Arkham City is an incredible game that capitalizes on its predecessors strengths - but as a PC game, it has flaws.
For players new to the series, combat is easy to learn, more difficult to master, but fun all the way through. The basic combat is simple - click to attack, right click to counter, double tap space to dodge. But two things make it much more interesting - first and foremost, the animation system is superb. Batman's legendary skill shows in every hit and dodge. It wouldn't be surprised if every single combat encounter in the game looked and felt different. Everything - from chance, to the enemies' position, even to the number of enemies attacking you - affects how you fight (for example, picking up one thug who throws a punch at you and using him to knock down two others mid-swipe). Secondly, you have an entire arsenal of gadgets at your disposal - Batarangs, claws, weapons jammers, explosive gel, and more.
Of course, equally important are the less action-packed sequences of the game. Stealth in Arkham City is infinitely varied, granting you a limitless amount of ways to clear a room. You could grab someone from a perch and hang them by a rope, jump out of a grate and knock them out, and even grab them through a wall of planks. As the game progresses, stealth becomes more challenging - enemies gain night-vision goggles, land mines, and other equipment to impede your inevitable victory. In the end, the stealth sequences in Arkham City are just as fun as, if not more fun than, the fast-paced open combat.
Arkham City is more than just your button-spamming action game. The game is a fantastic representative of the historical comic characters - from Joker's twisted humor to Dr. Strange's twisted evil. A whole cast of Batman characters make their way into the city, and each one of them is memorable in their own way. The plot utilizes them perfectly, starting with a gang war between Penguin and Joker and the maniacal plans of Dr. Strange. The entirety of the plot is great, but the last hour or so wraps up the story in a series of dramatic twists and turns, and an unforgettable ending.
The game is supported by a strong atmosphere. Like the first game, you once again find yourself in a dark environment, but this time lit up by the occasional neon light or street lamp. Thugs roam the streets, making air and rooftop travel a much better idea than going on foot. The game utilizes DX11 well, though perhaps not efficiently (detailed below), and the diversity of scenery dotted by notable landmarks - the tower in the middle of the city, the backdrop of Gotham - makes the game that much more memorable.
Any fan of Arkham Asylum will cringe at the relatively small amount of gameplay outside of the main story. For the most part, the first game was restricted to the main game, a few Riddler side quests, and a series of challenge maps. This isn't the case in Arkham City - you may find yourself sidetracked to hunt down Zsasz and stop his murder spree, help political prisoners, complete acrobatic challenges, and forge an unusual alliance with an enemy. Even after the final credits (which are unbearably long...) finish rolling, you'll still have hours of time left.
If you're debating between the console and PC versions of this game, go with the console version. Despite being a fantastic game, it is quite an obvious console port. The graphics are overdemanding - on a computer that can run Crysis 2 and Skyrim easily on maximum settings, I still get choppiness when running around Arkham City with tessellation turned down, among other downgrades. The program itself is unreliable - it takes a ton of time to boot, sometimes it randomly switches the resolution to the lowest setting (usually after a game crash, which occurred a few times in my experience). But the most disgusting offense to this great game are the four words that almost every PC gamer shivers to think of - Games For Windows Live. Expecting slow login and crappy patching procedure, I was stuck at logging in to my account in the first place after being told that my key was already claimed - which it wasn't. As a result, I sometimes experience crashes when I get to the main menu, and I won't be able to grab any DLC for the game until I get the issue resolved.
Arkham City is a fantastic game that any gamer will enjoy. As a console game, I would imagine it is almost flawless, besides the occasional simpleton boss fight. As a PC game, it suffers from somewhat substandard optimization, crashes, and GFWL. Still, if you're a PC gamer at heart, overcoming those obstacles is nothing compared to what you'll get from this game.