Batman: Arkham Knight – Review (PS4)

Rocksteady had a real job on its hands back in the late 2000’s – superhero games were generally very poor and the developer had been tasked with delivering a new Batman game. It was a challenge they relished and they ended up revitalizing the game genre, with seamless combat and tight scripted encounters, in 2009’s Batman: Arkham Asylum. The second game in the series, Arkham City, opened the game world up to a part of Gotham and laid the groundwork for the latest instalment. 2015’s Batman: Arkham Knight is the culmination of Rocksteady’s trilogy of Batman games and a showcase for the graphical capabilities of the new generation of consoles.

Set a year after the events of the previous game, Arkham Knight sees Scarecrow threatening to release a poisonous toxin throughout Gotham. When another, previously unknown, villain – the titular Arkham Knight – lends his weight to Scarecrow’s campaign of terror, it becomes apparent Batman is going to have his hands full. Luckily you’re not on your own, Alfred, Oracle, Robin and more are on hand to offer assistance.

In the panic and chaos, all of Batman’s greatest enemies come out of the woodwork to take advantage. These villains could easily have been written in throughout the story but are instead optional side content, called ‘Most Wanted’ missions. I felt that this was one of the strongest aspects of the game, as it allowed you to delve into Batman’s relationship with those villains when you wanted to and gave you a choice as to how far you wanted to pursue them. Each villain has 4 or more missions each before you finally get to bring them to justice.

I really enjoyed the side content in Arkham Knight, even more so for the fact that along with specifically choosing to do a side mission, you might just stumble across them because the game does a great job of delivering on visual/audio cues that you might naturally gravitate towards out of curiosity. It felt really great when, for example, I noticed a building on fire in the distance and went to investigate. When I got there it triggered the option to start a Most Wanted mission. Very cool.

My main complaint of the game was the way the Batmobile was handled. Introduced as a new way of getting around Gotham, it does a serviceable job – although I preferred to just glide over the city which was just as quick, in my opinion. Unfortunately the controls never quite felt right for me, with L2 switching the vehicle to ‘Battle Mode’, as opposed to braking – which is usually L2’s function for car based control in other games. It led to numerous occasions where I ended up failing a mission because, in the heat of the moment, I instinctively hit L2 to brake and instead the Batmobile came to a stop and transformed into a tank.

There are needlessly large car battles and even stealth Batmobile sections, both of which felt clunky and always seemed to break the pacing of the game. At one stage I almost walked away from the game entirely after an extremely draining chunk of time trying to finish one mission. Frustrating doesn’t cover it, especially as for most of the game you feel powerful and in control of combat – the Batmobile stuff just didn’t really work, sadly.

Thankfully that is the only real complaint I had with Batman: Arkham Knight, for the majority of the game I was having a blast and another of the new mechanics, Fear Takedowns, was a big reason. This ability allows you to cherry pick enemies to take out in order. Time stops and as you select targets Batman will automatically knock them out. As you upgrade the ability you can string more attacks together, mainly to be used for face to face combat. This means you can stalk your enemies first, taking them out with stealth attacks, and then confront the last four or five, taking them out immediately in quick succession.

Rocksteady do a fine job of bringing all of the Batman characters that you know and love into the final chapter of their trilogy. I’m not a big fan of Batman but I knew most of the characters here and even the ones I didn’t had interesting enough missions that I got to learn a little about them. There is a huge amount of content in the game, my playthrough was probably around 16-18 hours but that was doing a fair chunk of side content. I had finished the main storyline and completed almost half of the Most Wanted missions with an overall completion stat of 69%, so that gives you an idea of how much is here.

As much as I loved Arkham Asylum, for me Arkham Knight is a superior game overall. Not as ground breaking as the first title in the series but more fleshed out in terms of game world and content. To have the freedom of Gotham to explore, stumbling across villain missions or just taking in the (gorgeous) sights of the broken city, is a wonderful thing. This is a game to take your time with, to savour your surroundings and the world Rocksteady have created. Unfortunately a lot of the pacing and general enjoyment is ruined by the Batmobile missions – they are forced on you too much and leave a bad, frustrating, taste. Arkham Knight is the ultimate Batman game but be prepared to suffer through a few sections to be able to appreciate it all.

Rating: 8/10

Spec Ops: The Line – Review (PS3)

Once in a while a game will show up out of the blue and knock your socks off. Spec Ops: The Line is one of those games but maybe not for the reasons you might think.

Spec Ops: The Line tells the story of Captain Martin Walker, a soldier who is part of a squad sent into Dubai to investigate the failed evacuation of citizens by an army squad called ‘The 33rd.’ As things quickly unravel you find yourself under attack from all directions and hampered by the constant threat of sandstorms.

