By Jim Rossignol on March 15th, 2011 at 10:50 pm.
This made a wobbly appearance a bit earlier today, but I didn’t post it up because the embed had audio problems. Seems to be all fixed now, and the new trailer for Arkham City is quite the thing, with all the big villains showing their meticulously-modelled faces, to a fancy soundtrack. There is also swooping, and some mild face-punching. Don’t be alarmed, that’s quite normal. Better: the glimpses we get of the city itself! That sure looks like the kind of place I would like to defeat muscular men in hand-to-hand combat, yes sir!
Also, I would like to take this opportunity to remind you that Batman is just a man. And finally, that the game is out in the week of the 18th of October. What a week that will be.
18th of October is my birthday! :)
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And mine is the 28th! what a wonderful gift this game will be!
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I wish your birthday was in March.
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Reminds me of the Borderlands trailer.
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I was thinking the same thing!
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It’s almost as spectacular as how bad Gotham’s ideas for housing its inmates are. But yeah this is looking very nice indeed. I will need a lack of GFWL though given what happened to my saves with the first one.
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I spotted a games for windows logo at the end of the trailer, but not a games for windows live one, so maybe that just means it will be for sale on GFW.
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Encouraging! You’re right, Lewie. If they were going to include Live then it would have been that logo they would have used instead.
GFW is mainly a set of standards that Microsoft should have introduced to the industry years ago but somehow failed to. It’s all fairly common sense technical stuff and the logo simply means that this game will comply to those standards.
It will probably be in their store too, mind. But most games that pre-date the store that bare that logo (such as SupCom) do so simply because they comply to those standards.
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Really, REALLY looking forward to this game. The extra freedom afforded by the gliding looks like a lot of fun, and punching clowns is always good – the long-shoed, balloon-wrangling, ever-grinning bastards.
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Given clowns universal unpopularity, it’s a wonder they still exist as a profession tbh.
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I was just thinking the same thing about lawyers, dentists, bankers, estate agents and politicians.
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1:37 – A BOMB!
. . .. sorry. Got a bit carried away there.
I’m looking forward to this one. Really enjoyed Arkham Asylum and have high hopes for similarly fun action. Trailer was cool (as trailers ever are), liked the look of the swooping, grappling and fast diving; it’s always nice when moving around the game world in style is part of the fun.
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Will you be able to get rid of it today?
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The trailer makes me want to play the game.
Goal succeeded.
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That game looks shit. [/lie]
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I agree. I will not be purchasing this [/huge lie]
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It doesn’t look tight at all. [/lie]
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I don’t even like Batman (/base canard)
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I don’t even like bats! (/immense fabrication)
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I’m glad that at least in part of this comments thread the truth* can be spoken.
* May not be the truth.
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Looks a lot like Arkham Asylum.
Which is an EXCELLENT thing.
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I think I was one of maybe 5 people who didn’t get Arkham Asylum. It was fun to be The Batman and in many ways it was a rollicking Batman simulator, but it seemed like every fight regressed into a goddam Quicktime event. Maybe I’m just getting old, but the “hammer this button as fast as you can” mechanic is both painful and irritating.
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I didn’t find it to be a case of pressing buttons as quickly as possible – it was about finding the rhythm of a fight, blocking/countering when necessary and attacking when possible. A series of quick-time events, yes, but they were logical and relied less on good reflexes and more on observation and prediction.
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Agreed Westyfield, it had a nice amount of skill involved. It was certainly much, much more than hammering the button as fast as you can.
Once you are able to start using your batarangs and grappling hook in combat too it becomes even more engaging. However, the story mode doesn’t really require you to use those, but they really come in handy during the bonus levels.
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My only complaint was having to fight those Bane bads again and again. I agree, the combat was about getting into a rhythm of punches and blocks and watching whole swarms of them just get tossed around. The stealth/predator sequences were spectactular though, watching one last goon begging for help hiding behind a corner and firing blindly into the shadows was probably my gaming moment of the year.
