By Jim Rossignol on May 1st, 2009 at 8:15 am.
So, this has perked up my interest in the forthcoming Bat-brawler. This new Batman: Arkham Asylum trailer shows the caped protagonist beating on the nasties in a knuckle-crunching fashion. It looks remarkably robust and fairly fluid. The devs had been promising a flowing combat experience, and, judging by the game footage we see here, they might just have pulled it off. We should find out for sure on 23rd of June, when the game is released.
01/05/2009 at 08:20 Lack_26 says:
I’ve always wanted to play a fighting game, if this is good I think I’ll get it. It certainly looks quite good.
01/05/2009 at 09:01 l1ddl3monkey says:
Holy shit; it’s Bane! I’m sold.
01/05/2009 at 09:12 Sartoris says:
Piqued my interest, this has.
01/05/2009 at 09:21 Dave says:
I love how Batman, throughout the whole fighting battle of this video, never, ever once misses a punch.
Total chaos and also quite console-esque.
01/05/2009 at 09:22 Wurzel says:
The dialogue at the end seemed a little corny. Other than that, combat looks pretty cool.
01/05/2009 at 09:23 Yuccadude says:
It’s mostly showing how the chaining of attacks works out, but I think near the end there, Batman just flat out kicked some guy in the junk. Uncool Bats, uncool.
01/05/2009 at 09:50 Rei Onryou says:
Is it wrong that I’m glad they got a lot of the voice actors from the animated series, including Harlequin? What? Don’t look at me like that.
01/05/2009 at 09:51 ruaidhri k says:
Kevin Conroy = Batman
01/05/2009 at 10:02 dartt says:
@Rei Onryou
Not at all, the animated series was great!
01/05/2009 at 10:14 Demon Beaver says:
Heavy, dark prison environment… seems to be sporting LCD’s in every corner of the room touting the prison’s symbol… how weird
01/05/2009 at 10:27 Ian says:
I dunno if this makes sense, but I’d have liked it if the combat looked a bit less smooth and choreographed while essentially functioning the same way. Or functioning as it appears to, as I obviously haven’t played it.
01/05/2009 at 10:58 Ging says:
The game looks more promising with every video, but I fear the rumours of a delay till the fourth quarter.
01/05/2009 at 12:21 Waste_Manager says:
Looks pretty good, though I’m much more interested in the predator style play than out and out fighting.
01/05/2009 at 13:24 koizure says:
Why can’t all actors be like Vin Diesel and lend their voices to videogames. Yes I’m looking at you Christian Bale.
01/05/2009 at 13:47 Ian says:
@ Koizure: Well this is a bit different because it’s not part of the same canon/continuity as the Nolan/Bale films.
01/05/2009 at 14:03 James T says:
Well, there unquestionably needs to be a ’60s mode with full-screen onomatopoeic sound effects — WALLOP! POW! WHUDD! — accompanied by discordant trumpet blarts and guitar stings. Whack an Adam West model in there too.
edit: Cripes, I’m glad if Christian Bale -isn’t- doing his Batman voice for this; sounded like Will Arnett being gripped by the throat. “Thpicy CLUB SAUTHE!…”
01/05/2009 at 15:07 Jeremy says:
I agree koizure, but Vin is an admitted gamer, or at least was at one point in his life, so he respects it. Bale doesn’t seem so much like that kind of guy.
01/05/2009 at 15:07 Salem5 says:
This Batman doesn’t sound like he has smoked a whole pine.
just joking, seems like there is a lot of things taken from the comic. Not that I’d know.
01/05/2009 at 15:49 Shadowcat says:
So they wanted to show off the kinds of slick flighting moves we can expect to see… and the kind of sparkling dialogue we can expect to hear? :) Ouch!
01/05/2009 at 15:54 MonkeyMonster says:
Big Ass Bane looking dangerous… Good stuff!
01/05/2009 at 16:10 Taillefer says:
Hmmm, so does the game work by having a baddie-filled locked room which you clear to progress to the next room?
01/05/2009 at 16:25 Resin says:
Not really that interested in the console fighter genre, but I liked the animation particularly the cape. The art looks great, the gameplay design looks 1990′s.
01/05/2009 at 16:26 Cheshire P says:
I really don’t like the look of Bane, its just not the same without a tight black leather ensemble. I’m still sold on the game though, even if it ends up reveiwing at 60% or so.
01/05/2009 at 17:00 Benjamin Ferrari says:
No KRUNCH!, no BAM!, no ZONK!, no KLONK! ? I feel cheated!
I hope there will at least be a Batusi and some well written dialogue.
01/05/2009 at 17:31 Masked Dave says:
Looks very God of War to me. That’s not a criticism, God of War is utterly fantastic, but I’m interested if they’re hiding some QTE in the combat that (like for climbing onto Bane’s back).
I’m hoping they are to be honest, I know its popular to rip on QTEs but God of War has always been the example of how they should be done.
01/05/2009 at 18:12 Paul Moloney says:
I preferred the stealth-killing video a while back, but the game is still on my “probably buy” list. Though I didn’t like Batman’s whiny-lawyer voice.
P.
01/05/2009 at 19:27 Griffinheart says:
Ehh, I’m still pretty skeptical. The combat did look nice and fluid, but it’s hard to tell with how much they jumped around.
Show me a fixed camera angle, or at least a continuous and unedited stream of in-game footage, and we’ll talk.
01/05/2009 at 21:03 Solario says:
What the fuck, Paul Dini? I know it’s a callback to Knightfall, but “No, Bane, this time I break you” is the very best you could do? Really? Really?
01/05/2009 at 21:36 Adventurous Putty says:
^^^Agreed. Perhaps it sounds slightly better in context.
More worried about the voice actor for Bats, though — didn’t sound like Kevin Conroy’s best.
and <3 the gameplay; those calling it a brawler should see the other trailers.
01/05/2009 at 21:51 Mark says:
Did no one actually see the motionless goons, who apparently do nothing until Batman hits them? Looks like every crappy action movie ever made — *smack* *bam* *boom*!
NEXT!
*whack*
NEXT!
01/05/2009 at 22:55 Sam says:
@Mark: I’m under the healthy assumption their AI was turned off just for demo purposes (hopefully!)
That said, the banter between Bane and Bats was a tad corny, but even TAS got corny a few times. I look forward to this. :)
(on a slightly related note: Alone in the Dark 5 looked promising, and I found out how that turned out on both the Wii and PC versions…alas.)
26/07/2009 at 14:51 Grandpierre says:
Played the PS3 demo briefly at Gamestop. The fighting is very fluid, but much like Mark says, it’s also a bit easy. Of course, the demo had only the early stages of challenge mode (which really is “beat all the enemies to go through the room), which seemed to function more as a tutorial–I’d expect the later ones to be much harder.