You see this isn’t present day Dubai but an alternate version in which the country has been decimated by sandstorms that have left thousands stranded and desperate behind the ‘Storm Wall’ – a huge permanent sandstorm that has disrupted communication and stopped travel in (or out) of the area.

I won’t spoil the story for you here as it is the best thing about the game – this isn’t a title you’ll come out of brimming with joy and with a smile on your face but it really is one of the best stories I’ve played through in the last few years. And while a couple of the twists were a touch obvious, for the most part I didn’t anticipate many of them.

The gameplay itself is solid but unspectacular and you’ll spend a lot of time in cover popping out to take down enemies. One thing I liked about the game was the feel of the weapons, with some of the more powerful ones genuinely delivering an appropriate sense of recoil and a real kick.

The setting is pretty stunning and the sand tech is well realised. I was personally more impressed with the way the game portrayed the intense heat of the environment, with harsh sunlight and a nice shimmer on surroundings.

Speaking of the sand, one of the game mechanics they showed off lots in pre-release media was the ability to shoot out windows/glass roofs to take out enemies. However in the final product that is all fairly scripted stuff and doesn’t factor in greatly.

A quick shout out is needed on the music front as I felt Spec Ops really delivered on that note. A great soundtrack and paced perfectly. Also the voice acting is superb. I thought it might be an issue having Nolan North (of Nathan Drake/Uncharted fame) in the lead role but after the first 20 minutes or so I completely forgot he was even voicing the character.

The game is fairly tough and isn’t afraid to throw a large number of difficult to deal with enemies at you all at once. My main gripe with the combat was the enemy grenades. They felt too overpowered and I didn’t think the game did enough to warn me when they were nearby, or maybe more accurately it didn’t warn me quickly enough. I died a lot of times unnecessarily because of that.

Spec Ops makes a comment on the shooter genre, taking several pot shots during loading screens and differentiates itself from games like Call Of Duty and Battlefield by giving you several ‘moral’ choices during the story. Unlike games such as Infamous, where the choice is simply good or bad, in Spec Ops you’re choosing between bad or bad. There is no right or wrong answer. So who do you punish? Who do you sacrifice? I would love to see more games give you this kind of choice as opposed to the more straight forward options we usually get.

Another great addition in this game is the degradation of your character and squad over the course of the game. This is something that I can’t believe hasn’t been done before in this genre. The Batman games attempted something similar in terms of Batman’s appearance changing during the game but here, as well as physical changes, you and your squad take a psychological battering as well.

Late in the game, when your character finally takes down a heavy enemy and screams an expletive he is echoing the cry of gamers across the globe when defeating a tough enemy. Even reloading calls are shouted through gritted teeth further on in the game. It just makes the game feel incredibly visceral.

I didn’t touch the multiplayer as even the developers have said it was forced upon them by the publisher and brings nothing to the table. This is a game that *definitely* didn’t need multiplayer.

Spec Ops: The Line might not be for everyone and the gameplay might not be anything special but it has a great, interesting story and makes a decent comment on today’s shooter genre.

Rating: 9/10

NB. If you do play and finish the game I’d strongly recommend checking out this interview with the writer of the game (contains massive spoilers): GAMESPOT INTERVIEW

Batman: Arkham City – Review (PS3)

Batman: Arkham Asylum blew everyone away upon it’s release in 2009. The thing that caught most people off guard was that this was a great superhero game. Of course we had Infamous, which was brilliant but there hadn’t been a decent game featuring a known comic book star for far too long.

That critical, and financial, success meant that the pressure on developers RockSteady was immense to deliver with the sequel – Arkham City.

Taking place in a city environment, as opposed to the enclosed Asylum setting of the first game, Arkham City sees Batman facing off against several well known villians. Of course The Joker is the main antagonist here, along with Hugo Strange, but you won’t be short of cameos from familiar faces.

The idea is that Strange has cordoned off a section of the city to use as a prison and keep all the inmates locked up there rather than house them within a single building.

Fortunately Batman has his grapple hook and cape to help him get around so you’re never too far away from your next mission. I struggled a little to get to grips with the mechanics for some of the air travel and on occasion it felt a little counter-intuative when compared to something like Just Cause 2.

Graphically the game looks great and the atmosphere is nicely set up with ambient noise coming in the form of rain and the chatter of henchmen, among other things.

There are a few missions of the game where you can play as Catwoman – basically a faster but slightly weaker version of Batman – but I found these to be uninspiring for the most part. Perhaps because I don’t know the character very well? Either way if you didn’t get them with your game (only new copies received the codes for download) I would say maybe give them a swerve unless you desperately want to play them.

