First Reactions and Recommendations

This article is not written by the staff of GS. It is written by a writer outside of the GS team and is the opinion of that person and that person alone.


Batman: Arkham Asylum - Demo Review

Article Explanation: Before I downloaded this Demo to provide you all with my first review, I decided to check out the multiple trailers and previews for the game. At first glance I noticed it was a much darker and grittier Batman then any previous Batman game. In my personal Opinion The CG (Computer Generated) for the game is impeccable and can only be described as the dirtiest, grittiest, and darkest Batman I have ever seen (that being a good thing mind you;] ). "I will be using a scale of 1-10 on “Want-a-bility” 1 being I will never buy this, and 10 being I am already on my second play through. This article is the opinion of the writer and the writer alone, if you disagree, please post your comment in the comment section. We are looking for criticism and your feedback to make this place a lot better for the future." (Quoted-PaulyBoy 90803)

Batman: Arkham Asylum (Demo Review)

The Rundown:

When you first start the demo you go through all the logos of the Developers, and so on. One positive aspect to me is you can press start to skip each one of the logos. My point is, you don't have to waste those 30 seconds - 2 minutes going through just logos, like Gears of War 2 does, that game forces you to sit through the developer and publisher logos, while not being able to skip them. Moving on, when you first start the demo it runs you through the game's beginning CG sequence which portrays Batman, bringing in a captured Joker to Arkham Asylum. As the scene progresses, the Joker escapes into the depths of the Asylum to where you find out within seconds, the Joker has sprung a trap for the highly qualified Batman. As you learn of the plan through the opening CG scene, when the scene comes to an end and the game starts where the CG left off, it pops you right into a small tutorial for the fighting mechanics of the game. The fighting in this game is brilliant! Between the Silent take downs, to the pure awesomeness of the fighting mechanics. Another plus is you can go from one enemy to another without stopping to take a breather, it's as if the average goon is powerless against your superior power. As you move through the demo, the Joker mocks you over the Asylums intercom, as you start to move further in, you come to a point where you have to knockout another famous Batman villain; Mr. Zsasz. This of course is also a tutorial on how to use the Glide Kick and the Ground Take down and how the "Detective mode" works.


"The pay off of detective mode, the hidden Glide Kick"

The detective mode is a view you will all too often use in the game. You use it to start to swing from gargoyle to gargoyle to set up behind the enemy in the room. In the view, you see the name the heart rate, the weapon they are holding, if they are holding a weapon, what you can swing to, and things you can interact with. This mode I have a feeling will be used through out the whole game. After you've successfully taken down Mr. Zsasz, Miss Quinn, Jokers lovely associate, locks you in the room.. To move forward remove one of the AC grates and crouch through it to get to the next area.This will take you to a hallway where you see two guards begging for their life as Jokers goons finish them off. My first impression when leaving the AC duct, I thought Batman was going to kick the grate cover across the room.. This of course was not the case, Batman silently removes the grate so you can get out of the duct.. By now you should be able to figure out how to get past the Armed goons..
this part is also the Silent Take down tutorial.. After you take out the goons,and the goons boss(the man talking to Joker), there is yet again another AC vent for you to crawl through, to get to the last area of the Demo. This is where you get to put what you've learned to the test.


The Review:

A demo is a way for developers to show us[The Consumer] what the full game will be like, and as always to entice us to purchase the game. The Devs. for Batman: Arkham Asylum have managed to bring us the the Bman of old, the Batman you have only seen up till now, in the comic books. The way this game has delivered is everything a hardcore or casual Batman fan would love and more!The fighting mechanics for this game are amazing, along with excellent graphics and CG to blown your mind away.The controls are easy to master and the amount of "epic win" in this game is amazing.
I personally only had three problems with the game/demo itself. And two of those problems deal with movement. Both were where I felt like I was spending more time on the Gargoyles and in the Air vents then kicking ass!I started to notice a pattern in the game play, where the only way I could get to the next area or get behind an enemy was an Air duct or a Gargoyle. Though this seemed a repetitive aspect in the game. I don't believe it subtracts from the game play unless your like me and can spot these discrepancies in the game. My third and final problem was the fact that you lost health way too fast if you where actually spotted or shot at.. I understand they did this for you as the player to use stealth tactics, but sometimes I just felt like beating the life out of them instead of swinging from gargoyle to gargoyle and taking them out one by one.

Want-a-bility

1 - - - 5 - - | - 10


I place my personal want at around an even 8. I would get this if I had the money to spend. This game, if any indication to the demo will be one of the best games of the year!