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It was dead easy, too, so you ended up focusing on building the combo meter and hence or otherwise looking dead cool just being the bat.
That’s not an approach everyone is going to like, obviously. I thought it was fun.
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Personally I thought the combat in Arkham Asylum was most analogous to a rhythm game.
Once you master the basics of countering and punching and stunning and jumping and throwing, you just going with the flow of the combat, and the highest scores come from variety and efficiency and reading one or two moves ahead.
That last bit is why I love it so much, too. It’s just so BATMAN, y’know?
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@Bloatedguppy: I thought it was a masher at first too, and then suddenly I accidentally chained a proper combo together and suddenly it clicked. As has been said, once you get it the combat’s easy enough that it’s not usually: “Am I going to survive this fight?” It’s “How efficiently can I dispatch them?” Which for dealing with average goons is how Batman should be.
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I obviously I have no sense of rhythm then, as try as I might I just couldn’t get into the flow of it enough to be able to produce long combos. I think it was a testament to the game design that you didn’t need to be a combo master to get through it, and even though I wasn’t particularly adept at it I still enjoyed the combat immensely. Although some of the boss fights where they just kept piling on the baddies did get a bit frustrating, especially the very end fight against Joker.
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Ugh, I never did finish that last fight. Just couldn’t be bothered to play through it a few dozen times to figure out the right strategy.
I liked Arkham Asylum, didn’t love it, don’t really understand the massive universal love. It started off well, but quickly devolved into a series of boss fights. Not my thing.
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Like everyone said the combat is a rhythm game. Just like actual fighting, it was a tad mechanical since enemies usually won’t try to surprise you but just like in real life fighting it’s about finding your opponents rhythm and getting him out of sync.
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Man I love Rock Steady’s version of Harley. A cheerleader, in bondage gear with a baseball bat and sprayed on pants. Sexy but without actually breaking any of the fundemental laws of biology and physics. Kooky without being annoying and with just enough emotional baggage to make her relationship with Mr J that little bit “special”.
Really not so keen on their Catwoman though. Bit too posh, a bit too Carmen Sandiego fo my liking. I’ve always preferred the kind of feral cat woman, like Michelle Pfeiffer in Batman Returns, where you’d expect to find her rooting around the bins and getting chased out of kitchens with a broom.
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Yeah, not too sure about Catwoman either (a tad heavy on the eyeliner love).
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It’s nice to see the Jeanette Voerman character mesh getting work now that Bloodlines is no more.
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finally, the RPS Hivemind hate train in action, for a game that has everything going for it:)
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I agree with the odd looking Catwoman, don’t like the character design for her at all… Otherwise I’m intrigued with the free movement system.
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My thought EXACTLY. I love Harley but catwoman just isn’t enough catwoman for me… I actually never saw the movie with halley barry but catwoman of the comics for me is this very catlike lady, but more a cat than a lady. This one isn’t much of a cat or a lady.
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Mmmmm, I do love me some Batamn.
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Does this mean we aren’t getting anymore of Quintin’s misspelled posts? :(
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I got out of bed all excited to write the swan song, but Jim was just too fast.
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Ooh er missus
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*Humourous snort.*
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The whole ‘you’re the reason all these freaks exist’ is very reminiscent of one of the Frank Miller Batman renditions. Dark Knight Returns or Dark Night Strikes Again, can’t remember which one exactly. Maybe both!
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You’re probably thinking of “Dark Knight Returns” since I remember it too, but never stomached reading past the first 2 issues of “Dark Knight Strikes Again”.
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It’s what a find *brilliant* about the Batman mythology. Batman is an escalating reaction to organised crime, villains like the Joker are an escalating reaction to Batman and it imprints on Batman his moral code; he can not afford for things to escalate any further, so he can’t kill psychopaths or even allow them to be killed as everyone in Gotham wants to happen to them and they mistrust Batman for not doing everything that is absolutely necessary to stop them completely like Rah’as Al Ghul believed.