The developers have stepped up the number of things you can do on the side – from Riddler trophies (there are now over 400 of them to find!) through to genuine side missions featuring new characters (I stumbled on a great one featuring The Mad Hatter). The amount of stuff to do can be a bit daunting but I would repeat the advice I heard from several sources – stick to the main story missions on the whole and then go back and do side stuff when you’ve finished the main missions.

I felt it took a little too long to unlock some of the better weapons/gadgets – I understand they don’t want to make the game too easy too quickly but at times early on I just couldn’t approach fight situations the way I wanted to.

For me that is a big draw of the game – being able to form a strategy and then strike in your own way. It’s a minor complaint and may not effect you if your play style suits what the game wants you to do at that time. For me it meant a fair few frustrating deaths until I nailed the fight the way the game wanted me to.

One other complaint is the fact that there is an alternative ending and I wish the developers had let you end the game that way. Why give you the choice only to then not let you live with the consequences. I’m not saying don’t give people the option to ‘rewind’ and reapproach the situation again but it would’ve been cool to have the choice to have that as your ending.

But I don’t want to dwell too long on the negatives because Arkham City is a really good game. You can tell the developers have tried to think of everything to improve upon the first game and they have delivered a bigger, more open and content packed title. The question is – after Arkham Asylum, was that what you wanted?

Rating: 8/10

GregHorrorShow’s 10 Games That Should Be Announced For The NGP (PSP2)

With the official announcement of Sony’s NGP (Next Generation Portable – a working title if ever I heard one :lol:) the gaming world (mainly) rejoiced at what appears to be a gaming handheld for the hardcore market.

Regardless of whether you’re looking to your handheld to extend your PS3 experience or not, you can’t deny that a line up featuring original games (not ports of existing titles) from the universes of Uncharted, Killzone, Resistance and Call Of Duty to name a few is targeting a specific market.

For me there were immediately a whole host of game series swimming around my head that I’d love to see on this new device.

And just to clarify I’m not talking about ports of existing games – what I want to see are fully fledged spin offs or games that bridge the gap between a PS3 game and it’s sequel.

In no order whatsoever –

.

BORDERLANDS

Borderlands was a fantastic game. With it’s cell shaded style and outrageous weapons you couldn’t help but be impressed. I know Gearbox has released a whole heap of DLC for it so some people may have had their fill but I’d love to see a version on NGP.

.

EA SPORTS

Football? Yep. Hockey? Yep. American Football? Yep. There was no point trying to choose a specific sport here – needless to say with twin analogue sticks sports games should be able to step up to the next level on NGP. (Also on a side note… EA surely must be supporting the NGP and yet there was no sign of them at the announcement? Perhaps there will be a big EA reveal at some stage – I certainly hope so.)

.

DEAD SPACE

The Dead Space universe is well fleshed out with books and films as well as the games. I would love to see an NGP game with an existing character that somehow ties into the main game series. There is certainly enough material to work with.

.

BATTLEFIELD

With Killzone and Call Of Duty confirmed the shooter genre is fairly well covered on the NGP but that doesn’t stop me hoping to be able to play Battlefield on the go. C’mon DICE tie it in nicely with Battlefield 3 and we’ll be up and running!

.

FOOTBALL MANAGER

 

As much as I love Football Manager on the PSP it is pretty limited and the makers have said they have reached breaking point on the current hardware. I’d love to see you be able to run a full reserve team, work on your team’s ground and have more detailed interactions with the media/fans/players. The developers recently said they were looking into making a console version of the game so I’m crossing my fingers.

.

FALLOUT

Can you imagine a game like Fallout *in the palm of your hand* Probably nothing else would get played as I ploughed hour after hour into it 🙂 With the games being as buggy as they are anyway surely they’d be no problem bringing a new tale from the Capitol Wasteland or New Vegas to the NGP.

.

ASSASSIN’S CREED

Yes, yes after two games in two years (and another one in 2011) some of you will be sick of stabbing people with the hidden blade but there is real potential here for a full Assassin’s Creed spin off with an entirely new ancestor instead of Ezio or Altair. Sheesh I’d even take a modern day take with Desmond that features proper action/stealth. Maybe breaking into Asbergo etc.

.

SYPHON FILTER

Syphon Filter was a great little PSOne title that spawned a sequel or two and then branched further on the original PSP with two more games. Held back by the lack of duel sticks and some questionable A.I could the NGP see the return of Gabe Logan?

.