Here's My Game Rating on the Demo.
(Ratings are based within a 1-5 system with 1 being the worst and 5 being the best)

Story: 4
Graphics: 5
Controls: 4
Sound: 3
Replay Value: 4.5

Overall: 8.5/10

Written by KingxCloud

Ghost/Shadow Writers Wanted

Being the team of Gaming Simplicity,is busy with life, we are always looking for outside writers. If you think you have what it takes to write an article for our blog, please, by all means do so. There are a few requirements, no slandering of a console, game, and company, unless you can back up your accusations with actual proof. And that the GS team needs to review your article before we post it up on the blog.

E-mail either team member with your article, we will review it, and e-mail you back the revised article for your approval and than post it.

Thank you for reading this blog. We do appreciate the help and support we are getting

Paulyboy

Emails - PaulyBoy_90803@yahoo.com
Melior_Gladius@yahoo.com

First Reactions & Recommendation

Article Explanation: What happens on Xbox Live, they put out demos for all new games and arcade games if their developer makes one. Arcade games always have trials, so you will end up seeing more articles about arcade games than new full games due to the fact that developers don’t always put out new demos for their full games. The purpose for this article is to give the reader (you) a first reaction and a recommendation for what I or Melior think that the game is like if you haven’t had the time to download the trial if it is an Arcade game or if it is a demo. We will be using a scale of 1-10 on “Want-a-bility” 1 being I will never buy this, and 10 being I am already on my second play through. This article is the opinion of the writer and the writer alone, if you disagree, please post your comment in the comment section. We are looking for criticism and your feedback to make this place a lot better for the future.

Summer of Arcade – Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles In Time Re-Shelled

Well, TMNT:TITRS (inb4pun) is a ‘port’ of a game that was made in the 90’s and debuted on the NES console. It was quarter arcade game that has been ported over to the Xbox Live Arcade, among other games, including TMNT’s predecessor the TMNT 1989 arcade game which was a direct port. Re-shelled is not a direct port like 1989. At least graphics and game play wise. The story remains untouched. So you 90’s children out there who played the original are gonna get the same game but with updated graphics. For those who are the average TMNT fan like myself, you are going to be getting a new game with above average semi cel-shaded graphics.

Re-shelled is your average 90’s side scrolling hack and slash with the updated 3-D graphics. The trial of the game includes the first stage of the game, including the first boss fight. You get to choose from all four turtles in the demo, and you even get to play it with Local Multiplayer support, which is the games main features and options. I played this demo through 3 times. I played through with no trouble on the only difficulty available which is normal. At no time during the demo was it overwhelmingly hard for me. Some of the few things that irked me about it was, you tend to get lost in the crowd when fighting people. They have on the control scheme a button (LT) that you can hit and it will pop up a locator icon above your head in the color your turtle is sporting, which is helpful for multiplayer matches, especially the Xbox Live 4 player co-op matches that you can get in the full game. Another thing that kind of irritated me was the fact that everything got repetitive. You would do the same three attacks, over and over and over and ov . . . You could mix it up every now and then with a special attack, but it is nothing special. You would have to go out of your way to do something special to keep from getting bored. Now, the demo level is long enough to get used to the turtle you are using and the moves they have. But being the fighting is not that full of depth, it is very easy to get used to the turtle of use very quickly, which means you are likely to get bored of it rather quickly.

The main gripe I have with the game is the lack of new things, like an updated fighting system, or at least an upgrade with moves to add some more to the already lacking list. I know Hack n slashes don’t really need too many moves, but if you have too few moves, the point of hacking and slashing gets rather boring and irritating. I got bored with the game through the third turtle I played through with, I tried to play with the fourth and quit half way through to go play ‘Splosion Man.

I personally wouldn’t recommend this game if you are an average fan like myself. If you grew up with the turtles and are a die hard fan of the series, than this game should give you thrills just for the sheer fact of nostalgia setting in. In my honest opinion, with all that Ubisoft put into this game, graphically and online compatibility wise, I think they could have updated the moves and sounds a bit better than they did. I understand not trying to change a classic, but if the classic by todays standards bores you to death and it is only the demo, that doesn’t leave me high hopes for the rest of the game, nor does it make me want to spend my 800 Microsoft points ($10) to buy the game and find out.

Want-a-bility

1 - - - | 5 - - - - 10

I place my personal want at a 4, that means, I am leaning towards not purchasing this in any near future. I personally do not think this game warrants a 800 MSP purchase. If it were to drop to 600 or 400 I would purchase it, just for the fact that it is above mediocre arcade game, and arcade games standards have risen for me over the past year or two. To me, this game does not reach that standard.