Twice the Arkham, twice the fun.

I doubt it will come as a huge surprise for most when I say that Batman: Arkham City is a top contender for Game of the Year. It's the direct sequel to Batman: Arkham Asylum, and developed by the same fine folks over at Rocksteady. A lot of the core concepts that made Arkham Asylum such a hit are still present here, including some of the most responsive and brutally satisfying combat featured in any third person brawler. Other aspects are beefed up considerably, including side missions, open world exploring, and the overall story. If you were disappointed in the number of rogues featured in Arkham Asylum, you'll be happy to note that just about every major Bat-villain makes an appearance this time out. I've had a ton of fun playing through the game, and when it comes to the side content, I've barely scratched the surface.

The story picks up shortly after Arkham Asylum. Hugo Strange has been appointed warden for a section of Gotham that's now being used to house all the degenerates and criminal scum in the city. Not a particularly great idea, but it does provide a suitable playground for the game to take place in. In a preemptive measure to take out Batman, Hugo has Bruce Wayne arrested and thrown into the pit with the rest of the crazies. Of course this backfires a bit, and that's where the main story starts to take off. In a similar fashion to Arkham Asylum, sections of Arkham City belong to different gangs, headlined by criminals like Penguin, Two Face and so on. There are also certain sections of the city that are inaccessible from the start, until you've been granted access to the proper equipment. It's not quite as Metroid like as the first Batman title though, with little need to revisit sections over and over unless you're seeking out Riddler trophies or other collectibles.

Batman comes equipped with a lot of the tools from his first adventure, including his standard grappling hook to propel him across the city, the explosive gel used for both enemy takedowns and weak structures, along with a host of other items. There are a few new things tossed into the mix, but if you're familiar with Arkham Asylum, you'll come into this with a pretty good idea of what tools are right for the different scenarios you encounter. Of course, the game does hold your hand a little in the beginning, but the tutorial aspect isn't too invasive or overbearing, and you become free to explore your surroundings quickly. I always appreciate a game that treats me as a person that's probably played a video game before, which Arkham City certainly does.

Just like the previous title, the voice acting, animation, and character design is top notch. Some characters have slight revisions, but the models are all still based in a very gritty reality. They all bear resemblance to their comic counterparts, but with a bit more grounding. Everything seems appropriately covered in grim and muck, and the art design meshes both characters and the world they live in extremely well. I also love hearing some of the classic Batman: The Animated Series voice actors returning to the roles I remember, like Mark Hamill reprising the Joker once again. It's hard to imagine anyone else providing the voice for that character nowadays, so I'm glad to see him back on board.

The user interface and heads up display has seen some improvements as well. It's pretty easy to track down your current objectives, but you can quickly mark new custom waypoints and side missions via your map. Some objectives require a bit of detective work like the previous game, but unlike Arkham City I didn't find it beneficial to constantly patrol my surroundings with Detective mode enabled. To help drive players away from using it all the time, you'll notice that most of your HUD elements disappear, including waypoints. Another nice thing to note is that you'll intercept radio transmissions from different elements, like groups of enemies, which will help you locate and track down foes without needing Detective vision.

Combat, once again, is stellar. It keeps the system Arkham Asylum established, in that you tap X to perform attacks, Y to counter, B to disorient, and can toss in gadget attacks when needed. You'll typically take on gangs of enemies numbering 3 or more, and you can seamlessly land hits from one person to the next. Combat does get to be pretty challenging later on, when the game starts introducing armored enemies, guys carrying shields and blades, and more. Armed enemies are still quite threat, and it's damn near suicide to jump into the middle of a group all holding assault rifles or shotguns. Stealth is still a major aid, and you can still opt to take down enemies from above or below. There's a variety of takedowns you can perform, and skilled players will have a lot of fun figuring out the best way to navigate the game unnoticed.

There's been a lot of talk about the addition of Catwoman, who becomes a playable character in Arkham City. The Catwoman missions are downloaded free with a code included in new copies of the game. If you install the pack prior to playing, her missions become intertwined with the story, but overall her tale seems mostly separate. Batman and Catwoman do interact a bit, but I look at her adventure more as a side tale than anything else. She does handle differently as well, she's quicker and more agile than Bats, and she has a few new tricks up her sleeve. She can climb fencing, allowing her to suspend herself upside down to reach areas that Batman can't. She also has her own set of Riddler trophies to find, which can take some time to seek out. Overall her missions help to break up the gameplay nicely, without ruining the forward progression of the main plot.

Finally, the challenge maps from the original game return here, both with Predator and Combat maps. You can also opt to play a Riddler Campaign mode, which mixes the Predator and Combat maps around, along with modifiers to make them more challenging. You can even customize the combination of maps and modifiers as well. Your scores earned get uploaded to online leaderboards, and improving your scores on these maps can be quite addictive. Considering that both the combat and stealth elements of the game are so great, distilling these two elements into missions that are focused entirely on both remains a great idea.

So yeah, you should plan on picking up Batman: Arkham City. It builds upon the basis of Arkham Asylum extremely well, and just expands everything you loved about the first Batman title. Arkham City is huge, filled with secrets, and if you're a big Batman fan you'll love all the appearances tossed in, both for the good and bad guys. The addition of a New Game Plus mode also provides an astounding amount of replay value, and if you're any kind of completionist, you'll spend dozens of hours exploring the city for every little secret it contains. It's easily one of the best titles I've played all year, and I highly recommend picking it up.