Batman: Arkham Knight, the final part of Rocksteady’s Arkham trilogy is everything it was built up to be, but some of its more defining features were so nearly its downfall. The story picks up a few months after Arkham City, following the Jokers death, with Gotham under threat from foes, both old and new. Scarecrow has amassed an army with the help of a masked individual, known only as the Arkham Knight with the sole purpose of tearing Gotham down and destroying the Batman.
While the story is filled with many surprises and memorable moments, one of the game’s biggest components was built up to be the Arkham Knight who ends up being rather underwhelming to say the least. While his identity remains hidden till the final two hours of the story, they give you hints at every turn making it the most predictable plot point of the franchise so far. That could’ve still been forgiven had he been given a more memorable role throughout the story, instead he ends up being playing second fiddle to scarecrow for the most part.
Story and shocking turn of events aside, the gameplay here is rock solid, something the franchise has come to be known for. The combo crunching combat is free flowing and with access to new gadgets and manoeuvres it doesn’t feel as cumbersome as franchise veterans might remember. One of the game’s signature features is the addition of the Batmobile. While cruising around in the Batmobile is definitely fun and feels very tanky as it should, combat segments get very tiresome over the course of the game. There is no doubt some of the game’s most memorable moments involve the Batmobile, forced Batmobile combat segments throughout the campaign make it feel rather repetitive and annoying.
From Riddler puzzles with Catwoman to testing Azraels combat abilities; from disrupting Penguin’s weapon shipments to stopping firefly there is tons to do in Batman Arkham Knight that will keep you occupied for hours beyond the main story. Besides, to achieve the ‘true ending’ to Arkham Knight players need to complete all these side missions. While they do offer a lot of variety between the dozen or so different mission sets, each set ends up feeling repetitive by the end but together they add a lot more to the Arkham Knight experience.
Unfortunately for Arkham Knight no review is complete without mentioning the torrid time PC gamers have had with the game and the fact that PC’s running on even one-year-old hardware cannot run the game at a playable level, while is quite a shame. But for consoles and high end PC’s Arkham Knight is an amazing experience, and a fitting end to the trilogy.
