Batman: Arkham Asylum and Arkham City

http://i.imgur.com/zuPHfq5.jpg

i miss this guy.

i like the old batmobile better too.

gamergate's gonna freak when they realise batman's an sjw

it's time

my copy should be arriving in the mail today, right before i leave the country for two-and-a-half weeks :(

Gamespot gave it a grudgingly positive review: http://www.gamespot.com/reviews/batman-arkham-knight-review/1900-6416169/

So far as I am concerned "more of the same but incrementally better" is good enough!

enjoy that low low framer8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?t=72&v=37KpOYVrLZM

Played through the first couple hours yesterday. They're really trying to find as many ways as possible to force you to use the batmobile at the start, which is a bit tedious when some of the scenarios are ridiculous and you suck at driving and you really just want to pummel thugs and get some cool upgrades.

Apparently the PC port is so busted WB has taking it down from sale. Many theorizing this is due to Steam's new no-questions-asked refund policy

can't excited about this for some reason, even though i loved the first two games. love the stealth parts but the brawling hurts my hands after awhile.

realistic!

haha

pffff shock glove cheatin' rules

Hahahahaha

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CIX6QjsWsAQq72Y.jpg:large

omg hahahaha

Now I kinda want to play it.

the kotakuinaction thread on how that joke is actually on GG's side is pretty incredible

My god, so many particles.

Drowned myself in Arkham Knight this weekend. Still a winning formula, though I'm glad this is the last one; would love what else these developers can do outside of this aesthetic. I'm glad Origins was acknowledged in little bits of scenery/characters/history in the game. Gameplay spoilerz ahead:

The hand-to-hand fighting feels a little less refined or tight than Origins, but maybe I'm just used to playing on Xbox controllers and MAD that I can't pull off wild x50 combos anymore. I don't love how they changed the Explosive Gel floor quickfire into an attach bomb, I relied on that a lot in the old games. Maybe the developers felt it was OP... otherwise it's still the Freeflow we all know and love with little changed. Sadly the Shock Gloves only appear in an old evidence case.

That said many new elements are flippin' great, LOVE LOVE all the team-ups and that you get way more opportunities in this game to fight as other characters. Predator feels smoother than in older games; hard to quantify precisely, but I felt in this game like there were less cheap deaths and alarm raising. Just easier? The FEAR multi-takedowns are a wonderful addition, and allow more exciting stealth missions since you're not always waiting for 1-on-1 opportunities. The addition of enemy medics is also an interesting change.

The Batmobile/tank stuff is generally good. Odd that plot- and gameplay-wise this game went so far into the Drone thing (at least this was used in Origins). Took me several hours but I warmed up to it eventually; once you get used to the dodging and weapons systems, the tank combat is a totally unique/bizarre/interesting adaptation of the ground combat, dodging and weaving missiles, going for chain kill combos, and even including stealth later on in the game. On-foot/city stuff is kind of a wash; car puzzles are bleh. The general feel of the Batmobile with its afterburners and rockets, super-ejecting Batman into the air to dropkick suckers, and goofy anti-riot gun to bean-bag the hell out of rioters is pretty snap; very evocative of the Burton films' car, which makes me happy.

There are some really grim n' gritty story elements - even considering how dark Asylum/City were; with some cool interpolations of certain (not gonna spoil) storylines from the comics and animated series. I will say that when -REDACTED- enters the storyline in a SHOCKING TWIST I was like GODDAMIT at first but eh it turned out to be pretty entertaining on the whole, and when -REDACTED- dies it was a genuine holy shit moment for me.

Agreed on hand to hand fighting, it's just not as fluent as other games. I think I posted ages ago that in City or Origins I felt that any time I failed in combat it was entirely my own fault, that I couldn't blame the controls because they were so good. Not so much in this game. Although, I also played the other games on Xbox and this on PS4 - I still occasionally end up calling the batmobile when I'm trying to use detective mode.

And on that matter, the batmobile is used way too much in this, and aside from some of the more reasonable mine-clearing side quests (i.e. the ones not involving 40 drones) it's not really enjoyable for me. I reached the tank boss fight tonight and I'm so traumatised by its poor checkpointing and general awfulness that it's almost put me off this game altogether, but I'll try it again tomorrow on easy to see if that gets me through. I have zero shame about playing on easy.

I think I'm also a bit disappointed at the lack of storyline sub-bosses, but I do like the range of side quests which I guess replace sub-bosses in this.

Team ups are good fun and I like the storyline.

On the PC, there was a sharp difference between the two - in City it felt as you described, but in Origins it was much harder to tell whether, if you went to punch a criminal, one of his other friends might slide in from 10 feet away and knock you out of it.

This game does feel very finicky and demanding compared to the previous ones. Batmobile tank fights OK, Batmobile puzzle bits pretty good, "vehicle stealth" = ahahaha, how was the first guy who said this phrase in development not just fired on the spot? We've all fantasised about being the Batman, haven't we, in a tank, sneaking up painstakingly behind an army of drone tanks so you can shoot rockets up their arses

Also the Lord of the Rings fanfiction game from last year had the plagiarised Arkham combat style locked down extremely well and it's weird returning to the Original and Best and having it actually just be Annoying

(sometimes)

We've all fantasised about being the Batman, haven't we, in a tank, sneaking up painstakingly behind an army of drone tanks so you can shoot rockets up their arses

if you went to punch a criminal, one of his other friends might slide in from 10 feet away and knock you out of it.

Oh yeah, those were fun - it's generic mooks I'm thinking of.

picked up Arkham Knight after having only played Arkham Asylum/Arkham City previously

I'm iffy on all the batmobile stuff, but the Riddler being really into creating racetracks is just o_O