The puzzles are the carrot, but the camera is the stick. Thus, there’s a great deal of incentive to explore your surroundings.
#Batman arkham asylum upgrade
Each extra doodad that you find adds to your experience points, which let you upgrade your armor, weapons and martial arts moves. This is because none other than the Riddler has hidden a treasure trove of trophies, audio diaries and other puzzles all over the island. When you’re not fighting, you’re pulling apart breakable walls, looking for hidden passages, and generally closely examining every nook and cranny of the asylum. Batman’s explosive gel lets you break open walls, but also lay traps for unsuspecting enemies. Grappling hooks take you up, Line Launchers take you horizontally.
If Detective Mode has a flaw, it’s that it’s far too useful: Seeing everything of importance highlighted can be so helpful that you’ll walk around in this mode, exchanging the game’s actual (very attractive) graphics for Detective Mode’s harsh blue overlay.īatman’s array of gadgets can come in handy during the fighting, but are mostly used to navigate the island. You’ll also use this on occasion to track someone’s trail by the clues they leave behind - vapors on their breath, fingerprints, etc. In these silent segments, you’ll likely use the Detective Mode - a sort-of X-ray vision that shows you the location of your enemies and other important things - to keep track of everyone and make sure you’re not about to be spotted. In these cases, you’ll go into Silent Predator mode, in which you leap and creep around undetected - I like to use the grappling hook to lurk on gargoyles, wait for an enemy to come by, then string him up. His enemies have no such compunctions, however, and while Batman will always win against 20 unarmed men, one guy with a gun can put him down in seconds. It’s as enjoyable as the Watchmen game‘s combat was joyless.īatman, as you may know, has no superhuman powers and doesn’t use guns. Other enemies must be disarmed in other ways, like dodging or stunning them these too are represented by color-coded alerts. Whaling on the X button will make Batman punch most everyone, but if an enemy comes up behind you and gets ready to attack - helpfully indicated by an easily spotted colorful halo around his head - you hit the Y button to counter his attack. If you’re assaulted by a group of unarmed thugs, the camera will zoom out until you’ve punched them all into unconsciousness. Hamill has more leeway to be deranged in this Teen-rated game than he did on the kid-friendly Batman: The Animated Series.Īt predetermined points throughout the adventure, you’ll be cordoned off into a specific type of gameplay. The game’s titled Batman but Joker is the central character he’s there in the beginning luring you in, and thereafter constantly on the P.A., taunting you and moving the plot along, playing the same narrative and gameplay roles that GlaDOS did in Portal. While longtime Batman voice actor Kevin Conroy gets top billing, it’s actually Mark Hamill’s performance as the insane jester that runs the show. But the title’s true strength is in the writing and acting: Through a tight script and masterful performances, what sounds on paper like a typical, workaday game becomes a captivating experience and - albeit in a weakened field - a strong contender for game of the year. Arkham features a balanced mix of fighting, stealth and puzzle gameplay perfectly suited to Bruce Wayne’s many talents. Batman explores a Metroid-style version of Arkham Asylum, the famous nuthouse for supervillains, in this single-player action game, which was released last week for Xbox 360 (reviewed) and PlayStation 3.
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