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Assassins Creed? Am i the only one who was feeling a whole lot of assassins creed in this?
Looks awesome, looking forward to it real hard.
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i was feeling a whole lot of just cause 2.
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The music isn’t quite what I would use for anything Batman-related.
That aside, GET HYPE. I can’t stand the wait for this.
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I got the distinct impression the person tasked with choosing music just searched for random batman-related keywords in Google and picked the first song that was close to lyrically appropriate. The actual music seemed far to laid back and undramatic; for action games you need the music to be angry metal, orchestral bombast or Mad World by Gary Jules.
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I sort of agree, but at the same time this trailer would be about half as good if the music was just the same old clichéd nonsense we always hear. There is a bit of a clash with the mood we expect, but I think that works well. It feels like a massive street party that’s gone on for far too long and become too dangerous… and that works well for the setting of the game. Or at least, I like it.
Really liking the voice-acting in these trailers, especially Hugo Strange.
Also: Catwoman. <3
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It kinda made me think they were going to cut to a shot of batman sliding around on top of a grand piano in a seedy night club.
play it again, sam
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I loved the music, the Heavy can’t get enough exposure and it was nice to see a trailer without the traditional guff of some orchestral fanfare. I’m reminded Ubisoft’s trailers for Assassin’s Creed, which always subverted what you expected their music to be (French opera-pop anyone?) and stuck in your head because of that.
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I wanted to call the first one “Batman: Punches anyone who isn’t a municipal employee”. Still fun!
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Hey! 18th of October is that guys birthday!
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Looks very interesting. I hope the city will actually be relatively open, not segmented into little areas punctuated by loading zones. Does anyone remember the Spiderman 2 game? Rubbish boss battles, terrible missions, crap combat, but I spent hours zooming though the city, exploring all the nooks and crannies. If Rocksteady combine fantastic exploration in a non-sterile city with the existing excellence of Arkham Asylum then this game will be almost offensively good.
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Spider-Man 2 is a bit of a sore spot for PC gamers. Maybe compare it with Ultimate Spider-Man or Web of Shadows?
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Weren’t those two Spidey games shit, though? Spider-Man 2 was at least great on consoles. I don’t even know how many times I’d climb the tallest building in the game, dive off and fall, only saving myself at the last minute and just swing through the city.
Then I’d hit the edge, turn around, shrug and make my way back to start the process all over again.
Hulk: Ultimate Destruction captured things very well too, at least until it gets to the missions where all the enemies are enormous monoliths that you can’t impose your Hulkyness on. But before then, when you’re just doing enormous leaps around the city, running at speed, etc. it’s good fun too. Not Spider-Man 2 fun, but great fun anyway.
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Yeah spiderman two had spidermanning just right, it was incredible fun- the reason I enjoyed it was the same reason I loved crackdown.
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I’m with Ian. Web of Shadows was alright, but Spider-Man 2 is the best Spider-Man game by a country mile. I’d also spend ages just swinging around, ignoring the in-game activities and making up my own challenges like getting from one end of Manhattan to the other without touching the ground. The game was crying, screaming, pleading for an A to B time trial mode.
The later games all seemed to mess up the formula with their tweaks – camera angles, FOV, swinging mechanics… all they needed to do was fix the missions. What we really need is a Spider-Man 2 2. Or a game of the musical using the SM2 engine.
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Hopefully it won’t be another Dragon Age 2-esque fiasco of a sequel
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Hope this will be even half as good as the greatness that is DA2.
I’m just maintaining the balance of the force, nothing to see here.
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“You are under close surveillance”…sez the billboard with Batman lurking on top of it…heh.
Okay, I’m easily amused.
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The dialogue equivalent of the legendary ‘time to crate’ is the expression “This place.” Once you start looking for “this place” in dialogue, it will make you cringe each time you hear it. That’s partly why this look at catwoman is so unappealing.
