A City of Chaos

Batman's adventure continues in part two of the Arkham series.

In the world of media, there’s always going to be pressure with a sequel. In this day and age, it’s almost unheard of for a piece of media to not receive some kind of sequel unless explicitly stated otherwise. I feel it’s especially common in the video game industry particularly because the consumer spends more time with a video game then they would with a movie. Rocksteady knew this when they began development for Batman: Arkham City.

The sequel had actually been in development around the same time as the first game, and there’s even an Easter egg referencing the next installment(it was so well hidden that developers had to point it out over a year later.) Arkham Asylum had shown the world that superhero games did not need to be simple cash grabs but could actually be well thought out and executed. Rocksteady knew they had to bring their A game if they wanted superhero games to be taken seriously. Arkham City was released in 2011, two years after its predecessor. Much like the game that came before it, it received critical and commercial success, and was even named Game of the Year by several journalism outlets and publications. I wasn’t able to buy it when it first came out but did manage to pick it up on sale a few months later. Arkham Asylum had made such a strong impression on me that I was more than eager to dive back into the world of Batman.

Set a few months after the events of Arkham Asylum , Arkham City is the name of the prison facility that has been built in the center of Gotham. While campaigning against Arkham City’s existence, Bruce Wayne is arrested and brought into the facility. He manages to escape and assume the role of Batman in an attempt to shut the facility down. Unfortunately, he has two problems on hand. The first is that the overseer of the facility is aware of Batman’s secret identity. The second involves his greatest nemesis, the Joker. Joker has become sick with a terminal disease, and has managed to infect Batman, and is poised to infect the rest of Gotham. With the sickness quickly taking hold, Batman must find a cure for himself and Joker, as well as shut down Arkham City, and save Gotham all before his time runs out.

Joker reveals his evil plot and the truth about his health.

I don’t have much to say about the gameplay because the relative control scheme has not changed from the first game. The biggest changes involve the setting and the story itself. Arkham City has a much more open map compared to Arkham Asylum, and allows for more freedom and exploration. Although you spend most of the game contained in the facility, having the ability to glide over certain sections and planning out different attacks is a welcome change from being cooped up in the asylum. There’s also the addition of side missions as well. In the first game, any additional content came in the form of collectibles, such as trophies from the Riddler or character biographies. While those are also available in this title, Arkham City also makes use of Batman’s extensive rogues gallery in a much more effective way. Many of them have additional side missions that you can take on throughout your playthrough, or even after the main story. This allows the player a small glimpse into each villain and give you some extra content without feeling too bloated or tacked on. Playing through the side missions also allowed me a chance to explore Batman lore even further at a younger age and got me more invested in Batman as a character.

Perhaps the biggest change is the approach they took to storytelling. Asylum had a decent story, but it did feel very much like a comic book, which makes sense in relation to Batman. Arkham City had a much different feel to the story. It seems more like a video game narrative complete with tons of twists and turns while keeping the action moving so that the player is not stuck in one area for too long. It seems to be around the same length, but the pacing and story choices were much better, and I never felt as though the game was dragging. The game was highly praised for its narrative choices, and I can see why. Around this time in my life, I had just started to consider writing as a career option, and seeing a story that held so many twists yet still remained engaging was quite refreshing for me. I won’t spoil any major story moments here, but I will say that if you haven’t played this before, there will definitely be some surprises along the way.

Another minor change is the addition of a few new gadgets.

Although the game was originally released for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, in 2016 it was re-released as part of the Return to Arkham series, which allowed the first two games to be playable on PS4. Since I no longer had access to my original copy, I was absolutely ecstatic to pick up the set. Perhaps one of the best parts of the remaster is that all downloadable content was included at no extra charge. I had never been able to afford the downloadable content as a kid, so being able to experience additional missions was exciting for someone who had loved the series for so long. Part of the downloadable content includes Catwoman missions that connect directly with the main story. Although not required, they do blend in with the narrative quite seamlessly and act as a fun surprise for any Batman fan.

The other piece of DLC is titled Harley Quinn‘s Revenge and serves as an epilogue for the main game. The biggest change here is giving the player the opportunity to play as Robin who is seen in a cutscene, but not playable in the main game. Robin plays very similarly to Batman, but doesn’t have nearly as many gadgets, and seems to have a limited amount of health and defense, which was definitely a shift for me after playing as Batman for so long. As Batman, I had built up my armor and techniques to become more of the unstoppable force that he is known as. With Robin I did not have such protection and really had to strategize and plan my attacks.

Rocksteady took the pressure of a sequel and used it to catapult the second game high above the first. While Arkham Asylum is still special to me for being the reason I started to get into Batman. I personally feel that Arkham City is a much better game overall – it clearly has more polish, and a lot of care was put into the narrative and making the player experience enjoyable for hours on end. And yet, Rocksteady knew they weren’t done. Even with the success of Arkham City, something was looming on the horizon. Could another sequel really do as well as the first two titles? Only time would tell…

This post was written by Vanessa Hart, creator of Deep Dive Gaming.