Arkham Origins: The Black Sheep of the Arkham series.

To be fair, it's the only Arkham Game not made by Rocksteady.
The equivalent to this game would be... You know why Tim Burton had to leave Batman Forever? Studio interference. They wanted to sell more toys and Batman Returns was too freaking dark for Early 90s children. That's why Batman Forever was a bit campy.

And we know what happened to the sequel.


The game was made by WB Games Montreal and is pretty much a Re-Skinned Arkham City, but slightly clunkier... Will get into that later.

So, The title is partially a lie. People would read the title as a "Batman Begins" type of affair, but Batman has been around for some time (2 years) The game is more of an "Origin Story" To the Arkham Trilogy... Think of it as the Wolverine Origins to Arkham Asylum's First X-Men.

Story:
Christmas eve: AGDB 2 (Anno God Damn Batman) There's a riot at Blackgate and seems Black Mask is behind it. Batman goes and does his thing to find out he has a bounty on his head:
Lady Shiva, Electrocutioner, Firefly, Deadshot, Copperhead (who is now a woman), Killer Croc, Bane, and Deathstroke are after Bats for their own reasons and the money is a nice bonus. Then we get a rather lame Plot Twist because if we have a BAT Shaped Crutch for DC Movies, for batman games we have a Peculiar Villain used as a Crotch...

The Joker appears here, because Batman.
4.0

Graphics:
This is one of the higher points of the Arkham games (and seeing they use the Unreal Engine, we should have some decent graphics.) The art style is consistent with the Arkham series, though Teen Barbara Gordon looks a bit like a bobble head. The gritty look of Gotham looks slightly slushier now. Not sure if it's on purpose or not, but could have looked a bit better.
8.0

Sounds and music:
Music is forgettable and what little there is doesn't necessarily feel "Batman-y". Voices on the other hand... It's a mixed bag.
Alfred, Firefly, Deathstroke, Penguin, Vicki Vale, Jack Rider, Harleen Quinzel have the Same VAs as in Arkham Knight, which is a good thing. One tiny nitpick is that Harleen Quinzel sounded a bit too much like Princess Bookhorse instead of an Arlene Sorkin impression. (even I can nitpick about Tara Strong...)
Joker is played by Troy Baker, who is an adequate replacement for Mark Hamill. But Sanic the Hedgehog/Ezio Auditore pulled off a VERY convincing Batman. Didn't notice that it wasn't Kevin Conroy until I began replaying Asylum. While I enjoyed Baker's performance, I REALLY MISSED Hamill.
8.5

Controls:
They are based in the Arkham series, I think they're closer to the Arkham City control scheme. Asylum has a slightly different layout. Small issue aside, the controls are fairly responsive, aside combat scenarios. The WB Montreal team must have done something since Batman is SLIGHTLY Sluggish (Justified by the "Origin" story) than Arkham City or even Asylum. The addition of Armored Enemies makes the Free Flow Combat grind into a halt. Seriously, unless you have the shock gloves on, they block everything unless you cape stun them first. Paired with the increase in AI difficulty by the enemies, spotty weapon locking action. (Chances are that if you activate the quick use weapon like the Bat Claw to disarm gun-toting enemies, you'll shoot the claw to a random direction.
6.5

Gameplay:
Remember Arkham City, well... Take out Catwoman and this game is Arkham City Rehashed. Some of the Riddler quests are replaced by Anarky tags or Cyrus Pinkney Quests... but with slightly sluggish controls! Did I mention the game is Glitchy and has poor collision detection with the grappling hook? Well, it does
6.5

Overall:
Batman: Arkham Origins gets a 6.7 as its final score. It's more complete than SFV, but it feels incomplete... I mean:

At least Arkham Knight lets you beat up Nygma after all the crap he puts you through.

Just skip this game. So not worth it.