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Rttp: Batman (lets explore the Arkhamverse)

Kagey K

Banned
I just finished replaying Arkham Asylum on Hard with all riddles, and then did Arkham City new game plus and trying to solve all the riddles (currently about 350 out of the 440 or so)

And I figured it was time to talk about these games again.

Like Batman movies everyone loves them at first, but get upset at the sequels.

Let's use this thread to talk about the amazing parts of a great franchise, while also being constructive of what we would like from a new game.
 

Larxia

Member
Like Batman movies everyone loves them at first, but get upset at the sequels.
It was the opposite for me. While I liked it from the beginning, I enjoyed it even more with each sequel, with Arkham Knight being my favorite.

I never understood the complaints about the Batmobile in Arkham Knight, it's really exagerated because you don't have to drive it that much if you don't care about it, people made a huge deal out of nothing, and I also think the Batmobile gameplay was actually really cool, loved the Arcade feeling about it.
The rest of the game is also absolutely amazing, so hating on a whole game just because of maybe one hour of driving in a 40 hours game seems ridiculous to me.

The main complaint I have about Arkham Knight is how the ending is hidden behind a completion %, so if you just beat the initial main story, you won't get any ending at all, which feels very anti climatic and... a dumb decision.
At least if you have the DLCs, beating the DLCs villains unlocks enough % completion to trigger the main ending, so it's... decent, but it should have been done differently.

Talking about DLCs, I think having the GOTY edition of Arkham Knight is crucial to really enjoy it, because the DLC content really did add ton of value for me, I really enjoyed playing all the different characters episodes, playing all the combat challenges etc, it was among the most fun I had with the game as a whole, but I really like arcade scoring etc, so others might feel differently.

Since beating Arkham Knight and the DLCs, I always wanted a game about the rest of the Bat Family and not just batman, these DLCs really made me want something like that, so when Gotham Knights got announced... I was super happy and I'm really excited for it, it's my most anticipated game.

Arkham is a great series as a whole, but unlike a lot of people (from what I can read around), I really prefer the open variation of it, not a fan of a "dungeon-only" style of Arkham Asylum, even if the game was still really good of course. I like my free roaming as a "super" hero.
 

Kagey K

Banned
Just rebought the trilogy on Xbox for like 9 bucks.
Never finished any of them, excited to try again.
Darn you got a lot of great games for a good price.

A friend of mine and I were just saying a couple days ago, if you had never played those games, you were getting a great deal for some of the best gaming, by buying that trilogy pack on sale.

I wish they would re-release it again just so I could go for more achievements.
 

Kagey K

Banned
It was the opposite for me. While I liked it from the beginning, I enjoyed it even more with each sequel, with Arkham Knight being my favorite.

The main complaint I have about Arkham Knight is how the ending is hidden behind a completion %, so if you just beat the initial main story, you won't get any ending at all, which feels very anti climatic and... a dumb decision.
Arkham City kind of falls into the same trap. It's easy to overlook a large chunk of the game by just going from main mission to main mission.

These games really reward the completionists.

I will admit I hated the Batmobile when I had to hold LT to tank, once I discovered ther was a LT to toggle instead it changed the game (for me)
 

Larxia

Member
Arkham City kind of falls into the same trap. It's easy to overlook a large chunk of the game by just going from main mission to main mission.

These games really reward the completionists.

I will admit I hated the Batmobile when I had to hold LT to tank, once I discovered ther was a LT to toggle instead it changed the game (for me)
But Arkham City doesn't lock the main ending behind it at least.
Also I think there's completion and completion, I liked doing everything in these game except... the riddles. There are way too many of them and I personally don't find that very interesting. I will do some of them when I come upon them naturally while playing, but I won't go out of my way to find and beat all of them.
 

kanjobazooie

Mouse Ball Fetishist
I actually tried the main series for the first time last year. I've wanted to try it since the 360 days, but I've always had a problem with exploration-heavy 3D games.

