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"[GAME] Batman: Arkham City"

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Fri 16/12/11 at 19:42
Regular
Posts: 261
Welcome to Arkham City! The place where nearly everyone you meet is an impoverished thug. Although they want you dead, you can slap them to death with your diamond encrusted wallet, because Bruce Wayne is loaded.

Arkham City is the Sequel to the critically acclaimed Arkham Asylum, released in 2009. A year later from the previous events, Quincy Sharp takes the credit for all your hard work stopping Joker and becomes promoted to Mayor of Gotham City. Using his power, he closes Arkham Asylum and buys large slum areas of Gotham and making it a prison called Arkham City. Quincy puts Hugo Strange in charge of Arkham City and hires Tyger Security, a private military firm, to guard the prison.

Bruce Wayne holds a press conference to state his opposing views to Arkham City’s existence and he gets arrested by Tyger and imprisoned in Arkham City. Hugo Strange has you tied to a chair and mentions “Protocol 10”. As Batman, you will attempt to break out of Arkham City and find out what Protocol 10 is.

I have to wonder how Tyger get away with throwing people in prison without trial when someone expresses their opinion. I know that Tyger are a “rogue” military team and they don’t care about the law, but I’m sure Batman’s army of lawyers would have something to say about it.

The Joker is reported to be ill due to the Titan formula transformation he went through in Arkham Asylum. When you meet him he still smiles and makes jokes, which is admirable.

You will see the return of Harley Quinn, Killer Croc and the Riddler. There are many new faces introduced to the game series such as Catwoman, the Penguin, Two-Face, Mr. Freeze, Hugo Strange, Victor Zsasz and Talia al Ghul.

The game type moves from an enclosed Asylum to an Open city, but bigger doesn’t mean better. The changes that the scope seems to bring are fairly minor. Getting around the city is pretty fun and easy using the bat claw but I didn’t really care for the Hot-Cold style searching for the next destination. Trying to figure out direction is slightly annoying when the indicator makes it confusing when height is involved as well. The game is of a similar density though, as there are quite a few side missions scattered through the city.

I played Arkham Asylum on the PC and I felt that countering didn’t work properly, but it is fine in Arkham City on the PS3. I find that Heat Vision is easier to fight with on, so I find it annoying when getting hit throws you out of that vision. As with Arkham Asylum, there are moments when the number and variety of guards can become a bit overwhelming, but it’s pretty engaging. On the PC, I found that I had complete control over the camera during combat, which allowed me to continue my combos easily, but I find hit difficult to punch with Square and control the camera with the right anologue stick at the same time, resulting in me facing the wrong direction and selecting enemies I didn't wish to attack.

It manages to keep the enjoyable stealth sections of Arkham Asylum where you get to listen to the guards nervous and scared ramblings as you wait to pick another one off. The guards have a new ability to see you through thermal goggles, but I didn’t think it changed the difficulty much. I could say the same with the addition of Batman’s smoke pellets, which I rarely needed to use.

Your Cryptographic Sequencer has been “improved” to pick up on nearby conversations and it now hacks for passwords rather than the squiggly radio frequencies in Arkham Asylum, so these changes are pretty much cosmetic. You will still have to enter frequencies, but you will do it for the Riddler’s challenge room locations. Of course the Riddler once again has way too much spare time to travel the City planting green question marks in awkward positions and now the Riddler has become Jigsaw from SAW in Arkham City as he now has time to capture hostages….. and then create elaborate and crazy puzzle rooms for you to rescue them from. You will eventually be able to meet the Riddler in person eventually and stop his question mark addiction.

The Riddler challenge rooms make use of most of your gadgets in interesting ways. He also taunts you and insults your intelligence while you’re going through them. I’d say that the Riddler is the most amusing character, with his delusions of grandeur, but there are funny lines of dialogue from the Joker, Batman & Catwoman to lighten the mood.

The remote control batarang is used again to reach switches and destroy electric power supplies that you can’t reach. The most used new gadget is the Remote Electrical Charger which is used to open garage doors, charge devices which can push/pull objects and shock enemies. However, I rarely used the disruptor gadget apart from the boss encounters that it was useful/required for.

The director decided to disable the navigation directions in “Detective Mode” because people like me used it throughout the entire game. This answers why I didn’t do the same in Arkham City. This is a good change, as Arkham City is a good looking game and detective mode looks like the camera man ate a bacon and grease sandwich all over it.

