FREAKIN ROCKS! I am so hooked. Imagine the stealth of Splinter Cell with suped up gfx and and incredible arcade fighting style. It pays homage to the Dark Knight's best years, with a little splice of the 90s cartoon that became iconic. Joker isn't quite the disheveled carcrash anomaly that he was in Dark Knight Returns, but that was a reinvention of the character. This is more like a smashmouth tooth and fist of nails version of the comic version of him, running the asylum, letting the loonies out to do his bidding. The revamp of Killer Croc finally makes him so much less of the silly mobster of the comics or the dunderheaded thug of the cartoon, but more of a total, cannibalistic, beastly MONSTER to be feared. Bane too is spot on. Not the flash in the pan villain of the cartoon, the mindless grunt of the schumacher films, but a straight up, devious, BANE-ful incarnation of the comic version who broke Batman's back in two. Of course I'm only 35% done. I haven't even faced Poison Ivy yet. But I'm hooked. Definitely the best Batman game so far, and I've played all of them since NES where wall-jumping was cool. Expect batarangs, batclaws, explosive gels, grappling guns and more. I give it a 9 out of 10. To get a 10, it would have to have a command to have Batman show up on my doorstep and kick my butt while I played it, then tie me up and leave me upside down for the police to find. The kind of game that makes you want to read the comics more.
Detective mode is awesome. He goes from regular eyes to the glossy white eyes of the comic/cartoon/movie, and that enables him o pick up forensic trails, scan evidence, see in infrared and X-Ray, etc. Useful in so many ways. Cut scenes are entertaining, be it checkpoints or every time you die the enemy taunts you with one of many. When you die to Bane, he snaps your back like the iconic comic scene..
