As Batman: Arkham Asylum is on sale and is being played massively by Batfans everywhere (i.e: the entire living, breathing world who’s at least heard of him), we feel that it’s right that we revisit and talk in brief past games based on the Dark Knight himself. From the really great that take a few liberties on the movie license it’s based on, to the ones that really shouldn’t have been made in the first place, we take a glance at how the Caped Crusader was portrayed throughout the years.

Oh yeah, keep in mind that I’m not going to detail an entire list of Batman games. Just the ones I remember fondly as I grow up playing videogames.

Batman: The Movie (Megadrive) – 1990

Admittedly the first Batman game I ever played, this one was developed by then-big game developer Sunsoft. This is your standard 2D action platformer setting equipped with really slick graphics, smooth and precise controls, and rocking music. You have your Batfists, a Batblock (holding the attack button, B, makes you block bullets) your Batarangs which happen to be the only projectiles you have (and the most powerful among your arsenal), and your Batjump. Yes, the jump function in this game is a weapon not unlike Mario’s.

You see, if you happen to land onto the sides of an enemy, you deal damage to him. Sure, it’s half damage when compared to your fists, but unlike the fists you can instantly jump out of harm’s way. You are guaranteed to trade hits with the enemy (specifically boss enemies) if you use the fists. This technique has to be exploited if you wish to make it to the Joker, who resides in the end-of-the-Tim-Burton-movie cathedral. The Batjump can also become a Batsomersault when you press the Jump button twice (usually mapped on the C button of your Megadrive).

Special techniques aside, there’s variety to be found within the seven stages in this game. You’ll be climbing up shafts in museums fighting off burly Viking cosplayers, driving the Batmobile and Batmobile in a horizontal side-scrolling shooter segment, and doing a whole lot of tricky platforming.

Verdict: Bat-Yay! It still holds up, although the difficulty curve is still maddening.

Batman: The Movie (NES) -1989

The one Batman game held in high regard as the quintessential movie license game. This NES classic is a side-scroller like the Megadrive version. Only instead of your fists, you also have special Batarangs and a pistol that shoots rockets. You also have a walljump not unlike Ryu Hayabusa’s. The game’s levels are designed so that you can perfect your walljumps, because you really don’t want to take too much damage before you fight the end bosses.

The game is noted as taking its source material and upping the ante. I don’t remember robots with jetpacks and mutants being in the original movie. In the end, does it really matter though? There isn’t much of this game that isn’t covered on a lot of American sites, but it’s been popularized for a reason: it is that good.

Verdict: Bat-Yay! The game is 2D platforming perfection, right until the last few stages where things get way too difficult.

Batman: Return Of The Joker (NES) – 1991

Supposedly a follow-up to the movie, the Joker somehow returns (couldn’t tell from the title?) and decides to wreck havoc with more robots and evil samurai beings(?). The game is, not surprisingly, yet another 2D platformer with

Somehow the Caped Crusader feels more rigid and less agile, but he makes up for it with his slew of collectible arsenal. From spread shots to big projectile shots, he not only can fire them with ease, but also charge them up for a super shot. Super shot abilities range from a big area blast to a revolving shield that damages nearby enemies.

The game’s boss battles are a little odd, when in context with the usual Batman scenario. This part is presented as a versus-type mode. Controls are still the same, but somehow at the beginning of the fight, Batman summons the power of lightning from the sky to turn his standard hitpoints into numbers. It’s pretty much you versus a random boss thug, with you pelting the boss to death with whatever powerups you have. It’s presented in a kinda unique way, I figured , but the actual battles are pretty weak. If you know how to duck and jump at the right times, you’ll have no problems killing a lot of the bosses here.

In fact, it’s the game’s levels and Batman’s fatal flaw of getting knocked back when hit that makes this game difficult. There are times when enemies suddenly pop up as you scroll right, knock you back from the moving platform you’re on, and make you fall to your doom. Other times you’ll be navigating a field of ice with pitfalls and enemies chucking tricky-moving tornadoes at you (I kid you not) WHILE little missiles fall from the sky and explode onto the ground. If that isn’t balls-out hard, I don’t know what is.

Verdict: Bat-Yay! A serviceable platformer that manages to up the ante in terms of difficulty. At least the bosses are a cake-walk.

Batman Returns (SNES) – 1992

If it’s one thing Konami loves to do with licenses, it’s making a good side-scrolling beat-em-up with them. And Batman Returns is no exception. All you do here is scroll from left to right (vice versa sometimes) beating down all sorts of silly down onto Penguin’s goons. You can do a bunch of combos, and even smack two enemies together on their noggins. You also get Batarangs and test tubes to stun or hurt enemies from afar.

True, it’s only one player, and there’s no excuse for Konami not to throw logic through a Batwindow and add in a color-swapped Batman as a second player for some simultaneous 2-Player co-op beatdown. But what we got here is a pretty sweet-sounding, sweet-looking, and sweet-feeling beat-em-up that justifies you hitting women in leather bondage, clowns, penguins, and bikers wearing rather large skull masks. Still, there’s room for growth, given that the beat-em-up genre has that problem of repetition.

