Batman Arkham Asylum Review

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Batman Arkham Asylum Review
System: Ps3 and 360
Developed by: Rocksteady Studios
Publisher: Eidos Interactive/Warner bros
DLC: No
Multiplayer: Kinda, not really


Yeah i know the sequal is out and everybody cares about that but for people who didn't play Arkham Asylum your missing out. I'm a firm believer in playing the 1st game before the sequal. Now if your not into comics and superheros thats ok cause this game is so good you don't have to be to enjoy it, granted batman fans will love this game that much more. Traditionally superhero games blow with the exception of like 1 spiderman game for ps1, but Batman: Arkham Asylum breaks the curse.

Story:
Like anything good batman the main villian is Joker who is probally the most famous or infamous comic villian ever. He has no super powers, hell he's not even known for hand to hand combat. He's just completly insane to the point where you laugh and go "Holy crap this dude is nuts". To all starwars fan boys the voice acting for Joker is Mark Hamill (guy who played luke skywalker in the movies). Anyways the game starts off with Batman catching Joker and bringing him to Arkham (basically a jail that holds the criminally insane and is host to a shit load of "super villians". Batman is concerned because Joker never let him catch him that easily before so he escorts Joker inside Arkham. Well Joker escapes and reveals that his plan all along was to get caught and brought to Arkham. Then he unleashes hell on batman for the longest night of batman's life. A doctor inside Arkham was doing experiments on the super villian Bane by taking his venom (the venom that is pumped into Bane gives him super human strength and crazy), Joker plans to take this venom formula and make an army of Banes. With an army of Banes even the Avengers would be fucked. So you must beat up countless thugs along the way to finding a cure and catching Joker. You also come to blows with many super villians besides Joker like Harleyy Quinn, Killer Croc, Poison Ivy, Bane, Mr.Zsaz, Scarcrow and i'm sure i'm missing some.
Oddly enough as good as this game is i think the best part is the voice acting of Joker,Harleyy Quinn and Scarcrow. The development into those characters is simply fantastic and really make the game what it is. If it was just those 3, i would still love this game.

Gameplay:
Fighting in Arkham Asylum is very basic for the most part. You have a strike button, counter and dodge. But once you progress further into the game you get some cool gadgets to use like baterrangs, a batclaw and explosive gell. The boss fights are generally easy and shouldn't give many people problems. The hardest fights are the ones against Titan henchman (thugs introduced to the venom) surrounded by regular henchman. But fighting is FAR from the best parts of the gameplay. Theres also a heavy stealth aspect of this game. In a very true to Batman way you must hide from thugs and methodically take them out 1 by 1. You can blow up walls that they pass by, sneak around corners and choke them out or by far the favorite, sit on top of a gragoyle statue and when they pass underneath drop down and hang them by their feet. Tons of options. But even THATS not the best gameplay. I think the best, most challenging, most intersting and most satisfying part of the game is the 210 (i think 210) riddler trophies around the game. Arkham Asylum is very much an "open world" game and u can go where you want. The super villian "Riddler" planted 210 trophies around Arkham island for you to find and test your intelligence. These trophies differ between actual green trophies, riddler asks a question and u need to take a picture of the thing that the question describes, tape recordings of the super villians in their pysch meetings (very comical and intersting), or the sceret heart of arkham stone statue things where each one you listen to a recording of mystery man talking about how and why arkham was orginally made. Also these trophies unlock character bios where even if you think you know batman villians, it'll give you further insight to them. It covers heros, super villians and even villians who arn't in the game such as Two Faced or Mr.Freeze.


Likes: I'm in love with the voice acting and Riddler challenges are SO addicting. Cut scenes are great
Dislikes You have to hold down x to run which is stupid. The ingame conversations between characters can feel weird and lips not match the words.


Rating: 9/10
Great game for all ages even if your not a superhero fan and loads of stuff to do which crosses over to hours and hours of gameplay and a high replay value.