TEH. BEST. GAMES. EVAR.
By Andr'e Swartley

Issue #18
Batman Arkham Asylum
Developer: Rocksteady
Publisher: Eidos
Platform: PC, Playstation 3, Xbox 360
Rating: T for Teen

Batman: The Animated Series appeared in 1992, the same year Tim Burton directed the sequel to his reboot of the Batman franchise. Like the Burton films and the contemporary Batman comics, the animated series portrayed Batman as a dark and troubled man in an even darker and more troubled world. No longer did the name Batman conjure images of Adam West and Burt Ward go-go dancing with the various actresses who played Catwoman in the 1960's. The Dark Knight had arrived in popular culture.

Actor Kevin Conroy created subtle and authoritative differences between the voices of Batman and Bruce Wayne (without the near-parody of Christian Bale's coarse grunting), and Gotham City's arch crook, the Joker, was voiced with brilliant glee and malice by Mark Hamill. That's right-Luke Skywalker played the Joker, and true to his character's penchant for theft, he stole every episode in which he appeared. A remarkable cast of A-list actors filled the ranks of Gotham's other heroes and villains as well.

Despite its excellence, the animated series ran a brief 85 episodes with head writer Paul Dini penning about a quarter of the scripts himself. Flash forward to 2009 when Conroy, Hamill, and Dini joined forces again to take the Caped Crusader through the longest night of his life in Batman Arkham Asylum.

The game begins with the Batmobile racing through the streets of Gotham toward Arkham Asylum for the Criminally Insane. Batman has caught the Joker, although as he tells Police Commissioner Gorden, the Joker "surrendered almost without a fight...I don't like it."

Sure enough, Batman's fears prove well founded indeed as the Joker overpowers several hospital orderlies and takes over the Asylum in a long-planned coup. Joker's devoted partner in crime is Harley Quinn (voiced by series veteran Arleen Sorkin), a former Arkham nurse and the most consistent cause of Batman's woes throughout the game's 10-12 hour story.

It's the little things that elevate Arkham Asylum from just an excellent game to an instant classic. For example, the Riddler has placed 240 riddles across the island where the game takes place, and most of them reveal something new about the story, characters, or lore of Arkham Asylum (the game and the place).

You will divide your time between brawling criminally insane inmates and super villains, sneaking through heating ducts or swinging between gargoyles and catwalks, and solving miniature mysteries to advance the plot. Every couple hours Batman picks up a new gadget that grants access to new places, and by the end of the game you can access any part of the island at any time.

Gamers who enjoy the Metroid series or Castlevania (post Symphony of the Night) will adore the structure and pacing of Arkham Asylum. By the end of the game, you will have seen each area of the island between two and five times, but each time feels (and often looks) different due to moments in the story that dramatically alter the mood and terrain.

And you're not even done when the story's over. There are sixteen challenge maps as well: eight hand-to-hand combat scenarios and eight "Invisible Predator" modes in which Batman must take out henchmen armed with guns. The key in the latter challenges is to incapacitate every enemy silently-Batman is still only human, remember, and can't take much gunfire.

True to the comics, Batman never kills a single enemy in the game, meaning that at the end all of the goons you ruffed up could be back for a rematch in the sequel (supposedly due out later this year). Comic book fans have been denied good game translations of their favorite heroes basically since video games have existed. But the drought has ended. Batman Arkham Asylum is a brilliant game in its own right, and perhaps the best superhero game ever made.

Final Grade: A