The immensely awaited sequel to Arkham Asylum, this game has gotten insanely bigger, ridiculously more intricate, and incredibly more difficult! Not in a bad way, but the Bat Glide dynamics alone are killing me! I've been at it since I picked it up yesterday morning, and after more than 14 hours already, I'm a hole 11% finished. The main story alone is enough to keep one entertained and busy for days, but then they throw in a SLEW of side missions that are painstakingly intricate themselves. For example, throughout the game, there are political prisoners who aer being assaulted and need rescuing. I think there's 40 of them. Following up on murders, assisting former enemies turned temporary allies, rescuing damsels in distress and so much more.
The story goes, Quincy Sharp, former warden of Arkham Asylum, is now the Mayor of Gotham City. Mayor Sharp walled off a section of Gotham and turned it into a penal colony full of not only basic criminals, but super criminals as well, each trying to carve a section of Arkham City for themselves. You start as Bruce Wayne, running for Mayor himself so he can shut down Arkham City, and is promptly arrested by Dr. Hugo Strange and incarcerated in Arkham. The opening montage and action is incredible, and I don't want to spoil it if you haven't played yet.
When you buy the game, there is a download code to play a few levels specifically as Catwoman, which breaks up the story very nicely and offers even more intricacy to the story. If you preordered the game from Best Buy, you got an additional download code to play a few levels as Robin, which I do not have but am trying very hard to find! He does make an appearance in the game, however.
The art and animations are every bit as awesome as the first game, and even improved in some areas. The action never gets stale, as it continually amps up the ante to complete your tasks. Not just broken into unarmed and armed thugs, now some of the unarmed have machetes, shields, and body armor. The armed thugs not only have machine guns, but high power shot guns and sniper rifles as well. Top it all off with some of them with thermal imaging equipment, and the tried and true tactics aren't enough anymore, you have to be creative!
This game has definitely tested my patience, in a good way. I'm not a very patient kind of guy, so espionage games don't really agree with me, but there's enough action and exploration intermixed throughout to make it one HELL of a game.
If you play video games and are looking for one that'll take some time and be a lot of fun, yet offer an excellent challenge at the same time, run - don't walk - and get this game!
Oh, and as for replay value, if you beat the game on normal or hard difficulty, you can play again in + mode, which means you retain all of your upgrades and experience, but the whole thing is more challenging.
