So this li’l ol’ game just came out. A li’l ol’ game called Batman: Arkham Origins. You probably heard about it and if you didn’t I want to know how to exist in such a media blackout. Either way, if you’re still holding out on the game, this is our comprehensive guide as to whether the game is worth it or not. And, just to ease any worries, this review is spoiler free due to the story-heavy nature of the game. Now, let’s get to it.
It’s pretty safe to say there was a lot riding on this game. Back in 2009, Rocksteady Studios proved that you could make a videogame based on a comic book character that stood up as a well developed game in and of itself as well as it being a well written story in that character’s canon. That character was, of course, Batman and that game was Batman: Arkham Asylum. Arkham Asylum surprised just about everyone upon it’s release by… well, not being absolutely dreadful. In fact, it was very good. It was well written and positively dripping with references to the over 70 years of Batman history and even brought back Mark Hamill and Kevin Conroy as voice actors. It also had one thing really going for it: an amazing combat engine that made you, as a player, feel like you had spent years training your body to it’s absolute peak and were using that to combat crime in the city that took your parents. Looking back, the game was definitely solid, but it feels more like a proof of concept compared to what came after. What came after was Batman: Arkham City in 2011 which took everything present in Asylum and simply made it better. The story was more expansive and engaging, the combat engine was upgraded and fine-tuned and we saw an even bigger area to explore. In short, it was one hell of a sequel and set a high mark for video games based on comic books.
Why does the history lesson matter? Because Batman: Arkham Origins wasn’t made by Rocksteady Studios, a first for the series. It was made by Warner Bros. Montreal. It’s also not a continuation of the series, it a prequel taking place close to the beginning of Batman’s career. This makes critically examining the game an interesting thing because it’s a different studio creating a story that doesn’t further anything story-wise and simply seeks to tweak things gameplay-wise. What it feels like is more of an expansion on the previous game’s mechanics with an all new story. So did it work? Well, yes and no. The story of the game does fit nicely within the existing universe and contains more than enough winks and nudges towards fans of the previous games to keep it entertaining. However, it’s the the gameplay where the game does fall down.
Origins thankfully doesn’t try to reinvent the wheel in any way by using largely the same gameplay engine present in City. Yet, there’s just something missing. There seems to be a lack of refinement and polish in the gameplay that was present in Rocksteady’s games. This is most present in the combat engine which has seen some expansion in terms of enemy types, but feels a lot more rigid in terms of fluidity of combat. One of the things Rocksteady was praised for was creating a combat engine that was completely fluid with simple controls while still providing challenge. WB Montreal’s efforts however seem almost clunky in comparison with moves sometimes barely registering and the position of certain moves, specifically takedowns, being seemingly arbitrarily restricted. Some of this may come down to the game presenting a less experienced Batman whose skills are quite up to par with what we saw in the other games. This presents a much more challenging game, but it’s still let down by a lack of polish in the gameplay which results in numerous enemy bugs which leads to more frustration than anything else.
This leads to the game’s biggest problem: constant freezing. Perhaps this was a singular example with my copy, but the fact I was playing from an installed copy on and Xbox 360 hard drive leads me to think it wasn’t. The game will simply crash, forcing a full system reboot, at any given moment. There seemed to be no pattern to it and made gameplay a constant worry as to when the next gamestopping crash would happen. The only recommendation I have, as a reviewer, is to wait for the game to be patched before buying if you haven’t already. It’s the element that brings the game down the most and made powering through it to complete the game a chore despite the stellar storytelling.
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And the storytelling is stellar, despite the problems with the game itself. Set (seemingly) five years before the events of Arkham Asylum, we follow Batman on one Christmas Eve as a bounty is place on his head by Black Mask. What follows is a series of encounters that slowly but surely build the world in which Rocksteady’s games exist. One of the criticisms levelled at the game upon its announcement was that Batman’s origin story had been told enough that a whole video game about it was unnecessary. Yet the smartest thing the game does is that it doesn’t present Batman’s origins and instead presents us with how Batman went from a raw, unformed vigilante to the Dark Knight we see in Rocksteady’s games. Over the course of the night, Batman encounters many faces essential to the Bat-mythos for the first time which allows for a lot of nudge and wink references to the previous games.
What this culminates in is a story in which we see Batman develop as a character more than almost any other media outside of comics. At first we see a Batman who is unliked by many and is shown as very raw, angry and violent towards criminals and the corrupt police alike. This, to me, read as almost a commentary on the very one-note Batman portrayal of Christopher Nolan’s films as, over the course of the game, the importance of growing out of that anger thanks to his allies is stressed repeatedly.
The storytelling in this game more than stands up with the Rocksteady games which easily more than makes up for the problems with the game itself. Except for the freezing. That needs to be sorted out. Thanks to performances from Roger Craig Smith and Tory Baker as Batman and the Joker, respectively, that almost uncannily capture the magic of Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill, we see a very natural starting point for this universe. It’s still packed full of more than enough references to the history of the comics and the games yet to take place that make it a joy for fans of the caped crusader.
One of the better examples of WB Montreal expanding on what works in the other games is their expansion of the idea of Batman as a detective. Side Missions have become Most Wanted lists and Case Files have been introduced, allowing you, as Batman, to solve crimes across Gotham. It gives a sense of Batman as a crime fighter outside of the story as opposed to simply reacting to the events of story missions and collecting Riddler Trophies in between. This focus on the detective side of Batman is also helped by a new addition to Batman’s detective vision mode: the ability to reconstruct crime scenes in real time. Sometimes it leads to strange leaps in logic when solving the crime, but having a more active hand in solving the crimes gives even more of a sense of becoming Batman.
While it definitely has its flaws, some more pertinent than others, Arkham Origins is still good enough to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the rest of the series. This is largely thanks to an incredibly well-written game that gives more character to Batman than most stories outside of comics dare to. We see Batman grow and develop over the course of the game and as a player you feel like you have shaped him into who he becomes by the start of Arkham Asylum. That’s quality storytelling and it’s fully backed up with perfomances by actors who are readily able to take up the mantle of these seminal characters. Nolan North’s cockney accent still needs work, mind you, but that’s a minor quibble against a very impressive cast. Troy Baker’s Joker is definitely a stand out, ably bringing to mind a character who could easily grow into Mark Hamill’s Joker while still feeling organic and original. It may have it’s flaws as a game, but as a story it’s probably some of the best you’ll see for Batman outside of comics.
Final Verdict: 7.9 – I still say buy, but you might want to hold off until a patch fixes that freezing issue.
