Arkham General Landmass

I meant to post a lot sooner than this but I've been quite busy and I don't mind a bit of Internet free time. When I was last on the Internet, I checked out some of the new Arkham City game trailers. Not sure if I've mentioned this before, but I'm not a game player. That is, I love games, but I prefer them retro - like Super Nintendo, The old Game Boy, board games...charades... haha. That's not to say I don't play more current ones - we own a Nintendo Wii now and I have some computer games that I still like to rock. I just can't get into all the PlayStation and Xbox games.

None of the games interest me and the controllers suck. It's not as fun as when I was a kid with my Super Nintendo, having to do everything the hard way and having fun while doing so. These days, if you don't get it, just look up the cheats on the Internet. Too much reading? Watch a walk through on YouTube. Too much effort? Open an in-game dialogue on the game with your friends.

That said, I like to watch other people playing some of these games. If they let me hang around, sometimes I get to add commentary. If I'm still around after that, I know they wuv me. So, Arkham Asylum was totally awesome from what I heard - Arkham City has some big inmate shoes to fill. (Especially if Killer Croc is around)

So, the trailer. I'm watching this with K-dog, and we look at each other and say at exactly the same time: 'The next Batman movie should be from these animators.' They have done a great job so far, and Batman doesn't suffer from the eternal sore throat of damnation in it. At least we'd have nice things to look at if they ever put more random bland characters in the live action ones. Yes, Katie. You.

It opens with a shot of the Warner Bros water tower. Even though it's black, white and depressing, is there any among us who did not look at that and go 'YAY! ANIMANIACS!!' ? Of course it's not the Animaniacs, but oh well. There's sure to be plenty of madness to go around anyway. Hugo Strange questions Batman, asking if he's ever considered this to be his fault - and it's a good one to ask. There are plenty of comics out there that put it right out there that there would be no Joker without Batman.

However, crime doesn't sleep and if it's not a Joker than it's going to be a Penguin, or some other crime lord, petty criminal or what have you running around unchecked, so you can't blame Batty for trying. Plenty of criminals in Arkham City are happy to be predictably violent and fashionably so in their prison oranges but some seem to have broken into the numerous Gotham make-up stores and turned clown face on us.

Of course, so far they all seem to be male and build like fire-truck bench pressing gym junkies. One of the best things about Batman is his choice in arch nemesis. Bane broke the Bat, and he is always a threat, brains and brawn, sometimes with an amplifier. Mr. Freeze could freeze him. Croc could eat him. Penguin could.. throw umbrellas at him.. yet Joker is the main enemy. Physically, he's not too strong so he relies on tricks, slights of hand, well thought out traps and sidekicks.

So it'd be nice to see some different body types going on here, even some equality gender-wise. You don't have to be a body builder or even male to shiv someone. (Please refrain from doing so, however.)
Two-face has captured Catwoman... uh.. somehow. I thought she was pretty good at getting out of places. Besides, it's *Two-face*. Catwoman is a thief.. did she not have a handful of coins to throw at the precise moment he tosses his, effectively confusing him and leading to his downfall?

Batman flies around, looking cool and hitting signs.. Well, he has been cramped in a little mental house, he's not used to spreading his wings so far. I like the part where he flies in like Superman, and when he lands, like ten goons get knocked off their feet. When I said that Rocksteady should be in charge of the next movie, I was complimenting them on their realistic and lifelike animation, but this sort of makes me go... yeaaaah NO. He's not Superman. Anti-Shark spray was pushing it, but this is getting there too.

'It would be a shame to get blood all over my nice new outfit!' squeaks Harley Quinn, and as usual she's absolutely right. This new outfit is much more her and less playing dress ups for the fan-boys and lobby groups for bastardisation of familiar uniforms. I could just replay that baseball bat hitting Batman all day. K-dog wasn't sure about that - Batman took out all those dudes without breaking a sweat, and now he's taken down by one baseball bat hit?

Yes, a good point but Batman is not infallible and Harley tends to get misunderestimated as a villain so that would be one of her major advantages. The trailer shows a bit more of the heat vision, anti-WMD and skeleton scanners of Batman but to me it plays like an old horror movie. 'Turn around!!! He's behind you!!' I want to scream at the henchmen. Oh, too late. Poor henchdudes.

Catwoman gets saved by Batman and declares that she likes this dangerous place. I'm happy she didn't say it was purrrrfect. No, really. Yes, she's a cat lady but when the character has been around for as long as she has, let's just say that the jokes stopped being amewsing about a bazillion years ago. The bit at the end with the Joker's close-up kinda squicked me out. He looks *really* festy. Really festy and way too old for Harley Quinn.

Of course he's older than her, but geez, let's try and not make it look so wrong. Especially when Batman spoils all the tie-in comics and says that there's nothing wrong with the Joker. Damn it, Batman, can't take you anywhere!! Speaking of anywhere, word on the streets is that if you find a rooftop full of cats the game will ask you if you'd like a sex change. That's right, you can play as Catwoman!

My problem with that is the Catwoman reveal trailer. She struts around Batman seductively, she walks seductively, she has lips, I guess they're seductive too in some way, she pulls out a cat toy and says 'Come to kitty..' Come to.. Come to kitty?? Is that really what you just said?? Yeah, that's gonna get you the fear and respect Two-face is on about all the time.

So she struts seductively forward, then we get a split panel of her seductively walking in case we weren't sure from the first clip, then there's one more shot of her walking with her face obscured and then one head shot. She does an awesome under car slide thing, but I can't help thinking that they were just trying to show off her cleavage for some reason. Then she beats up some bad guys. Yay for Catwoman! Then she.. oh, here we go. Dust of yer cliche's, it's time for a kiss the bad guy you're about to throw away. Eew.

The action scenes of her jumping on buildings and using her whip to swing off towers looks great but I don't feel as excited because of all the stereotypical objectification. Catwoman is by definition sexy, she's all about control of her womanhood, I won't argue that. I just wish that I could watch this trailer and not feel like I'm sitting through the old Batman movies again where they just had to include nipple, crotch and butt shots of all the main characters.

People will find Catwoman sexy no matter what she does. People who hate furries will find Catwoman friggin' attractive. I'd like a game that didn't have to sex up everything so much though, because as we all know there's a collective of gamers out there who would beat off to Princess Peach from her original games. We don't need to pander to them anymore. Enough people are going to buy your game and you damn well know it. Why can't we have a playable female character who is there because she's awesome, and not just eye candy? Between Harley, Ivy and Catwoman, these designers are trying to phase out ordinary female walk cycles!!

I think Catwoman was a good choice for an alternate character though. Her fighting style is more gymnastic and graceful than Batman's violent fists of justice, and her weapons are different too. Apparently there's going to be a Robin running around as well - a bird in the hand means you're going to start breeding Robins and Batgirls though so we should probably watch that carefully.

I'm a little sad that Arleen Sorkin won't be voicing Harley Quinn in this game however, and even Mark Hamill says it's the last time that he will do the Joker's voice so that bites. He wasn't in Under the Red Hood either, but you could see the voice actor channeling him.

Hopefully there will be more awesome Harley bits in this game though. I have to say the best poster for this game is the one where Harley has her back to the viewer, red highlighted and the rest monochrome, giving Batman a stern talking to. Ma Wayne would be proud.