Emms reviews Arkham ORigins, spoiler-y

The story was good, solid and very interesting.

they're a lot more liberal with the boss battles than City. whichh given the premise makes a lot of sense, the boss battles are also damn fun.

The bitching about The Joker is completely stupid since way back when it was anounced this game was gonna get made it was said point blank 'this will game will involve Batman and The jokers first meeting" yes to be fair the whole black mask involvement kind of confused everyone but we honestly should have paid more attention.

The new fast travel is a mixed blessing, it's great to effortlessly go from section to section of gotham but then that means you do less of the grapel-glide travel, which in my opinion once you finally got the hang of all the glide mechanics was more satisfying than anything else. anyone else get reminded of web swinging in spiderman 2 when they glide all over Arkham City?

There's a lot less details in Arkham Origins, which is either an oversight on WB Montreal's part or intentional since most of Batman's villains haven't gotten started up just yet.

The Riddler Trophy's are still there, but Riddler now has two additional side quests to throw in the form of the network relays that were the security cams in Arkham City and the radio towers that, for some reason I fail to understand beyond game mechanics make it impossible to fast travel to that area until they're deactivated.

the combat is, to be honest a little cluttered, as you progress in acquiring gadgets the A.I feels they need more car door shields and assholes in body armour, you have to do combo's to take each of the special guys down which will almost always be interrupted by an enemy attempting to kick you in the back, which makes building up combo's frustrating.

The single player is pretty solid, despite nothing really innovative or new. 8 of 10 from me.



The Multiplayer however is...it feels like it's still in beta mode.

it's incredibly difficult to get into a lobby, even more difficult to find one that doesn't drop you midmatch.

Heroes are a bit cheap. I lost track of how often I got punched down by batman or Robin multiple times and then knocked out with no real way of fighting back.

The shooting aspecys suffer from the typical issues that befall shooters with 'leveling' meaning you can level up, gain new weapons and special stuff to increase your shooting abilities....but you'll still get shot by that new player with the default assault rifle, inexplicably you get shot from quite a ways down the map but you can't aim for shit even if you hold down the aim button and direct entire clips into the center of mass for your target. basic Shooter issues.

The customization is fun and definitely makes you feel like a Joker/Bane Henchman. I hope they put in more options and maybe new factions too.

otherwise The multiplayer is strongly lackluster and is in need of lots of attention before it can really be anything worth talking about.

4 out of 10.