It was a dark and stormy night.

Batman: Arkham Asylum
Has the bar really been set this low? I understand the excitement that gamers must feel about a reverentially licensed game, but the hyperbole in the press and the gaming community surrounding Batman: Arkham Asylum is just disgraceful. While the game does an admirable job of tailoring a rather violent genre to the Batman franchise (no guns, no kills), it fails to do any justice to the caped crusaders vaunted detective skills. The Riddler environmental puzzles are dull and a majority of the combat sequences involve little more than button mashing (Rocksteady's idea of difficulty seems to be simply adding more and more enemies). The game only soars (pardon the pun… just trying a turn at being a profession reviewer!) in the stealth set-pieces in which you silently take down unsuspecting henchmen one by one. Yet even these moments require little thought or creativity, merely patience as you wait for enemies to isolate themselves from the rest of the group.

A classic rental. No more, no less.

Grade: B-