One of the most noticeable negatives of Arkham Asylum was the boss battles, which were all, bar one, just a series of more guards thrown at you. I would have to say that Arkham City is an improvement on this, although I thought the final boss was pretty poor requiring even less thought than fighting guards.

The highlight of the game for me was Mr Freeze, which is the best boss battle in both games combined. He isn’t very difficult, but it is fun to try and think of all the different ways to approach him as you can never use the same attack twice. He moves quite slowly and it creates quite a bit of tension. I also thought the Solomon Grundy boss fight was decent, but I suppose it was to make up for the lack of a fight that Penguin gives.

There are quite a few occasions where you have to use Mr Freeze’s Freeze blast to create platforms on water. You can then pull yourself around by latching on rings with the bat claw, which I thought was quite fun.

The downside to Arkham City is that due to the creators trying to add many familiar faces and trying to give them all screen time, there wasn’t anything quite as memorable as the Scarecrow sections. There is a section which tries to replicate it, known as the Demon Trials, which was interesting as you can fly up and down at high speeds, but I didn’t enjoy it quite as much. This section is also quite surreal as well, but you aren’t drugged in this game, so whatever is in that Demon chalice must be some good stuff.

I suppose that it is a bit disappointing that you don’t fight most of the returning characters. You don’t fight Harley Quinn and Killer Croc makes a cameo appearance in one small cut scene. You do get to fight Poison Ivy, but only as Catwoman.

Overall, I’d say that the level design is slightly better and the bosses have more interesting ways of being defeated, but only just. All the good qualities of Arkham Asylum are still there, like the stealth sections and cinematic set pieces, but I wish there was something else that I enjoyed as much as Mr. Freeze as I feel like the lack of something as memorable as the Scarecrow sections cancel it out. That said, I enjoyed this game very much and I consider it to be better than its predecessor.

Good
+ Good Environmental Puzzles
+ Interesting Riddler Challenge rooms
+ Mr Freeze is the best boss fight evar!!! (Hyperbole)
+ Entertaining Set Pieces
+ Engaging and sometimes amusing dialogue
+ Good Soundtrack

Bad
- Contains nothing as memorable as Scarecrow
- Camera harder to control during combat compared to PC
- Weak final boss

8.7/10
There have been no replies to this thread yet.
Fri 16/12/11 at 19:42
Regular
Posts: 261
Welcome to Arkham City! The place where nearly everyone you meet is an impoverished thug. Although they want you dead, you can slap them to death with your diamond encrusted wallet, because Bruce Wayne is loaded.

Arkham City is the Sequel to the critically acclaimed Arkham Asylum, released in 2009. A year later from the previous events, Quincy Sharp takes the credit for all your hard work stopping Joker and becomes promoted to Mayor of Gotham City. Using his power, he closes Arkham Asylum and buys large slum areas of Gotham and making it a prison called Arkham City. Quincy puts Hugo Strange in charge of Arkham City and hires Tyger Security, a private military firm, to guard the prison.

Bruce Wayne holds a press conference to state his opposing views to Arkham City’s existence and he gets arrested by Tyger and imprisoned in Arkham City. Hugo Strange has you tied to a chair and mentions “Protocol 10”. As Batman, you will attempt to break out of Arkham City and find out what Protocol 10 is.

I have to wonder how Tyger get away with throwing people in prison without trial when someone expresses their opinion. I know that Tyger are a “rogue” military team and they don’t care about the law, but I’m sure Batman’s army of lawyers would have something to say about it.

The Joker is reported to be ill due to the Titan formula transformation he went through in Arkham Asylum. When you meet him he still smiles and makes jokes, which is admirable.

You will see the return of Harley Quinn, Killer Croc and the Riddler. There are many new faces introduced to the game series such as Catwoman, the Penguin, Two-Face, Mr. Freeze, Hugo Strange, Victor Zsasz and Talia al Ghul.

The game type moves from an enclosed Asylum to an Open city, but bigger doesn’t mean better. The changes that the scope seems to bring are fairly minor. Getting around the city is pretty fun and easy using the bat claw but I didn’t really care for the Hot-Cold style searching for the next destination. Trying to figure out direction is slightly annoying when the indicator makes it confusing when height is involved as well. The game is of a similar density though, as there are quite a few side missions scattered through the city.

