Batman: Arkham Knight - Ishvii Reviews

Arkham Knight is a fantastic end to the Arkham series. It's miles ahead of it's two predecessors, fully realising it's potential as a big open world Batman game. The combat is even better, movement has been perfected, and the graphics are amazing. I'm really glad I pushed through the other two games to get to this one.

Pros

New engine. Looks waaaaay better
The Batmobile is awesome
Really cool new abilities, like multi-silent takedowns, throw counters and environmental takedowns
I really like that upgrade points aren't just tied to XP anymore, you earn them from challenges
A very short time into the game, you start hallucinating Joker. He's everywhere with you - hanging out on corners, looking off rooftops, making little comments about things, sneaking around in vents - it's so well done and very funny
Huge map that actually gives you space to fly around without landing
The evidence scanner crime scene reconstruction is interesting, well voiced, and works really well (even though most of them are extremely unrealistic)
While the previous games only made incremental changes to the formula, this feels like a totally fresh, yet familiar, game
The combat is just so impressive to watch. Sometimes you've got an ally, and can do an ally takedown where you both work together to clothesline a thug

Cons

The car is great, but it's over-used. Coming from the previous games, you'd kind of expect the car to just be a way to get around the city faster and maybe some combat. But it's used in Every. Single. Mission. Every main and sidequest requires the car for some obscure reason, and I ended up feeling like I was just opening up pathways to be able to bring my disabled friend rather than having a useful tool
Scarecrow was eaten by Killer Croc in Arkham City, yet here he is again
The button for Detective Mode has been the same for 3 games in a row. Now they've changed it and put the Batmobile call button on what used to be detective mode... why not just put the Batmobile call on the new button?
They also changed the button to enter a grate from RT+A to RT+B
The Batmobile frequently became unresponsive - either stuck going in a certain direction or not moving
I'm not sure how driving into people and cars on the streets at 700 miles an hour in a rocket-powered electrified tank fits into Batman's "no killing people" ethos
Instead of locking on to a target, the disruptor now has to be manually aimed at guns, which is fiddly on a controller