And wheres the batman?? "at home washing his tights" !!
There have been countless batman games accross multiple hardware platforms and never played a bad one!! i espcially enjoyed the amiga 500 version (90), on that basis i purchased Arkham Asylum.
The ps3, pc and 360 have a fresh look on "bats" as the joker taunts you!!
At first it all seems a little tedious walking with the joker chained up while in true joker fashion he rambles nonsense and makes fun of the batman!! but quite quickly the game begins to open up after and its surprisingly deep and really really nice to play, it all moves seamlessly!!!
I thought this was just gonna be another smash and grab beat em up, but with your suit to level up (which isnt easy) by creating higher combo counts when you are beating joker "ettes" can be enjoyable in itself. The game rewards you for perfect counter moves and there's plenty of the riddlers tropphies to find, with boss style finishers before you move on to the next riddle!!! oh the batterang to throw too is fun!!!
You have a varied and wide range of weapons, again to upgrade and discover. You have your grappler to reach high destinations, you can hang and take out foes, glide down and your suit has some quirky gadgetery to aid you in the jokers mad quests and you have to use them, plenty of secrets to find. Throughout you ll hear joker taunt you over speakers, tv's, he does have a few friends which you will meet along the way with different modes of play (scarecrow), harl i quin!!! The morgue was quite scarey, infact everytime you meet scarecrow it is scarey!!!
The fighting parts are well mapped out with multiple enemies at one time, slow down time to get moves bang on, they range from bare knuckle to gunwelding foes and it all keeps it varied, also with the ability to just zip off to higher ground it makes fighting awesome!!!
Detective work is needed and in the way batman does (new age gizmos!!) you have to follow dna residue, nicotene traces, and your able to switch the scanner on and off at your leisure (unless told to) to plan attacks, look for secret ventilation points to pull off and explore, some of the xray bodie look pretty cool and the suit tells you if theyre unconsious etc...
Arkham is a pretty big place, its sort of sand box style but there are load points where a quest is needed to complete and enemies will then appear. or joker will release them when he feels like some fun!!! Varied outdoor and indoor activities mix up the play a little.
I was pleasently surprised by Arkham Asylum its really deep and compelling to play and the joker can be quite amusing !! some good boss fights and tasty graphics keep this a scream even today. With loads of back story, tapes to listen to as you wander (when joker gets a girlfriend is quite amusing!!) and tons of material on each character make a polished and well balanced game. Frame rate is flawless with minimul load times too (bonus), it seems like rocksteady and eidos have made a winner and rightly so. Bring on Arkham City this year i cant wait !! :)