I played Arkham Asylum on the PC and I felt that countering didn’t work properly, but it is fine in Arkham City on the PS3. I find that Heat Vision is easier to fight with on, so I find it annoying when getting hit throws you out of that vision. As with Arkham Asylum, there are moments when the number and variety of guards can become a bit overwhelming, but it’s pretty engaging. On the PC, I found that I had complete control over the camera during combat, which allowed me to continue my combos easily, but I find hit difficult to punch with Square and control the camera with the right anologue stick at the same time, resulting in me facing the wrong direction and selecting enemies I didn't wish to attack.

It manages to keep the enjoyable stealth sections of Arkham Asylum where you get to listen to the guards nervous and scared ramblings as you wait to pick another one off. The guards have a new ability to see you through thermal goggles, but I didn’t think it changed the difficulty much. I could say the same with the addition of Batman’s smoke pellets, which I rarely needed to use.

Your Cryptographic Sequencer has been “improved” to pick up on nearby conversations and it now hacks for passwords rather than the squiggly radio frequencies in Arkham Asylum, so these changes are pretty much cosmetic. You will still have to enter frequencies, but you will do it for the Riddler’s challenge room locations. Of course the Riddler once again has way too much spare time to travel the City planting green question marks in awkward positions and now the Riddler has become Jigsaw from SAW in Arkham City as he now has time to capture hostages….. and then create elaborate and crazy puzzle rooms for you to rescue them from. You will eventually be able to meet the Riddler in person eventually and stop his question mark addiction.

The Riddler challenge rooms make use of most of your gadgets in interesting ways. He also taunts you and insults your intelligence while you’re going through them. I’d say that the Riddler is the most amusing character, with his delusions of grandeur, but there are funny lines of dialogue from the Joker, Batman & Catwoman to lighten the mood.

The remote control batarang is used again to reach switches and destroy electric power supplies that you can’t reach. The most used new gadget is the Remote Electrical Charger which is used to open garage doors, charge devices which can push/pull objects and shock enemies. However, I rarely used the disruptor gadget apart from the boss encounters that it was useful/required for.

The director decided to disable the navigation directions in “Detective Mode” because people like me used it throughout the entire game. This answers why I didn’t do the same in Arkham City. This is a good change, as Arkham City is a good looking game and detective mode looks like the camera man ate a bacon and grease sandwich all over it.

One of the most noticeable negatives of Arkham Asylum was the boss battles, which were all, bar one, just a series of more guards thrown at you. I would have to say that Arkham City is an improvement on this, although I thought the final boss was pretty poor requiring even less thought than fighting guards.

The highlight of the game for me was Mr Freeze, which is the best boss battle in both games combined. He isn’t very difficult, but it is fun to try and think of all the different ways to approach him as you can never use the same attack twice. He moves quite slowly and it creates quite a bit of tension. I also thought the Solomon Grundy boss fight was decent, but I suppose it was to make up for the lack of a fight that Penguin gives.

There are quite a few occasions where you have to use Mr Freeze’s Freeze blast to create platforms on water. You can then pull yourself around by latching on rings with the bat claw, which I thought was quite fun.

The downside to Arkham City is that due to the creators trying to add many familiar faces and trying to give them all screen time, there wasn’t anything quite as memorable as the Scarecrow sections. There is a section which tries to replicate it, known as the Demon Trials, which was interesting as you can fly up and down at high speeds, but I didn’t enjoy it quite as much. This section is also quite surreal as well, but you aren’t drugged in this game, so whatever is in that Demon chalice must be some good stuff.

I suppose that it is a bit disappointing that you don’t fight most of the returning characters. You don’t fight Harley Quinn and Killer Croc makes a cameo appearance in one small cut scene. You do get to fight Poison Ivy, but only as Catwoman.

Overall, I’d say that the level design is slightly better and the bosses have more interesting ways of being defeated, but only just. All the good qualities of Arkham Asylum are still there, like the stealth sections and cinematic set pieces, but I wish there was something else that I enjoyed as much as Mr. Freeze as I feel like the lack of something as memorable as the Scarecrow sections cancel it out. That said, I enjoyed this game very much and I consider it to be better than its predecessor.

Good
+ Good Environmental Puzzles
+ Interesting Riddler Challenge rooms
+ Mr Freeze is the best boss fight evar!!! (Hyperbole)
+ Entertaining Set Pieces
+ Engaging and sometimes amusing dialogue
+ Good Soundtrack

Bad
- Contains nothing as memorable as Scarecrow
- Camera harder to control during combat compared to PC
- Weak final boss

8.7/10

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