Arkham Asylum comes to stop super villainy from throwing superhero names in the gutter due to shameful games
On yet another chaotic night in crime-ridden Gotham City, the Joker attacks the mayor's office when he is – once more – stopped by Batman. The Dark Knight is then tasked with escorting the criminal to Arkham Asylum, a prison located in an island just outside the city. For years the island has served as a location where Gotham's most dangerous felons went through psychological treatment in the hands of skilled scientists, and lately – due to a fire on Blackgate Prison – the place's rate of evil mind per square meter went through the roof due to the relocation of the prisoners. Suspecting something is off, given that the Joker made it strangely easy to be caught, Batman accompanies him on his way to his cell, and as soon as the prison guards take over the escorting process, Harley Quinn manages to hack into the facilities security systems, allowing the Joker to escape, and take control over the whole island. In the course of a few seconds the situation turns from Batman having the Joker locked up once again, to the bat and the guards being locked up inside the prison with all kinds of criminals running loose on an island where a mad clown is now the warden.
Needless to say, that is one fantastic premise, and it is just not because there is a lot to be discovered below the game's initial setting; it is because from the get go it allows the team of developers to flesh out two of the main stars of this amazing game: Arkham Asylum itself and the cast of villains that populate its hallways during the Joker's uprising. The whole Arkham Island is filled with a variety of buildings that are bursting with dense atmosphere. By being mostly set inside a prison compound, the game was running a big risk in spending most of its gameplay time within bland grey walls, locked up cells and narrow corridors that one would expect to find within an Asylum. However, the island has been smartly constructed by many distinct constructions such as Botanical Garden, a Medical Facility, a Penitentiary, a few caves, a cemetery, a mansion and more, never giving one specific scenario enough time to bore gamers' retinas. Batman Arkham asylum is constantly changing its visual palette, but it remains dark and eerie all the way through.
Batman, needless to say, is quite an amazing character himself, and Arkham Asylum has got to be one of the best settings to ever appear on a videogame, but what really makes all those elements - of place and characters – come together is the incredible cast of villains. Rocksteady clearly could not put all main criminals of the Batman universe into one game, but when exploring the madhouse and other buildings around it, Batman will come across little nods to some villains that do not show up physically in the game. It is possible, then, for example, to encounter the cell where Two-Face was being held – identified by the Harvey Dent campaign propaganda on the wall; a tea set left behind in a hallway, a clear reference to the Mad Hatter; Mr. Freeze's frozen cell; and other items that were left behind or places that served as their holding grounds until the moment Joker took control of the Asylum and let them loose. Investigating the environment, then, comes with the pleasant reward of stumbling upon those references and eventually unlocking the profiles of those characters, a nice treat for fans of the comic book series, and a nice introduction into the world of Batman for those who do not follow his stories too closely.
The villains that, for some reason, chose not to escape the facility have joined the Joker in taking over the facility, and – in the process – the game's spotlight. Harley Quinn, Croc, Bane, the Scarecrow, Poison Ivy and a few others, all appear at certain points in the game and interact, and try to destroy, Batman. Watching those villains engage in conversations with Batman or amongst themselves, and use their abilities to stop him is an absolute blast, and it is perhaps the strongest feature of an already impressive game. The cast of outlaws is especially amazing for three separate reasons that when joined produce incredible results. First of all, their physical portrayal is absolutely stellar, and the game's artists managed to do minor alterations to their looks without harming their distinct personality while making them go along perfectly with the game's overall look; secondly, the voice-acting is simply marvelous, especially because some of these actors have already filled in the shoes of those characters in the Batman animated series, meaning that these are professionals that fully understand the twisted minds they are attempting to give voice to; and, finally, the game's writing has given life to all of these characters via very precise lines, ranging from angry and violent, to casual and humorous.
During the twelve hours or so that Batman will spend walking around Arkham Island, the hero will be faced with challenges involving a lot of exploration and some beat'em up segments in between. The exploration is done by using the character's equipment (batrangs, batclaw and etc) to find ways to proceed through the environment and advance, therefore the game demands a certain degree of attention when scanning your surroundings. Batman can enter detective mode at will, allowing him to look around the environment while points of interest, such as ledges and the entrance to refrigeration vents, will be highlighted in lighter colors. Meanwhile, detective mode and its X-ray powers will also give information on the enemies roaming the area, identifying the ones who are armed as red skeletons and the ones who are not armed as blue figures, giving support so that players can come up with good strategies to approach the groups of enemies without being seen by those with firepower.
