Batman: Arkham City

Hey if we waited 10 years for Starcraft 2, we can wait another year for this. I hope they can keep up with the great balance the first game had. And improve the boss battles.

Was kind of hoping they would move the setting away from Arkham in general but this works. As long as it's not just more corridors and is an actual city I will be happy. Also, let me drive the Batmobile please.

I want this game so hard.

Man, that is the worst idea for prisoner relocation ever.

(Day one, obviously.)

I'm in the if-it-ain't-broke camp on this. I think there's room for at least one very direct sequel before it starts to get tired. Open-world is so difficult to do and, frankly, is a little overdone now. I'd rather see a corridor-based sequel and then that's it for Arkham games.

I'd pay good money for a poster size version of that GI cover. That looks fantastic.

The first one was my favorite single player experience of 2009. Hope they can outdo themselves on this one. I don't mind too much when it comes out as long as they get it right.

Absolutely fell in love with the first game. And the challenge maps in particular were a blast to conquer - anyone play the two newest ones up as DLC? I turned the game in before they came out...

There's new maps for Arkham Asylum? Are they free to download or do you have to pay?

YES. This news just made my day. That cover art is aces.

Last I saw, you had to pay. And not cheap either, something like $3 a map!

A DRAGON AGE II scoop and cover story last month followed by a BATMAN: ARKHAM CITY scoop and cover story this month? I just subscribed to Game Informer.

I imagine there will be a prison break somewhere in it. Why else would a game put a major asylum in the middle of a big city?

Because the actual asylum got fucked up real bad in the last game and they need somewhere to put the loonies?

Well, yeah, but if I were making the game, I'd put the prison in the middle of the city so I can eventually have a riot and then prison break

Or it's a part of the joker's humor...

At the end of the first game there was an explosion in Gotham City by Two-Face wasn't there?

If "City" takes place right after the events of "Asylum," well, that would:

1) Be awesome

and

2) Make sense that they would cordon off a few big blocks where the escaped convicts and inmates have invaded or what have you.


I'm hoping for three things: More mission variety, a lot more different type of enemies, and some sort of open-worldiness (not a total sandbox). Don't really care if I drive the Batmobile much, though.

And boss battles... they definitely need to work on the boss battles. A lot.

I'd actually like to see a bit of the Uncharted series type of upgrading brought to this (ie, from Uncharted 1 to Uncharted 2). Meaning more scope if not necessarily wildly different locales. Some online co-op missions that aren't actually part of the game (love the single player aspect of the first), and maybe a level or two where you're working with Catwoman or some other character like the Chloe/Elena/Tenzin levels from Uncharted 2.

But the biggest improvement they could make to this game would be something along the lines of what Just Cause 2 has - the ability to grapple onto anything, and then use the cape to float back to ground level. How cool would that be? To be honest, it probably wouldn't fit in with a claustrophobic type of game like these, but if they ever made an open-world Batman game it'd be pretty great to set it up like JC2...

Lastly, they shouldn't change the fighting system (or detective mode for that matter). Easy to use, but took a while to perfect yourself into the ultimate fighting machine. To try and make it more complicated would be a mistake...

Get out of my head!

I was playing JC2 last night, in one of the city sections, and kept thinking how great that engine could be put to use in a Batman game, or any superhero game for that matter.

I'd like more areas that necessitate stealth. Those were my favorite parts of the first game, but it seemed like they were parsed out fairly thin.

Oh, and more hidden forced-perspective question marks. Those things ruled.

A Batman game doesn't need to be as large as the world in JC2 (even 50% of the size would be more than enough), but using that engine to create an open world Gotham would be fantastic. Instead of causing chaos, you'd be stopping crime. Stronghold takeovers & side missions could be helping out Gordon & the police. If they could incorporate the fighting method from AA with that open world, I don't know if I'd ever remove myself from the PS3...

I thought they balanced out the stealth pretty well with the fighting. I mean, he is Batman - he should be kicking ass a little more than sneaking around.

Agreed on the forced perspective question marks. Even the riddle solving wasn't bad (not exactly difficult, though). But collecting of random Riddler trophies sucked...

Yes. Junk the trophies, up the riddles by a lot. And make them harder and interesting and each be different and unique. It'd be smart of them just to have a couple guys on this game who's sole job it is is to come up with riddles and puzzles. Maybe they could use a third for the question marks. The question mark guy.

I'd also like to face the Riddler in this one this time.

If this is anything close to being as amazing as Arkham Asylum was...this will be one hell of a good game. I cant wait.

This game is going to be friggin' awesome. Loved the first one, and had a really fun time playing it. Looking forward to the new one.

Holy crap. I noticed those replaying the game last week but didn't really pay any attention to them. Cool stuff.

Some screenies are doing the rounds - Two-Face looks to be a cross between Tommy-Lee Jones on the normal side and the puke-inducing TDK-style red-raw, exposed tendons and jaw bones on the other. His suit also apes the film by appearing burnt and frayed on one side. The rest of the screenshots are basically Batman being Batman, gliding, divebombing, perching on wires, etc.

