While Rocksteady is continuing its Arkhamverse with its upcoming 2022 Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League game, players fondly — and rightly so — remember and enjoy the Batman: Arkham series to this day. This is especially so since WB Montréal’s upcoming 2021 Gotham Knights is actually a Batman-less Batman game. Rocksteady launched this series in 2009 with the critically-acclaimed Batman: Arkham Asylum.
This game, and those to follow, proved to be for Batman in video games what Christopher Nolan’s revered The Dark Knight Trilogy was for the superhero in live-action films. Asylum is still lovingly remembered and played now, and it’s easy to see why. But, since nothing is perfect, here are the best things about Asylum and a few that could’ve used improvement.
10 Best: Tense Setting
Before the video game community and industry became obsessed with the format of large open worlds, whether they were well executed or not, games were still more so welcomed if they were in tighter, concise spaces. Arkham Origins was an example of a game that gave a big open world, but not realizing the space to its potential. Asylum, meanwhile, made masterful work of using Arkham Asylum and the island it’s on as the setting of the game.
The game beautifully captures the essence and haunting atmosphere of being Batman stuck in one of the most dangerous places in Gotham City. Where any feeling of security should be is replaced with compelling tension and it incorporates Metroidvania elements into progression well.
9 Needed Improvement: Final Boss Fight
Perhaps the biggest gameplay and story complaint is what the final boss fight for Batman turned out to be. The plot centered on the Joker manipulating a doctor under an old alias into bringing in the highly-dangerous Titan formula for later use of creating an army of even more insane, barbaric “Banes” to unleash on Gotham.
But having Joker inject himself with the formula to become a massive Titan-Joker (complete with a mohawk) boss seems ridiculous and out of character — and not a ‘good’ ridiculous — even by comic book and Joker standards. To some, it felt thematically out of place for a Batman story that is still overall well done, as the plot felt like a good, even-darker version of something out of The Animated Series.
8 Best: Introduction Of Free-Flow Combat
No doubt that the signature gameplay feature of the Arkham series is the free-flow combat system that Rocksteady implemented throughout its trilogy, and adopted by WB Montréal for Origins. Obviously, Asylum started it all and inspired games outside of this series to take tasteful inspiration from it, like Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor and even Spider-Man to an extent from just two years ago.
The combat in these games only got better as the series progressed, but going back to the first is still a blast. While players are grateful for the improved combos, animations, gadgets, etc. that evolved the system, it’s still thoroughly enjoyable to play Asylum now, trampling hordes of thugs at once as the Dark Knight.
7 Needed Improvement: Bane’s Portrayal
For the many things Rocksteady nailed in their trilogy, Bane is one of the characters/supervillains that got the shortest end of the stick. His best portrayal and role was in Batman: Arkham Origins, which was a genuinely great depiction. Arkham Asylum made Bane’s appearance both too brief and disappointing.
The point of Bane is that he’s supposed to be the rare supervillain who rejects the trope of the strong buffoon by having both ridiculous brawn and brain, giving Batman a major test on both fronts simultaneously. Yet, we saw none of that here, or even in City. Bane was just used once as an introductory boss fight on how to fight Titan’d-up foes, only to be quickly brushed aside.
6 Best: Killer Croc And Survival Horror Elements
While Bane was disappointingly a stereotypical brute, another ‘brute’ Batman supervillain that did get used well was Waylon Jones/Killer Croc. In the game’s opening sequence with Batman and Commissioner Gordon escorting Joker through the asylum, we get an ominous introduction to him before he’s taken away. Players finally have their close encounter with him when having to retrieve the ingredients to the Titan antidote in the bowels of Arkham where Croc is kept.
What follows is a nerve-racking, semi-boss fight with him taunting with his voice booming in every direction and sporadically rushing from the sewer water to charge you, while you move as slowly as possible to not draw him. It’s a prime example of the setting/survival horror elements used fantastically in a non-horror game. Likewise can be said when entering the wing of Arkham with Poison Ivy along with the now-loose, particularly-disturbed inmates of Arkham.
5 Needed Improvement: More Side Missions
The only true side mission in Arkham Asylum is with the Riddler, solving riddles and collecting trophies in order to finally apprehend him. While, as mentioned, this game was meant to be more tight and compact and came before the full-blown obsession with open-worlds, more side missions would have been welcome.
The Arkham series began incorporating them and open worlds more from City onward, though, with the cast of rogues, it would have been nice to have more. Given the Metroidvania-lite elements and eerie atmosphere of the asylum, we could have seen some side missions with Clayface, for instance. This would’ve helped pack the game with even more engaging content.
4 Best: Scarecrow Nightmares
Surely another fan-favorite feature of the game was the way that Jonathan Crane/Scarecrow was used in the plot. He surely came a long way in terms of demeanor and personality by Arkham Knight, but Asylum gave early context for how he would reach his breaking point against Batman with the ‘insane Ichabod Crane’ portrayal.
More importantly, this was conveyed through his fear toxin infecting Batman and initiating the “Nightmare” sequences. They were wonderfully trippy in a disturbing way and a fun twist to the gameplay loop, giving some insight into the Caped Crusader’s tortured mind. Plus, no one will forget that fake-out game crash.
3 Best: Homage To A Classic Comic
You can’t create a high-quality Batman game without taking some level of respectful, well-executed inspiration from the great source materials the superhero spawned. Rocksteady with their games is no exception to that line of thinking. Arkham Knight most obviously took notes from Under the Red Hood. With their first, it took pages from Grant Morrison’s Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth.
Both center around Batman having to quell an uprising at the asylum instigated by Joker. While the comic was much darker, delving into psychological horror, Rocksteady’s game still captured the harrowing, haunting atmosphere of the setting while being more palatable to the mainstream gaming audience.
2 Best: Stealth
When talking about the revolution Asylum brought to action-based combat, stealth-based combat also needs to be praised immediately after. Among Batman’s distinctive qualities include being a master strategist/tactician generally, but also in stealth and weaponizing fear against “those who prey on the fearful.”
Asylum established a thrilling foundation that would only get even better with combat, and the stealth side of it is included. Tired memes aside, the game allowed players to use creative tactics to triumph and feel like a powerful, terrifying creature of the night and relentless force of nature that delivered his own hammer of justice against the malicious, all with simple controls.
1 Best: Audio Tapes/Lore
Another great bit of the game was how it added to the lore for both returning and new fans. The Batman mythos is a gargantuan and still-thriving legend in the comic book world. Arkham Asylum, like many games, has collectible audio tapes/logs giving insight on the various rogues in the asylum.
Thankfully, players don’t have to stop and read pages upon pages of lore to get necessary plot context in text if they don’t want, and the audio logs are great bite-size interviews. They can be played in the background as you make your way through the asylum/island and they truly, effectively set/foreshadow the dark, dire tone of the now-loose supervillains.
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