It's no Assassin's Creed

User Rating: 6.5 | Batman Begins XBOX
Batman Begins, while still a half-decent movie/superhero game, fails to meet my standards of a fighting game due to its untapped potential.

I enjoy playing this one every now and then because I like the snap of his cape, the incredible original Xbox graphics, how Batman can dodge criminals' attacks, and the great sound effects of the game. But this is a Batman game, folks. As such, it does take more than Christian Bale's incredible voice acting skills and a couple of martial arts moves to make this one fly.

Whereas the "polish and shine" of the game is very good for an Xbox game, most of the problems I have with it involve a complete lack of gameplay depth. This game, for instance, lacks a clear saving option. It only allows you to save your game every checkpoint and gives you only about half a dozen slots at that. Honestly, no game does that anymore. Would it have been too much to have at least added a level select feature?? There are no unlockable moves – just 1-2-3 "link together" attacks. To be honest, even his cape looks way too small and stretched back to even hold him up and not at all like the movie. There isn't an option to pick up objects in the extremely linear environment. Even Batman's famous grappling hook is only usable at certain geographical points in the maps. This game reminds me too much of the first Spiderman movie game: looks good, but there's too much missing to make it worthy of even the first Xbox console.

The counter-attack system works pretty well and reminds me a lot of Assassin's Creed. Oh man…Assassin's Creed…. Hm. Oh I'm just pondering if it would be possible to make a game with an upgradeable, dynamite-looking, 360-worthy "Altair" who has the option to now climb every building in sight, fight a dozen armed men at once, utilize outstanding gadgets, free-running techniques, a vehicle, and the option to use his cape to glide and fall incredible heights without injury instead of leaping down into a haystack. Due to the existence of games like Oblivion, Halo 3, Assassin's Creed, GTA IV, and soon-to-be Force Unleashed, I now know for a fact that it is no longer too much to ask. The only question I have, therefore, is "there's no such thing as too much FUN for a video game, right?"