Verdict: Bat-Yay! It’s mindless, but fun. There’s a lot of things Konami could have done with this, thus putting this game as “good” but not as “great” as it could have been.

Batman Forever (Megadrive/SNES/PC) -1995

How bad did Acclaim and Probe Entertainment f***ed up this 2-D platformer based on the Batman movie with Val Kilmer? Well, let’s count the ways:

(i) They used the same controls for Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub Zero. They didn’t work at that game, and they didn’t work in this 2-D mess. Not only is it cumbersome to fight enemies, it’s not simple to even get the grappling hook and batarangs to work in your favor at the early parts of the game.

(ii) It takes forever to kill an enemy, and it’s easy to die from a few hits from enemies. Case in point: dealing with the hulked-up Riddler thugs require you to jump-kick them to death.

(iii) I could have used the entire week to put in more Diablo I quality time on Battle.net than to play Batman Forever up until the last stage.

Verdict: Bat-Nay-Nay-Nay! I would like to make a scatological comment related to this game, but somehow guanno is more valuable than this pile.

The Adventures of Batman & Robin (Megadrive) -1994

I’m surprised that no-one has covered this version of the game when doing Batman retrospectives. Anyway, this one is a Contra-style two-player shooter where Batman and Robin flings out Batarangs of varied trajectories and colors via powerups found in containers. Red is a spread attack, blue is a speedier spread attack, and green is a strong wide bolas shot. Honestly, they could have done more with the powerups; the red and blue ones are indistinguishable. These Batarangs can be powered-up to three levels with stronger shots or wider range. The both of them also have melee attacks for up-close encounters.

This Batman game implements a unique charging system for your weapons. Rather than holding down the attack button to charge your attacks, you just have to wait until the top bar charges for a few seconds, then attack to unleash a larger projectile. The bar will still stay charged even if you use your melee attacks, so it’s easy to save your large projectile attacks on oncoming swarms of clowns and thugs.

Every major enemy in the game (Joker, Two-Face, Mad Hatter, and Mr. Freeze) has a bunch of giant mechanical contraptions represented as giant bosses, be it a mechanical cat, a giant crane piloted by Harley Quin, or a giant old-school bomber jet. That latter part puts you in a horizontal shoot-em-up stage where you pilot the Batjet over Gotham. All these boss battles look spectacular even with the limited color palette of the Megadrive’s graphic chip.

The game’s difficulty is legendary. When you die at any spot, your Batarangs revert to their weaker default mode. Death itself is easy to come by, as all manners of projectiles and explosions can take away a large sum of your health. Even if you jump out of the way, you can get hit somehow thanks to all the bullets flying in your way. At the very least, you pick up where you left off after you lose a life, but if you’re stuck fighting a boss, you’ll be powered-down and would need more effort in taking them down. All I can say is that I wish you luck. You are going to need it, especially when fighting Mad Hatter on a pseudo 3D maze. Also, whose smart idea was it to make all the health powerups float up in the sky?

I should also point out that the man who did the OST for Assassin’s Creed and Hitman, Jesper Kyd, made his mark on this game. The industrial and moody music of the game is well-composed here. The graphics also impress; just check out the aforementioned Mat Hatter level and even the early parts to see how much flair they packed onto the game’s cartridge.

Verdict: Bat-Yay! I won’t be surprised if you end up breaking your controller in half at Mad Hatter’s Stage. Still, it’s worth a look-see and is a decent challenge until that point.

Other Batman Games I Missed (In One Sentence)

Batman: The Caped Crusader (Commodore 64)-1988

A comic laid-out side-scroller that’s mediocre at best.

Batman Returns (NES)-1992

Still a one-player 2D beat-em-up, but pretty decent.

Batman Returns (Megadrive/Mega-CD)- 1992

Not like the first game; get the Mega-CD version for the sweet Batmobile stages and soundtrack.

The Adventures Of Batman & Robin (SNES)-1994

A smart and beautiful 2D platformer I sadly missed out on, but where’s Robin in all this?

Batman Forever: The Arcade Game (Arcade, PSOne, Sega Saturn)- 1996

A knock-off of Final Fight that doesn’t hold up too well.

Batman Beyond: Return of The Joker (PSOne) – 2000

It’s Superman 64 for the PSOne; ’nuff said.

Batman: Vengeance (PS2, Xbox, GameCube) – 2003

Great action-adventure license that could have looked better with cel-shading.

Batman: Dark Tomorrow (Xbox, GameCube)-2003

Initially a fan’s wet dream, right until you start playing it.

Batman: Rise of Sin Tzu (Ps2, Xbox, GC) – 2003

A nice if repetitive beat-em-up with an unnecessary combo system.

Any Batman videogame history or memories you wish to share?