I've only played for 2 and 3 hours. The game felt like playing a comic book. I loved the aesthetics, the combat, the sound design.. But the exploration part was indeed too confusing for me.

I did play the Metroidvania spinoff on the Vita years ago and I absolutely loved it. I wish they made more side-scrolling games.
 
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Kagey K

Banned
But Arkham City doesn't lock the main ending behind it at least.
Also I think there's completion and completion, I liked doing everything in these game except... the riddles. There are way too many of them and I personally don't find that very interesting. I will do some of them when I come upon them naturally while playing, but I won't go out of my way to find and beat all of them.
I can agree with that. I hate collectathons. But since going back and playing new game+ I decided I was going to try to get them all, and I'm finding a ton of stuff I missed in City the first time.

Anyone here have any of the perfect Knight achievements or trophies?

I'd love to hear from you.
 
My take is a little different than most. I think Asylum and Knight are the best of the trilogy.

Asylum had a well curated map, great riddler clues. While I loved City, Knight was a refinement of it and I liked it better in everyway.
 

Kagey K

Banned
My take is a little different than most. I think Asylum and Knight are the best of the trilogy.

Asylum had a well curated map, great riddler clues. While I loved City, Knight was a refinement of it and I liked it better in everyway.
Arkham Knight had a lot going for it (especially because it looked amazing graphically)

It still looks incredibly good now, and it was a natural evolution after the previous 2 games.

Nobody talks about Origins anymore though, and I think it deserves more respect.
 
Arkham Knight had a lot going for it (especially because it looked amazing graphically)

It still looks incredibly good now, and it was a natural evolution after the previous 2 games.

Nobody talks about Origins anymore though, and I think it deserves more respect.
I been putting off Origins for too long. Arkham Knight looks INSANE still. Really have the sense you are in Tim Burtons Gotham. So much debris and trash on the streets.
 

Krappadizzle

Gold Member
Just spent the last month or so playing through Arkham Knight on Hard. Really fun game, and simply put, looks stunning on PC. Ran a dream, a locked 90fps with everything maxed on a 1080ti. It's better than I remember, but those Batmobile sections definitely wear themselves out after hour 10 or so. Arkham Knights combat is pinnacle Batman, and it was just a joy to play. Highly recommend anyone looking to play it, play on PC if you have even a semi-decent PC. The games art direction and visual style have aged like fine wine.

I still think Origins is arguably the best of the series, even though people treat it like a black sheep. It told a great story, it was cool to see Bruce Wayne as this young and brash hero that doesn't quite know his own strength. The detective sections were arguably done best in it and it has a great musical score. If I had to put them in a list, I'd put Arkham Knight at the top as far as fun factor is concerned, but most compelling story would go to Origins and then City.

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Really wish the Collection and Knight had 60fps patches on the SX. Asylum on SX is only 45fps because the weirdos who did the remaster made that the cap for some reason.
 

nani17

are in a big trouble
I couldn't finish Arkham Knight it was just annoying as fuck for me. For every single puzzle or issue use the batmobile. Yes, we wanted it but my god.

Me: How do I get inside the building hmm maybe through that window up there?
Game: nope use the batmobile.

Me: this elevator is a clue
game: Yes use the batmobile

Can I fly over this brid.... wait let me guess batmobile
Game: Yes that's right you wanted it now you must use it for practically everything cool isn't it?

I might retry the game sometime.
 

TLZ

Banned
I played and finished them all on release then replayed the remastered versions again. Arkham Knight desperately needs a remastered version on Xbox at least (I think it's stuck on 900p). The game looks so beautiful it's a crime not having a 4k option.
 

solidus12

Member
I couldn't finish Arkham Knight it was just annoying as fuck for me. For every single puzzle or issue use the batmobile. Yes, we wanted it but my god.

Me: How do I get inside the building hmm maybe through that window up there?
Game: nope use the batmobile.

Me: this elevator is a clue
game: Yes use the batmobile

Can I fly over this brid.... wait let me guess batmobile
Game: Yes that's right you wanted it now you must use it for practically everything cool isn't it?

