About the game
Batman: Arkham City is a 2011 action-adventure game developed by Rocksteady Studios and published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. Based on the DC Comics superhero Batman, it is the sequel to the 2009 game Batman: Arkham Asylum and the second installment in the Batman: Arkham series. It was written by veteran Batman writer Paul Dini with Paul Crocker and Sefton Hill. In the main storyline, Bruce Wayne is locked inside Arkham City, a super-prison built over the decaying slums of Gotham City, and as Batman he sets out to uncover the secret behind a scheme run by the facility's warden, Hugo Strange.
The game is played from a third-person view with a focus on Batman's combat, stealth, detective skills and gadgets. Arkham City is an open world that is open from the beginning, and Batman glides across it with his cape and reaches ledges with the grapnel gun. Detective Vision highlights clues and items of interest. The Freeflow combat system from Arkham Asylum is improved so that the player can counter several blows at once, and many gadgets can be used in a fight. Experience points buy upgrades to the Batsuit, gadgets and combat and stealth skills.
The main campaign lasts about 25 hours and the side missions about 15 more. The Riddler offers 440 optional challenges, most of them trophies hidden around the city, and after a set number the player must rescue a hostage from one of his death traps. A New Game Plus mode unlocks after the story, and a separate set of challenge maps is ranked online against other players. Catwoman is a second playable character, with her own campaign that crosses the main story at set points.
Rocksteady came up with the idea of a sequel before Arkham Asylum was finished, and serious work on the story began in February 2009. The virtual footprint of Arkham City is five times that of Arkham Asylum, and the city was designed around Batman's ability to swoop and glide. The Batmobile was left out because it could not travel on the broken terrain. The soundtrack was written by Nick Arundel and Ron Fish, and a separate album of 11 original songs inspired by the game was released by WaterTower Music.
Arkham City was released in North America on October 18, 2011 for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, followed by Australia on October 19 and Europe on October 21. A Windows version came about a month later. A Game of the Year Edition with all the downloadable content was released on May 29, 2012 in the United States and Canada. The Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions include a stereoscopic 3D mode.
The game received critical acclaim for its narrative, characters, world design, soundtrack and Batman's combat and navigation. It was tied with The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim as the highest-rated game of 2011 on Metacritic and won many awards, including Game of the Year. Two million units were sold worldwide in its first week, and Warner Bros. announced more than six million shipped by February 8, 2012.
The prequel Batman: Arkham Origins followed in October 2013 and the narrative sequel Batman: Arkham Knight in June 2015. A remastered version for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, Batman: Return to Arkham, was released on October 18, 2016.
The text above is adapted from Wikipedia and licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
What critics said
Metacritic 94 out of 100 (Xbox 360). Individual reviews: IGN 9.5/10, GameSpot 9/10, Game Informer 10/10, EGM 10/10, Eurogamer 9/10, Official Xbox Magazine 10/10, Official PlayStation Magazine UK 10/10, GamePro 5/5.
Extra content
Five downloadable packs came out after launch and a story expansion followed in 2012. The achievement packs have been removed from the Microsoft Store, but the Game of the Year Edition disc still carries them.
- Catwoman Bundle Pack: Catwoman's campaign, unique weapons and moves, plus two alternate skins. A code came with new copies
- Nightwing Bundle Pack: Nightwing as a playable character in challenge maps, an Animated Series skin and the Wayne Manor and Main Hall maps
- Robin Bundle Pack: Robin as a playable character with the two pre-order challenge maps
- Skins pack: All the alternate Batman pre-order skins
- Challenge map pack: The Iceberg Lounge and Joker's Carnival maps and a new map, Batcave
- Harley Quinn's Revenge: A story campaign set two weeks after the main game, with new areas and enemies, playing Robin and Batman
Good to know
- The Catwoman campaign was locked behind a one-use code that came with new copies, so a used copy may not include it. Warner Bros. said GameStop's pre-owned copies carried the code.
- At launch some customers found the code missing from their copy. Warner Bros. said it affected less than 0.5 percent of customers.
- In November 2011 Rocksteady investigated reports that Xbox 360 save files were being erased without warning.
- The Game of the Year Edition cover was widely criticised because the review scores and quotes dwarfed the name of the game.
- The Xbox 360 version has a stereoscopic 3D mode for 3D TVs, and for 2D TVs with Inficolor 3D glasses.
- The achievement list is 70 achievements for 1,500 Gamerscore: 50 for 1,000 in the base game and 20 for 500 across four DLC packs.
Made by
Director Sefton Hill, Writer Paul Dini, Writer Paul Crocker, Writer Sefton Hill, Producer Daniel Bailie, Producer Nathan Burlow, Programmer Ben Wyatt, Artist David Hego, Composer Nick Arundel, Composer Ron Fish.
