Two successful and popular Arkham games, one less than successful downloadable spin-off and a prequel... but how did that prequel do? Lets find out:
JUST TO WARN YA.... SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!
The story begins with a young and inexperienced The Black Mask on Christmas Eve, after discovering that he had placed a $50 million bounty on his head and therefore attracting eight of the worlds deadliest assassins, including Killer Croc, Deathstroke, Electrocutioner, Copperhead, Lady Shiva, Deadshot, Bane and Firefly; and among the chaos occuring with the assassins trying to find Bats, Anarky and an unknown murderer called The Joker take this time to fulfil their plans for their own agendas.
During Batman's mission to take down the assassins, he also runs into The Penguin, Corrupt Police officers and multiple thugs and mercenarys in on the bounty.
As Bat's gets closer defeating all the assassins, he discovers that there is something much more sinister within the plot. As Batman is ready to take out Roman, it is then revealed that it wasn't Roman who had put the bounty out... it was in fact the unknown JOKER! Also amongst this, Batman discovers that Bane had deduced his secret identity, therefore finding out where the Batcave is. So basically Batman knows that he's gonna have to sleep in in the morning.
So, to rap this up Joker is taken to Blackgate prison, he then takes over the prison and sees Batman in a different light. Bat's has to take on a freakish Venom induced Bane and then defeats Joker in a church... all in all, it was a pretty peaceful night.
Alongside this, during the credits The Joker sings A cold, cold heart (presumably singing with Batman in mind); an easter egg for Quincy Sharp (you guys remember that guy from the first two games right?) to put Arkham Asylum back into commission and an after credits scene involving a sneaky Amanda Waller hiring an imprisoned Deathstroke to join the Governments 'Suicide squad', hinting at a possible spin-off, or DLC.
Like the tragically terrible Harley Quinn's revenge, this video game was not written by the Batman TAS writer, Paul Dini. Although it wasn't written by Dini, the game did stand it's own. It certainly wasn't a bad story, but it was the weakest out of Arkham Asylum and Arkham city.
As an avid comic book reader, you will notice that certain aspects of the video game was a mirror image of most of Dini's work, mirroring Batman TAS, most Batman comics and even the two previous video games within the Arkham series; for example, the twist where Black Mask turned out to actually be The Joker. This was basically the exact same twist where it was shown that Clayface was playing The Joker from the start to finish of Arkham city.
Don't get me wrong, though there were a few story points which were a tiny bit weak, there we a few very prosperous and impressive plot points and twists. An example of this is how Alfred doesn't approve of Bruce's alter-ego and I quote, calling him "A Playboy, with a trust fund and too much anger". But once Bane discovers that Batman knows that he knows his secret identity (which was an excellent plot twist by the way) and goes after Alfred in the Batcave, once Batman arrives and resuscitates him (courtesy of the Electrocutioner), Pennyworth then approves of Bruce's night time agenda and accepts that Gotham needs A Dark Knight.
One thing that ruins this twist is the Bane boss battle fight in Blackgate. It seems that in all Arkham games, they find it necessary to include a fight with a Titan induced character (in this game it was really a TN-1 induced character, but who pays attention to detail?).
We know that in Arkham Asylum, that it was confirmed that the Knightfall ark (when Bane broke Batman's back) had already occurred in this timeline, but by the end of the Bane battle, it shows that the TN-1 had caused Bane to lose his memory 'permanently', therefore meaning that Bane has forgotten about the secret identity of our Caped crusader, and then meaning that the Knightfall aspect will never happen. This just makes the timeline go all higgledy piggledy.
The Gameplay in Arkham Origins was an improvement upon Arkham City's gameplay, but not a huge improvement as the gameplay was basically up to perfection in City!
Like all the other games, Origins requires stealth gameplay in nearly all parts of the game. Personally, the stealthy parts of the video game are the best parts.
With the combat, you can see how the AI have gotten a lot more ruthless as the street thugs really aren't afraid to through punches at our Caped crusader, showing that the gameplay has gotten a lot harder.
As i had said, the stealth gameplay is a s good as always. Being able to grapple from gargoyles is the same and most of the gadgets (like the story) were mirror images of previous games. For example, the glue grenade was basically the freeze pellets, the concussion detonator was the Remote electric charge gun, etc. I have to admit that the Remote claw that you obtain from Deathstrroke was fun, but that was just a copy of the line launcher!
You do eventually get shock gloves *cough* Arkham city Wii U edition *cough* from Electrocutioner, which is a tiny bit fun at the beginning, but you eventually have to rely on that when in a tight spot, which i don't really approve of.
Batman has a new Detective vision which includes having the ability to rewind and fast forward crime scenes, which i personally enjoy. Although, it does tend to hold your hands through the detective work, it is still a fun accessory.
Another new feature is the multiplayer aspect. An aspect that wasn't even touched in the previous games. This system includes a 3v3v2 game, where players can either play as a merc on Bane's team, a common thug on Joker's team, or a certain Caped Crusader and Boy Wonder. I found this part of the game fun, but it wasn't necessarily anything new or groundbreaking.
The Map for Gotham is huge! So huge in fact that it requires you to have to use fast travel. Yes, the Bat-wing is accessible to use in this game. I am rather disappointed that you can't personally fly it, but it is a useful tool to go from place to place.
One of the fun thing
s about using the Bat-wing is being able to get to the Batcave, which you are able observe and explore!
Just a quick mention about Christopher Drake's music, which is beautifully composed. To be honest, this soundtrack is probably my favourite out of the series. I can definitely feel the Die Hard aspect of the score.
Overall, I found this to be a pretty fun game to play. It wasn't anything new or fresh mind you, but it was fun. Unfortunately, this prequel suffers from what most prequels fall for... timeline hiccups. This game doesn't lead into Asylum or city very well, so there are a few plot holes. Among this, it would be fun to actually not have Joker be the main villain in every single game. Give another villain a try...like Egg-man...
Despite some of the mistakes and negatives, i still give this game a positive 7/10
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