On Game Informer's website, there is a link to download wallpapers of the awesome mag cover of this game.

Oh man, that last image with Bats in the middle of the weapon-wielding thugs makes me all kind of excited for the game. I want this now, dammit.

I get more excited about the image before that, it gives me hope that maybe detective mode can be used to...I dunno, be a detective at some points in the game.

There's that wonderful moment in the first game where you stand on the roof of the Manor and look out over Gotham. I just can't wait!
If that's gameplay footage it looks like everyone is jumping in at once rather than the kung fu movie one-on-one fights of the first one.

Also, loving the two guys getting their heads clunked together.

You don't consider following around inexplicably suspended clouds of whiskey and Harley Quinn's dirty hand-prints good solid detective work then?

So Hugo Strange is going to be the villain in Arkham City and maybe The Dark Knight Rises too? That guy's got a good agent.

Merc guy sounds like Christian Kane.

Wasn't the last trailer incredibly Joker centric? Is it possible they changed some of the plot to coincide more with the film next year?

No. The last trailer was just a teaser. I doubt if it was even over a minute. They announced a bunch of the plot elements a few months ago, in September? October? Before Tom Hardy was cast and the Hugo Strange rumors started, I know that.

In fact, I wonder if it might be the opposite. If Hugo Strange being in the sequel inspired the casting rumors in 'Rises'.

The trailers for this, ME3 and Elder Scrolls V have given me a major Sunday morning woodie.

I doubt that Nolan and Rocksteady had any real interactions with each other, but if Strange is the main villain in Rises it's going to serve Nolan well having the character 'introduced' to mass audiences in the sequel to one of the biggest selling games last year.

Didn't see these posted but SSH has three new stills and a cool promo pic:

 

http://www.superherohype.com/news/articles/125456-new-batman-arkham-city-shots

Really would love to see some gameplay clips or something for this game. Uncharted 3 had stuff come out last month, and that's going to be out a month later than this...

Interview with the game's director.  Some little tidbits about the villains.  Also some cool new screen shots.

 

And good news! NO MULTIPLAYER/CO-OP!  Instead, they made the wise choice of focusing solely on the single-player experience.  That makes me happy.

Fantastic.  Fuck anyone who wanted time taken away from a (hopefully) magnificent single player session to add to a (most likely) sucky multi player.

 

Quote:

I can't say I really understand this. Why wouldn't you want more for your $60?

 

I'm relatively new to gaming (owned a SNES & Genesis when I was a kid, but only last Christmas got a PS3), so maybe you two have more experience with sequels getting ruined by this. But a pretty good example for just the opposite is the Uncharted series. They only had a single player game in the first one, and a damn good one at that. Then they improved the single player game, while also adding a pretty damn great multiplayer & co-op option to it. Again, why wouldn't you want that?

Not to answer for them, but Uncharted 2 was a rare exception, at least for me. It seems that those really great single-player games end up sacrificing a lot of the single-player quality once they incorporate multi for their sequel. I don't know if this is the real reason, but I'd imagine that a fair amount of dev time is spent figuring out how to get the multi aspect to work and the game starts to lose focus. You end up with games like Halo 3 and Call of Duty MW2 (not sure if this holds up for Black Ops), where it seems like the solo campaign gets tacked on, just because they have to. 

That's exactly it.  Too often, incredible single player experiences are diluted, in either original or sequel form, to appease some sort of Game God that claims that only multiplayer sells games.  It takes quite a bit of resources away from the development team and, more often than not, is subpar.  

 

Take Dead Space 2, for example.  I bought the game and never once entered my code to play online.  Why? Cause I don't give a shit.  That is added multiplayer to a game that doesn't need it and unless it does Left 4 Dead better than L4D did, I see no point in it.  It could be good.  You know what would've been better?  Taking those resources and tying them back into the main game.

 

Yes, Uncharted 2 is a rare example.  Rather, most games fall into the Stranglehold (shitty multiplayer sucking time and resources away from what could've been a damn awesome single player game)/Metroid Prime 2 (shitty multiplayer that no one played and is a massive joke because what the fuck, Nintendo?)/COD past 4(multiplayer delivery system) categories.

 

Batman doesn't need multiplayer just to have multiplayer.  Now, if the developer was able to come up with a super mega kick ass multiplayer mode, God bless 'em.  Put it in.  But multi just to be multi is horseshit and has tainted many a game.

What was wrong with the Boss Battles?  The Twin Titans was the best especially right before the Joker. Although that was easier than originally thought to be..oh well I'm looking forward to this game.

The "boss battles" were the worst parts of the game.  They were completely unimaginative and lame.   Here's every boss battle:  Fight off a bunch of goons, hit boss a couple times, more goons come, hit boss a couple times.

 

Bane, Poison Ivy, the titans (aka 2 Banes), Venom Joker (one of the worst final bosses of recent memory.)

The way I see it, I AM getting more for my $60 this way.  This means they can put more time, effort, quality, polish, and maybe even content into the single-player game than they would have been able to had they tried to add multiplayer as well.