Batman: Arkham Origins

Batman: Arkham Origins is the only one of the four main Batman: Arkham games not developed by Rocksteady. My theory (and apparently the official story as well) is that Rocksteady needed more than two years to develop the new features of Arkham Knight but Warner Bros. wanted a new Batman game out sooner. Thus WB put their Montreal studio to make Origins which often times feels like a rehashed Arkham City.

Reheated Arkham City

As the game's title suggests, Arkham Origins takes place chronologically before the other Arkham games. The location seems to be vaguely the same as in City -- judging from familiar landmarks such as the church and courthouse -- but it is not in shambles yet; not the massive prison it became later. Oddly enough however, there seems to be way more criminals hanging out in the streets. SWAT is evidently thoroughly corrupted as well, adding in even more baddies. The whole thing is beyond plausible.

You start with almost all of the gadgets Batman had at the end of City but the game doesn't really spend time teaching you their use. It's like it expects you to have played the previous releases before coming to it. Since I had done that, it wasn't a problem for me, but it could be for someone who touches the series for the first time.

A tiny bit worse

Origins doesn't really innovate either. WB Games Montreal probably didn't want to change anything in a drastic way or maybe just didn't have the time or skill to do so. They did do some small alterations, however, and I didn't really like them.

Coming from Mad Max, I expected the freeflow combat to be better. Well, I guess it is better than Mad Max's poor implementation but it's not as good as in City. Something is slightly different and I think it's how enemies are too aggressive. After you block an attack, there nearly always seems to be someone else with the attack indicator above them already. Taking the initiative is challenging. Only if/when you manage to spread out the enemies so that they can't keep up with Batman's freeflow, does the combat become as enjoyable as it should be.

The other thing I didn't like was the Dark Knight challenge system. Few skill upgrades are locked behind it and you need to complete 2/3 of three sets of challenges to get every upgrade. The challenges need to be completed in order and it's really easy to fall behind with the Worst Nightmare track because there are a limited number of predator (stealth) encounters in the game.

I got only 6/15 done of that particular track before the game ended. I got stuck at the 5th one because I mistook the ledge takedown to be the one where Batman is hanging from a ledge and takes down a target above him but instead Batman needs to be perched on a ledge above the enemy. Also having already upgraded the explosive gel to have proximity trigger and wider radius made it difficult to actually take down an enemy with it.

The Gotham Protector track wasn't too difficult to master -- they could've easily made the glide challenges harder. Somewhat unexpectedly I also managed to complete all 15 challenges of the Shadow Vigilante track. The final one requires you to beat a Medium+ threat encounter without getting hit while reaching 50+ combo and 15+ attack variation. There's a video on YouTube that shows the perfect location for it but it still took me a few attempts.

"I am Batman."

Batman's voice acting surprised me. I thought Kevin Conroy had suddenly gotten a lot better but as it turned out, Batman was voiced by Roger Craig Smith in this game. I definitely prefer him over Conroy. The Joker also has different voice actor and as far as I'm concerned, Troy Baker did an adequate job as Mark Hamill's stand-in.

The "Arkham Origins DLC key" from the 2013 Humble WB Bundle turned to be just one of the game's worthless skin packs. For some reason I assumed it to be the season pass. At least that wasn't that big of a disappointed as there's not a whole lot of addition content for the game available anyway. Cold, Cold Heart is the only thing worth something and I don't like Batman enough to consider specifically buying and playing it.