Yes, more than a month after the consoles got Batman: Arkham City, developer Rocksteady's baby has landed on the PC. I realized Batman: Arkham City is a brilliant game - a brilliant game that's even better on PC. The hundreds of things Batman: Arkham City nails outweighed my nitpicky problems.
But the days rolled on and I couldn't stop playing - in fact, I only wanted to play more. When I formed the list, I found myself disappointed with the game. It tossed in too many villains and didn't flesh them out, it clearly tried to replicate the Scarecrow stuff from the first game and didn't do it as well, and Batman still moves a bit stiffly when simply walking around. When I finished Batman: Arkham City, I immediately cataloged what I thought it did wrong. Honestly, if you want to save the $10, you're fine just waiting for the inevitable sequel to get more Batman into your life.Sometimes reviewers can't see the forest for the trees. Harley Quinn's Revenge would be great DLC if it were any other title, but the quality bar set by Arkham City is simply so high that it feels lacking in every respect. But honestly, it's pretty skippable, and you see nothing new with Robin here that you wouldn't see in the challenge rooms playing as him- still a seperate purchase, if you want to do that, which seems dubious to me. I personally enjoyed it, it was a fun two and a half hours and I can't say I regret buying it. Was this worth the price of admission? Maybe. The worst of it is the ending- you save the day, and Batman just walks off with Robin making a half-hearted quip.
Anyone hoping for some sort of plot twist, sequel tease, or compelling characterizations is going to be dissapointed. In terms of narrative, I don't want to spoil anything, but to be entirely honest there's not much to spoil. He is, however, fun to play as, which makes the whole thing still work pretty well, despite it's faults. He gets a single stealth segment and then a single combat segment, and that's that. It makes the whole DLC feel like a Robin tutorial with no actual Robin gameplay payoff. Robin has two sequences that seem like they're meant to fit this mold, but they're either unexciting(using his shield to block automated turrets) or never used again after you're introduced to them(planting flashbangs on enemies via stealth and planting flashbangs on moving objects to attack enemies from a distance). In many cases throughout Arkham City, you'd have a core principal of playing as Batman demonstrated to you, be asked to execute it, and then have opportunities to realize when to use it later on your own. No sooner have you become familiar with all of Robin's tricks than Batman simply takes over again and the DLC ends. But the immaculate pacing falls apart when it's rushed this quickly.
In theory, playing as Robin would fix this issue, as the player is introduced to concepts at a brisk, but manageable pace, and brought back up to speed challenge-wise. Harley Quinn's Revenge, as a rather short and stand-alone experience, has no choice but to throw you into Batman's end-game experience immediately, feeling a bit disjointed, especially for those who are returning to the game after months of not having touched it.
Throughout the game there's a very well-crafted sense of progression not only in terms of the story, but Batman's capabilities and the similarly escalating threats he has to face along the way. Unfortunately, in terms of both gameplay and narrative, it doesn't meet them.Īnyone who's played the base game knows that Arkham City is a Batman experience to be remembered. A highly anticipated add-on to Batman: Arkham City, Harley Quinn's Revenge is going to be held up to some high standards.