I might retry the game sometime.
You: Deathstroke seems like a cool boss fight
Game: Yes, with the batmobile
 

lefty1117

Gold Member
I like the gameplay (even including the batmobile) in Arkham Knight best, but I like the story and vibe in City best.
 

Sleepwalker

Gold Member
They are still the best super hero games made.

I wish I had gotten the trilogy on pc rather than series X, arkham knight is locked at like 900p res, and asylum is locked at 45fps or something like that.

I might just double dip on PC and start with origins, never played it.
 

Kagey K

Banned
Finally got Perfect Knight on Asylum today.

Finished New Game Plus and got genius on City as well.

Now to do these ranked challenges, to get Perfect Knight 2.0.
 

Flintty

Member
Best superhero game series ever made. The second was the best purely because of the scale of the city was huge compared to Asylum and it blew me away. The combat, gadgets, puzzles and clues were superb. I should do another play through.
 
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Random thoughts:
- Main gameplay loop is awesome. A high-level FreeFlow combo on a large enemy crowd on Hard mode is *chef's kiss* stuff. A quickly done Predator room is awesome. And starting with City, traversal is pretty fun due to improved gliding mechanics.
- City is the best overall game out of the bunch
- Mr. Freeze in City is the best boss fight in the series. I love how it forces you to use almost all Predator/stealth variations
- Challenge rooms are well designed and a lot of fun. Well... At least the ones in City and Origins.
- Asylum is a fantastic game and I've 100%'d on Hard multiple times. But it's still overrated compared to the other games in the series.
- Origins probably has the best story of the bunch, and the game is also unfairly maligned compared to the others. It's a really good game; I'd say second best game in the series since in a lot of ways it's essentially City Part 2.
- Riddler trophies in City are awesome since they're practically mini puzzles.
- All games look pretty good (on PC, anyway). But Knight just looks FANTASTIC. Really awesome art direction.
- Knight... Sigh. It had potential. I like the idea of the Batmobile, and they tried their best, but the execution is horrible and having such a strong Batmobile dependency brings the overall game down. I typed up a REALLY long write-up on Knight here on GAF somewhere, I have to go find it and repost it in this thread.

That's it for now.
 

DukeNukem00

Banned
I don't think a game has ever aged better from a graphical point of view in a similar timeframe as Arkham Knight. This game is 7 years old and if you play it right you would marvel at its visuals as if it was released today. Amazing feat they did with this tech. And the base of this supposedly is unreal 3.5 or something like that


Batman-AK-2021-02-28-18-05-42-795.jpg




20201011235509-1.jpg
 

deriks

4-Time GIF/Meme God
I love Asylum because it's simple enough to anyone who never played and has the better pacing of all

City is the best story, fun and material of a Batman game ever

Knight is the best gameplay. You play as Batman, but feel like Robocop of some tough shit... Although has the worst story ever and not that good of pacing

Origins... eh. One of the most 7/10 games out there
 

Hugare

Member
I don't think a game has ever aged better from a graphical point of view in a similar timeframe as Arkham Knight. This game is 7 years old and if you play it right you would marvel at its visuals as if it was released today. Amazing feat they did with this tech. And the base of this supposedly is unreal 3.5 or something like that


Batman-AK-2021-02-28-18-05-42-795.jpg




20201011235509-1.jpg
I've recently installed it on PC after playing it on the PS4, and yeah, the game still looks gorgeous

What they did was some black magic.

It runs on heavily modified UE 3 engine, which is bonkers, because it looks better than many UE 4 titles
 
Speaking of Knight... I think Krappadizzle Krappadizzle already mentioned something about it in this thread, but not only does it look great on PC, but it looks great with relatively humble system requirements. (As in: you don't need a "monster" PC to run the game well.)

Which is to say, the game seems well optimized.
 

