It may have numerous flaws but this is still one of the best portable Batman games and a damn good beat em up!!
Now when you think of Batman games (or any superhero games for that matter.), you usually tend to think of it more as either mediocore games or unbelievable pieces of crap! I actually have a GBA Batman game and a lot of you are gonna say " good luck with that game or try it without saying how unbelievably abysmal they are!". Honestly I found Batman Rise of Sin Tzu to be a fun game. But, I'm gonna have to prove my point. On with the review!
The Story is about a bad dude named Sin Tzu who is a waroholic maniac who wants wage various wars in various cities and places. This time he has targeted Gotham city as a place to wage war in, and he has decided Batman is his advesary. So now, Batman has now go clean up Gotham city and take out Sin Tzu before he causes any more harm!
The controls are pretty responsive for the most part. You move with the control pad, press A to jump, B to punch, L to switch gadgets, R to use a gadget and press up of the control pad+B to kick. So very straitforward controls and easy to grasp which is fine for a 2-D beat em up!
The Graphics are very well done for what the GBA has to offer. The texures look colourful and dark at the same time and the level design looks pretty good too! The character models in the game (particularily the Dark Knight himself) look very detailed and smooth. Overall, very well done graphics for a 32 bit handheld!
The Gameplay is a 2-D sidescrolling beat em up with a bit of platforming segments in between. You control Batman as he punches the snot out of thugs and makes his way through various different levels as well as fair bit of jumping puzzles on moving platforms. The game is actually quite fun. There are loads of enemies to beat up, loads of puzzles to do and (you guessed it) beat up more bad guys. After you finish the Gotham city level, Commishner Gordon will contact you to go to chemical factories, docks, sewers, warehouses etc. There's also a tutorial mode in this game that allows people to dish out their bat skills. The Combat is okay, but it's not brilliant. You can puch and kick your enemies but for some reason. Batman never has a variety of attacks, only basic combos. (bummer). There's also a fair amount of jumping puzzles and they are actually more enjoyable than the combat segments. The Boss fights were fun but it gets a bit boring after a while. Overall, awesome gameplay with fair combat!
The Music is good but a little forgettable. On the other hand the SFX do the cartoony feel quite well and made sure it stood that way.
The Downsides I found were that why is Robin, Nightwing and Batgirl not playable! That is one huge bummer, I was soo looking forward to playing those characters! Also, the animation for when Batman dies is just weird. Why can't he just pitch forward and lay still! (that would be helpful) Ahh well onto verdict!
Batman Rise of Sin Tzu is an extemely fun game with good platforming segments! Let's overview the facts shall we?
The Good: good platforming segments, great artistic design, enemies are varied and challenging, SFX is fitting for atmosphere, lots of bad guys to smash into mush, responsive controls, gliding makes platforming a hell load more easier!
The Bad: Batman is the only playable in this port (darn!), Music is forgettable, Password system is overly complicated, death animation is weird!
The Ugly: No ugly points here!
Title: I really like it!