BIOSHOCK

I’m talking Bioshock Infinite as opposed to Rapture, despite the fact I enjoyed the first two games. It would be great to have a handheld game that could maybe set up some of the story for the forthcoming game. I wouldn’t object to a title set in Rapture (perhaps during it’s heyday?) but that world needs to be done a little differently to avoid feeling stale.

.

BATMAN (OR SPIDERMAN/INSERT HERO NAME HERE)

Come on you know you’d love to see this. At this stage I’d even take a Robin spin off 😆 After Arkham Asylum and the upcoming Arkham City, Batman is definitely back in vogue and perhaps a darker grittier version of another classic hero (Spiderman? Superman?) could also work. There are a wealth of comic characters out there if the feeling is that Batman has been over saturated.

.

So there you go – food for thought on the NGP front. Would welcome any comments or games you guys would like to see on the NGP. Or even just to know if you’re gonna pick up an NGP?

.

Batman: Arkham Asylum – Review (PS3)

It’s a sad state of affairs for the gaming industry when a title is being touted as ‘finally a brilliant superhero game.’ 😦

The amount of hero games that suck vastly outnumber the success stories… Iron Man, Superman – even the usually reliable Spiderman’s recent outings have been poor.

Sure, by all accounts (I’m yet to play it but will at some stage), the Wolverine game earlier this year was decent but it seems to be that The Dark Knight (with some help from the lads at Rocksteady Games) is the only one who is willing to stand up and be counted.

Before I start getting into the nitty gritty let me just say that the finished game is miles better than the Demo. I can see with the demo that they were trying to show combat and stealth but believe me it all works a lot better in game.

So, with Arkham Asylum taking place in one night – is there enough here to keep people playing?

The answer is a resounding yes. With some wonderful voice acting from the cast of the animated series, Batman: Arkham Asylum’s story moves at a good pace and familiar enemies are used to good effect throughout.

You’ll be tasked with getting from a to b, taking out groups of henchman via hand to hand combat or using stealth. But it never, ever feels as simple as that.

The combat itself is pretty cool, with square as attack and triangle as counter (to be activated when an opponent is about to attack). Batman will move seamlessly between opponents with you just pressing square and the direction of the enemy you want to hit.

Be warned though, one of the best things about this game is that guns do a hell of a lot of damage to Batman so you can’t storm armed opponents unless you want to die… lots.

You’ll also acquire a wonderful selection of weapons/gadgets such as the Batarang and the beautifully destructive explosive gel 😎

There are also some puzzle elements, usually involving the detective mode (like an x-ray vision that alerts you to points of interest) but none are too taxing thankfully.

With such a vivid setting and a memorable selection of bad guys from Batman’s career it’s no surprise that Arkham Asylum is such a great game.

There are some stand out moments throughout the game but the encounters with Scarecrow certainly rank up there for me as some of the best gaming I’ve had this year.

Despite the odds being stacked against it, Batman: Arkham Asylum is a quality title that has had a lot of care put into making it. I’d recommend this to anyone, regardless of whether on not they are into the comics (I’m not btw).

Rating: 9/10

Batman Arkham Asylum – Demo Impressions (PS3)

I’ve said it before but I’ve never been a big comic fan and while I can tell you who a lot of the recognizable characters are, it’s not a media I’m familiar with.

However basing a game on the Batman comic rather than tying it in with a film seems like a no brainer to me – you can come up with a more flexible plot and include as many characters from that universe as you want.

So I was looking forward to Batman Arkham Asylum, especially once it became clear that the developer had done a great job on the look and feel of the game.

The first thing I noticed, after the brilliant opening cinematic, was how tight the camera was to Batman – tighter I think than even Resident Evil 4, which was firmly over Leon’s shoulder.

As someone who likes to utilise the camera to check out my surroundings this caused a few minor issues further into the demo. As I say nothing major but meant a few times I was looking at the wall instead of my opponents.

The combat felt suitably heavy, with every punch and kick landing solidly and I liked the slow mo counter moves which reminded me of the takedowns from The Bourne Conspiracy.

The only problem was repetition, essentially the same moves over again – particularily silent takedowns – but I expect you’ll unlock more moves and different move sets as you progress through the game.

I liked the detective angle – pressing L2 takes you into a sort of x-ray mode where things of interest and enemies are highlighted.

Hopefully it’ll be one of things that’s cool to use to set up attacks on your enemies but that you don’t need all the time.

It’s a fairly short demo (around 10 minutes) and while it hasn’t blown me away as much as I hoped, Batman Arkham Asylum is definitely something I’ll pick up to playthrough – just not necessarily upon release.