Krappadizzle

Gold Member
Best comic book games ever made, simply amazing. their flaws are insignificant in comparison to all they do right
The flaws aren't insignificant, but the highs are so much higher in the fantasy of "Be the Batman" that it's still worth recognizing and praising what it does so well, which is visual design and music/art direction with the already established fantastic and slick looking combat system from previous games but built upon those systems even better. The Batmobile shit in and of itself isn't bad, it's a bit easy and very arcadey, but it's not outright bad, but it just gets old in the "Can't wait to finish this to get back to the really fun parts of the game."
 
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Larxia

Member
I see people sharing their screenshots of Arkham Knights so here's one of mines :messenger_grinning:


24626926145_c8c8f2241c_o_d.png

And yes the fact that it's technically a UE3 game is quite impressive compared to the rest out there.
 

Kagey K

Banned
Arkham Origins is underrated in my opinion, it improves upon Arkham City, but Arkham Knight is the most polished of the series.
I think Origins biggest problem is that it didn't have the Rocksteady name tied to it.

It has a large number of villains showing up front and center and the city is more streamlined, but because Rocksteady didn't make it, it gets dismissed or overlooked.
 
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kiphalfton

Member
The missions based around each respective villain play out exactly the same in Arkham Knight. Very disappointing.

I think linear is the way to go with these games, as nobody knows how to make an open-world game without reusing missions over and over 500 times.

I also hate how all the characters have that “Gears of War” steroid look where they’re all built like a tank.
 
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Kev Kev

Member
just started replaying arkham asylum remaster, havent played since release, and omfg this game is so goooooooood!!!

im loving everything from the story, the art style, the character bios, interviews, puzzles, riddles, combat, even the boss fights are great!! its so fucking well done, i cant praise it enough right now.

both arkham asylum and arkham city remaster are bundled $5 on xbox, maybe elsewhere but i havent looked, and you should definitely pick them up. i was hesitant thinking "been there done that" but oh man i was so wrong. best buy ive bought in a hot minute
 
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OldBoyGamer

Banned
I really enjoyed the entire game series.

Asylum was that years ‘Spider-Man’ if you know what I mean. Was probably the best comic book / super hero game made. A work of art, a classic.

Origins comes in for a lot of slack but actually it’s a really good game (too short for me infact I finished it wanting a lot more).

I agree with others that I loved the bat mobile in knight. The only criticism is that they used it in several missions that just didn’t suit it - driving and jumping on rooftops in a car.. didn’t work.

My only other major criticism of knight is the difficulty curve was raised mostly by throwing more of the same enemies at you instead of asking for more skills. I’d be fine with that to a point, but when the biggest thing being used to make things more difficult is just going from 3 cars to 10, from 7 bad guys to 20 etc. that wore me down a few times.

I’ve completed it apart from the riddles. They were just too much for me.

I finished it still but not with all the riddles. That was a step too far for me.
 

jaysius

Banned
This is kind of neat:

Great stuff all around.

I had forgotten how good the scenes and voice acting in that Batman series were. I don't think we're going to get back there any time soon unfortunately, this shitty GaaS and then a 4 player more than like forced co-op Suicide Squad game isn't what Batman Arkham series was.

Also Breaking Bad is awesome of course.
 

Strider311

Member
The Batman Arkham games are my absolute favorite series and helped open the door to me becoming an absolute Batman fanatic. In my opinion, every one of them, to include Origins and Knight, are 10/10.
 

Jaybe

Gold Member
I was enjoying Arkham Asylum on PC at lot a couple years back but it constantly crashed. out after a certain flashback scene. I couldn’t find a solution. At some point I’ll either check again to see of There is a solution now or simply buy the trilogy on sale for the XSX.
 
I was enjoying Arkham Asylum on PC at lot a couple years back but it constantly crashed. out after a certain flashback scene. I couldn’t find a solution. At some point I’ll either check again to see of There is a solution now or simply buy the trilogy on sale for the XSX.
Buy Trilogy on XSX.

I'm pretty sure there will be a bunch of graphical improvements
 

NeonGhost

uses 'M$' - What year is it? Not 2002.
Wish Batman Arkham origins received the backwards compatibility upgrade treatment from Microsoft
 
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