Batman: Arkham City

Genre: Open-World Action-RPG

Players: 1

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Review:

(Note: This game is included in Batman: Arkham Trilogy, along with Batman: Arkham Asylum and Batman: Arkham Knight.)

When Batman: Arkham Trilogy released on Nintendo Switch in 2023, it was a long-awaited port of three beloved games that was nevertheless also disappointing, both because the first two beloved installments in this series were lumped in with the underwhelming third installment, but also because that third installment had a pretty rough port job in its Nintendo Switch release. However, now in 2024, we finally have the ability to get these games separately. And while the trilogy bundle still represents the best value if you want to get all three games, players who would prefer to get one or both of the two earlier games now have that opportunity.

The second game in the series, Batman: Arkham City, first released in 2011 on PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360, with a Wii U port launching alongside that console in 2012 in an “Armored Edition” that added new features to take advantage of the Wii U gamepad… with none of those features present here.

While Arkham City retains the same sort of Action-focused gameplay with RPG elements that was seen in the previous game, Batman: Arkham Asylum, this game expands on the prior game’s Metroidvania-style world with a fully Open-World map, allowing players to tackle a variety of goals in any manner they choose.

Everything Asylum did so brilliantly, City does even better, bigger, and more nuanced. Paul Dini and the major voice actors are back and as great as ever here, with a new story where a condemned part of Gotham City has been cordoned off to use as a prison after the events of the first game, letting criminals run free in a plot by the villain Hugo Strange, who knows Batman’s secret identity and has locked Bruce Wayne in with the criminals as a part of his plan.

Graphically, this game seems to be about on par with the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions of the game. Which is to say it looks good, with detailed 3D visuals, great character models (for the time, anyway), and environments with a ton of personality to them. The game has aged somewhat in the decade since it was first released, and it no longer impresses the same way it once may have done, but it still has a distinctive visual style that makes it a joy to watch, even if it doesn’t quite impress on a technical level anymore.

I also need to take a moment to mention the absolutely superb sound design and voice acting in this game. This game’s sounds are phenomenal, not only giving weight to punches and explosions, but giving a unique feel to Batman’s grappling hook, his suit’s technical elements, and so on. Much has been said about the phenomenal contributions of Batman voice acting veterans Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill reprising their roles as Batman and Joker in this franchise, but pretty much everyone is on their A-game here, with virtually all of the game’s colorful cast of characters delightfully well-acted down to the random nameless mooks musing about the plans of the big players. This is no doubt partly due to the phenomenal writing, thanks to a script written in part by aforementioned Batman: The Animated Series veteran Paul Dini.

Being a full Open World game, players have a wide area of a city to navigate explore, giving them a tremendous amount of freedom. Players can tackle the campaign mode to get more of the great story, they can seek out hidden secrets, they can take on “Riddler Challenges” that have players solving puzzles and taking on difficult tasks, and there are even occasional uses of the “Detective Mode” to scan environments and “solve” crimes. Suffice it to say, there’s a lot to do here, and pretty much all of it is a blast.

It terms of the moment-to-moment gameplay, another common thing that has been said about the Batman Arkham games is “they make you feel like Batman”. While I know this sort of comment has been roundly mocked, it’s a frequent statement for a reason – the developers at Rocksteady have absolutely nailed so many of the elements that makes Batman one of the most beloved fictional characters ever created. Combat is fluid, responsive, and does an impeccable job of making the player feel empowered without making the game a cakewalk. Stealth isn’t a slog like it can often be in some games, but rather an absolute joy as you stalk criminals like a predator silently hunting prey. The simple act of free-running up and over jagged buildings, gliding from rooftop to rooftop, and using your grapple to effortlessly climb into the air all feels so fluid and gives an immense sense of freedom and elegance.

Oh, and before continuing, yeah, this game works fine on Nintendo Switch. It doesn’t really improve on the original release, but doesn’t detract from it either. There’s not much to report here, really.

In the end, Batman: Arkham City is quite simply magnificent. I know that many players see Arkham City as superior to Arkham Asylum, thanks largely due to the new free-roaming Open World elements. Personally, I think each game does its own thing extraordinarily well, and there’s no need to choose one over the other. They’re both absolutely must-have titles that are two of the greatest games of all-time, and in particular any gamer who considers themselves a Batman fan needs to play these two games immediately if they have not already done so.

tl;dr – Everything that Arkham Asylum does well, Arkham City does just as well if not better, as well as bigger and more spectacular. The Open-World game design here is superb, Batman’s expanded moveset and traversal abilities are truly delightful, and the story and world of this game is a thrill to explore. Another must-play for anyone looking for a great Batman game.

Grade: A+

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