Combat, as expected from a game that embraces the beat'em up ways, is pretty straightforward, as it only takes the press of the right mouse button for Batman to hit enemies, and the left one to counter attack when an enemy sneaks up on him while he is busy beating with somebody else. Sadly, enemy variety is awfully limited, and even though there are some foes that require a different approach during battle – for example, the ones who carry electric sticks or dual knives – the amount is simply not enough to provide good combat variety, even when considering some items, like the boomerang, can be incorporated into battle to stun the enemies for a short period of time. Combat might not be the game's biggest focus, but it could have been easily more fleshed out. Thankfully, the game's boss battles do not suffer from the same issues, and happen to be very creative, even including a couple of struggles against the game's core villains that do not involve hits or energy bars, instead choosing to focus on other quirks of those villains in order to create unique clashes.
However, the game's true gameplay pinnacle are its stealth segments. Arkham Asylum's biggest achievement is that never has a game been so successful in putting you in the shoes of a superhero so perfectly, and the stealth portions of the title are mostly responsible for that. Make no mistake, when sneaking around in the shadows trying to take down enemies without being noticed, you will truly be Batman himself. The game's locations have a number of nicely set-up rooms filled with a good number of armed guards, and since Batman does not carry fire weapons, the only way to beat them is by being silent about it. By using detective vision and launching an X-ray look upon the environment it is possible to devise clever strategies to take down all enemies one by one. Batman has a huge array of stealth moves to help you out, like hanging from gargoyles and attacking enemies from above; flying through the room and kicking foes into unconsciousness; sneaking inside vents to drop behind enemies and silently take them down; sidling against walls and launching batrangs on foes who are just around the corner; or simply walk around crouching to approach enemies without being seen. Almost everything from the environment can be used to your advantage, therefore the game rewards deep analysis of your surroundings.
The tension of those segments is greatly enhanced not just by the fact that those enemies are heavily armed and can easily kill Batman upon spotting him, but also by how realistically the game's AI reflects the actions and reactions of someone who is locked up inside a room with a capped superhero wandering in the shadows and taking down your peers one by one. Upon noticing a downed foe, some enemies will gather around the deceased fellow and proceed to curse their luck and desperately try to wake the poor soul up, only to fail and despair even more intensely. Of course, this realistic pattern can also be used to the bat's advantage since it is possible to predict where enemies will go to after somebody guarding the room with them is taken down, opening up a good time window for Batman to move to a new place to wait for enemies to come back to their original positions so he can strike once more. These stealth segments are an immense display of how Arkham Asylum successfully immerses players in the role of Batman.
If exploration, stealth and combat are not enough to satisfy your batwishes, the game also comes packed with plenty of sidequests arranged by Riddler himself, who even though does not show up physically, finds a way to torture the bat – and amuse the players – with riddles, obviously. There are throphies to collect, challenges to clear and a few rooms even have riddles that will require players to look around for objects to scan that would solve the little play on words coined by the villain. Unfortunately, some of those items and riddles can only be dealt with when Batman acquires certain equipment, meaning that those looking to complete the game will be forced to do a lot of backtracking after the game is over. On a positive note, though, after the Asylum is clear of threat enemies barely appear, so Batman is free to focus on searching versus being interrupted by enemies constantly. Amidst all optional collectibles, the most interesting ones have got to be the tapes containing interviews from the series most iconic villains during their stay at the Asylum. All villains have 5 interview tapes lying around the Asylum, and to hardcore fans of the comics, listening to their favorite evil mind go through sessions of psychology alongside a doctor will be a delight, while for players who are not familiar with the comic book world, those tapes will be interesting nonetheless for they will offer great background on equally great characters, and add more layers of depth to the halls of Arkham Asylum and the insane stories that they hold.
Batman Arkham Asylum puts pretty much all superhero games released before it to shame; however, considering how low the quality on those titles tends to be, it would be far more accurate to say that the game is a comic book come alive. Batman, Arkham Asylum, and an incredible cast of menacing villains are all tied up in one clever story told through an exciting game. The game's high production values are paired up with amazing stealth sections, glorious cutscenes and good doses of action. If the story told here had come out in the form of a comic book, it would have gone out, won awards and caused a huge splash between fans of that media; fortunately for us gamers, it is instead told through one amazing interactive piece of software that proves once and for all that, when it comes to developing a superhero game, the true villains are the ones that cut expenditures, resulting in titles that are not deserving of the heroic name they carry. Fortunately, there are heroes like the folks from Rocksteady Studios, who combat bad games by producing masterpieces like this one.