AA succeeded largely because it had a lot of content: enemies, voice actors, locations, events, while still remaining structured in terms of physical progression through the game. If they can pull off the same level of quality, while adding in metroid-style sequence breaks, (the ability to intentionally skip ahead in the plot, or item collection, by being a badass) this could be even better than AA.
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Too bad… that THIS PLACE… ain’t no place… for a hero.
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Seriously, who else is getting their BAT-DANCE on to this song right now?
Damn it’s good. So good I added it to the RPS Spotify playlist. B)
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Great trailer – they’ve already (partially) sold me! And I don’t usually fall for hype easily.
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Oct 28… of THIS year?
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I absolutely disagree, I thought the trailer was pretty crap. I want my Batman to have gravitas. The song in this trailer is kind of upbeat and happy, despite the appropriate message.
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They don’t have to sell it to me. I played the original, which is a candidate for best game I ever played of all time (and I’ve been playing them for over 25 years).
Unless I discover this game causes my monitor to beam cancer rays, or that 98% of Rocksteady was gutted in the recession and this is being made by the guy who was formerly doing accounting, I’d say the sale is already assured.
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This. After 30 years of gaming (yes, there were games on the VZ200… well, one), Batman: AA is absolutely in my top ten.
The trailer, it delights me, for it shows me that there is more of the goodness.
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I’ve really lost interest in Batman in recent years (more good guys fighting bad guys.. whoop-de-do), but this is looking really good. The freedom of movement and exploration is very appealing to me. Unsure if I’ll pick it up yet, but this trailer single-handedly brought my interest in it from 0% up to 50-60%ish.
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I like that song? what was it? to iTunes!! must have!
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The Heavy – Short Change Hero
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Thank you bro, you are legend!
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I’m really looking forward to this. Much as I enjoy shooting men with guns in manshoot games punching men with fists in manpunch games somehow is more satisfying. It’s just that most manpunch games aren’t that good. Arkham Asylum was a real revelation in this respect, there are few games that made the empunchenment of men as enjoyable. Also: Batman!
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Is that Mark Hamill voicing the Joker again? I thought he was going to quit doing him?
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If he’s just a man why does he dress like a bat? He must be a bat.
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They stole the infinite parachute/grapple combo from just cause 2!
eeeexxcelleeenttttt…..
Now there is literally nothing left to add to make this any better. It’s (a bit) like just cause 2, but with a tighter world, better characters and proper brawling (and some knock-out graphics to boot). Its a sequel to an already proven top game that is just adding more fun on top. Release it now!
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The thing that I like most about the trailer, apart from the fact that the game looks awesome, the characters well realized, the gameplay opened out, the existence of people in the game and on your side at the same time, the lack of a GFWL logo, the watertower WB logo that makes me wish the Animaniacs were Batman canon, the fact there weren’t massive plot spoilers and the subtle and entirely unexpected twist at the end, is that the music wasn’t the standard doomy-doom-doom orchestral crescendo with optional electric guitar that I generally expect from an AAA game trailer.
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I will reserve judgement for now. I loved Arkham but this has a quality to it that they are trying too hard to please more people.
If it has an open world feel like Deus Ex then I’m in, otherwise I’ll be playing Deus Ex.
Music was godawful shit [/not lie]
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Now that’s how you make a trailer!
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This in-game footage is disappointing. Now, I’ll will never know of Batamn survived the poisoned towl!!!
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Oh yes, yes please.
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“Villian” is a typo that I have an irrational hatred for, just like I always giggle like a schoolgirl when people write “rouge” instead of “rogue”.
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I approve of grappling from the air.
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man, harley’s voice is HOT!
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Judging by the picture up there, I’m guessing “ordained minister” is an unlockable skill.
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This is not the Harley Quin I know. This is not the Catwomen I know. This is not the kind of Batman I remember! They changed everything! :(
This is not the Harley Quin I know. This is not the Catwomen I know. This is not the kind of Batman I remember! They changed everything! :D
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the only thing that bothers me about it is the typical unreal engine look. i’m really getting tired of it.
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Thanks, this is in every respect what I need to know.
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