get close to him. Indeed, whilst the boss fights have felt like a step up from the previous game they were still more irritating than engaging. Like the fight against Solomon Grundy – dodging the timing of the attacks whilst still being able to inflict damage became quite a precise thing towards the end of the fight, yet when it comes to straight out running and jumping Batman doesn’t fare too well – he’s certainly no Nathan Drake.
The best boss fight was against Mr. Freeze. This one really played to the strengths of the game, requiring a multitude of different techniques from stealth, to gel explosives, to drop attacks as Mr. Freeze stalked about the room evolving and adapting to each attack you made, meaning the same technique couldn’t work twice. I really liked it.
Since the Scarecrow was not present this time around there were other devices used to create some trippy sequences. None of them were as good as, say, the bit in the first game where it appeared that the game had broken and reloaded, but the journey into the weird world of Ra’s Al Ghul was fun. And a meeting with the Mad Hatter cropped up out of nowhere for a strange sort of encounter that the game probably could have done just fine without, really, but it all adds to the package.
The real class act though, and the part you really don’t want to read about if you haven’t finished the game, was the end. It actually felt a tad climactic, at first. Whilst the lair of Hugo Strange was interesting in its totalitarian design leanings I didn’t much of a sense about the character himself, and the reveal that Al Ghul was the mastermind behind it all did little to overwhelm.
That both of these guys were taken down without a significant battle at first made me think the game had rather cheaped out on providing a proper confrontation. Of course, the Joker took to the stage for the finale. I particularly enjoyed the twist about how he had been using a double to disguise his ravaged looks. I didn’t see it coming though it did make sense of all the remarks and hints and clues that had been scattered throughout the game puzzling over as much.
The subsequent fight against Clayface was not really befitting as a grandstanding last game boss battle, to be honest. Lots of games struggle to deliver in this regard, though, so it’s no massive letdown. And the game ultimately packs more of a punch with the final scenes. Some ironic, bittersweet exchanges between Batman and Joker are the last words the two share before the Joker actually dies.
The image of Batman carrying the body of his nemesis and laying it down was really quite moving, and the game closed out on a powerful tone in that regard. Having Joker sing ‘Only You’ over the credits at the end just really added to the emotional impact. There’s been moments in a number of games that have drawn tangible emotions out of me, but the finish to Batman: Arkham City really left me feeling a kind of subdued astonishment – in a very good way.
Of course, finishing the game doesn’t mean the game is over. There’s still sidequests galore (find Nora for Mr. Freeze, discover who the ‘watcher’ is, capture deadshot, a murderer, and not to mention the vast number of Riddler trophies to find and puzzles to resolve to save hostages. Unlike the Joker, there’s life in the game yet!
Fair enough having such encounters in the main game, but having them as re-spawning enemies on the main map is just irritating. Either have them there to be taken out and stay taken out, or don’t have tough villains in great numbers hanging around at all.
That’s my major rant. My other rant was how finding things could be annoying. Like you’d set a waypoint on the map and then get to it, but because there was no sense of depth with the indicator to tell you if you’re above or below your intended destination (just a small up or down arrow would have done) you can spend ages hunting for, say, a dead body, or a door. Again, annoying, and needlessly so. A petty inconvenience that could have been easily remedied.
So, rants over, and them withstanding I can still state that Batman: Arkham City is a wonderful game. It is magnificently-well put together, with maddening attention to detail, faultless characterisations and terrific atmosphere. It’s telling that I’ve finished the game and a number of the sidequests, including Catwoman’s stuff, and there’s still about 45% of the game remaining. You certainly get value for money, and that’s just the main game – there’s the challenge maps and campaigns in the mix, too. It all amounts to a great package that more than makes up for the lack of multiplayer (which I struggle to imagine there’s any need for anyway).
If you haven’t played the latter stages of the game, and in particular if you haven’t finished it and seen the amazing ending (really, it’s quite special) then there are SPOILERS abound that will ruin this game for you. Stop reading. Go away.
So last time I posted I was just about to tackle the Penguin regarding his capturing of Mr. Freeze (whom I needed to make me an antidote to cure the disease I was carrying, phew!). The Penguin fight wasn’t really troublesome, just annoying in trying to get close to him. Indeed, whilst the boss fights have felt like a step up from the previous game they were still more irritating than engaging. Like the fight against Solomon Grundy – dodging the timing of the attacks whilst still being able to inflict damage became quite a precise thing towards the end of the fight, yet when it comes to straight out running and jumping Batman doesn’t fare too well – he’s certainly no Nathan Drake.
The best boss fight was against Mr. Freeze. This one really played to the strengths of the game, requiring a multitude of different techniques from stealth, to gel explosives, to drop attacks as Mr. Freeze stalked about the room evolving and adapting to each attack you made, meaning the same technique couldn’t work twice. I really liked it.
Since the Scarecrow was not present this time around there were other devices used to create some trippy sequences. None of them were as good as, say, the bit in the first game where it appeared that the game had broken and reloaded, but the journey into the weird world of Ra’s Al Ghul was fun. And a meeting with the Mad Hatter cropped up out of nowhere for a strange sort of encounter that the game probably could have done just fine without, really, but it all adds to the package.
The real class act though, and the part you really don’t want to read about if you haven’t finished the game, was the end. It actually felt a tad climactic, at first. Whilst the lair of Hugo Strange was interesting in its totalitarian design leanings I didn’t much of a sense about the character himself, and the reveal that Al Ghul was the mastermind behind it all did little to overwhelm.
That both of these guys were taken down without a significant battle at first made me think the game had rather cheaped out on providing a proper confrontation. Of course, the Joker took to the stage for the finale. I particularly enjoyed the twist about how he had been using a double to disguise his ravaged looks. I didn’t see it coming though it did make sense of all the remarks and hints and clues that had been scattered throughout the game puzzling over as much.
The subsequent fight against Clayface was not really befitting as a grandstanding last game boss battle, to be honest. Lots of games struggle to deliver in this regard, though, so it’s no massive letdown. And the game ultimately packs more of a punch with the final scenes. Some ironic, bittersweet exchanges between Batman and Joker are the last words the two share before the Joker actually dies.
The image of Batman carrying the body of his nemesis and laying it down was really quite moving, and the game closed out on a powerful tone in that regard. Having Joker sing ‘Only You’ over the credits at the end just really added to the emotional impact. There’s been moments in a number of games that have drawn tangible emotions out of me, but the finish to Batman: Arkham City really left me feeling a kind of subdued astonishment – in a very good way.
Of course, finishing the game doesn’t mean the game is over. There’s still sidequests galore (find Nora for Mr. Freeze, discover who the ‘watcher’ is, capture deadshot, a murderer, and not to mention the vast number of Riddler trophies to find and puzzles to resolve to save hostages. Unlike the Joker, there’s life in the game yet!
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