Review: Lego Batman (Wii) (2008)
Feb. 26th, 2010 02:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
GAME: Lego Batman.
YEAR: 2008.
SYSTEM: Nintendo Wii.
RATING: 5/5.
Lego Batman is the first game (aside the requisite Wii Sports or Wii Sports Resort) I have played on the Wii. After railing against the console for years because of the dubious nature of its motion sensor controls ("I'm a gamer, I don't need exercise! Especially not whilst playing games!") I finally gave in and pledged my loyalty completely to Nintendo. Thanks to games like Lego Batman, it's a commitment I'm glad I made.
First and foremost, it's a pleasure to play for comic-book geeks. As a massive DC fan, I was glad to see that the characters were treated with gentle stereotyped derision (Robin's stupidity, Killer Moth's penchant for lights, Catwoman being tempted into a police van with a bowl of milk) without going overboard. Equally, I was happy that the entire game did not revolve around the Joker. Thanks to the success of films like Tim Burton's Batman (1989) and Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight (2008), I was concerned that the story-line in its entirety would revolve around Batman's ongoing dualism with the Clown Prince of Crime, with the other villains skirted to the periphery. No need to worry: Batman's three main villains (the Riddler, the Penguin, and the Joker) get equal treatment, whilst the somewhat demoted villains (Two-Face, Clayface, Poison Ivy, Mad Hatter, Manbat, Killer Croc, Bane, Killer Moth, Harley Quinn and Scarecrow) nevertheless get their own chance to shine in levels and boss missions. Batman's team is equally well represented, with characters like Batgirl, Nightwing, Commissioner Gordon and Alfred included in the unlocking mix.
So, now that we've sussed out the characters are all present and accounted for, the game-play is next under the microscope. For the most part the on-foot missions work well with the Wii controls - as someone who had never as much as held a Wii Remote or Nunchuck before, it was startlingly easy to pick up what each hand was doing - and the vibration and sound effects built into the Wii Remote made swishing and kicking and powing and zapping far more enjoyable than should be legally allowed. (Insert vibration joke here?). Leaping around Gotham City wreaking havoc on all who got in my way (and that was just as the Dynamic Duo) is really, really fun with the detailed scenery, clever level designs and cute little side puzzles. The casual nods to other geeky enterprises (such as being able to ride Doctor Who's K-9 in a Riddler/Two-Face mission) is a nice little touch, and the cutscenes are beyond adorable. The unique properties each character brings to the Free Play missions are all well decided (Poison Ivy being immune to toxic waste, the Riddler able to mind-control, the Mad Hatter able to double-jump with the aid of another wacky hat) and the customisable character palette is about as unique as you can get without allowing you to draw on the screen itself.
But where the game fell down for me was, as is apparently typical of Lego games, the vehicle levels. And it wasn't really the vehicles themselves (the Riddler's Jet is the best to fly, the Batplane was the worst) or the design of the levels (Flight of the Bat was challenging without being ridiculous, whilst Batboat Battle was fun but a little repetitive): it was those blasted mines. In every level, one of the two vehicles you controlled had a system of latching onto a mine via tow-cable and flying it to its destination. Unfortunately, most of the time this involves grappling a mine, flying all of two centimetres, and either a) getting blown up (Flight of the Bat); b) having an enemy suicide-fling themselves into the mine and blowing both of you up (Batboat Battle); or c) hitting a lamppost you didn't quite think was in your way and having the mine skid back to another section of the level, where it would then blow itself up by the time you'd managed to turn the unwieldily Batmobile around on the narrow street (Two-Face Chase). Initially challenging, the idea quickly dissolved into sheer frustration and it was a miracle that I made it through Flight of the Bat at all considering how many balloons appear from nowhere to claim yet more studs from my Super Hero total.
This clumsiness is also, sadly, present in some on-foot levels. There would be the odd jump that was slightly misplaced, a ledge made to make your character slide as opposed to land, or even instances where the Batarang would completely ignore a target right in front of it. There was a level where all that was required was for Poison Ivy or Harley Quinn to double-jump onto a ledge, but as the ledge hadn't quite been told that it was actually a ledge, there followed a fifteen minute trial-and-error session whereby the little Lego gal would jump up, slide on the ledge's perfectly flat surface, and fall off the other side. Eventually you discovered there was a tiny square in the centre of the ledge that wouldn't make you slip...only to have Ivy perform a back-flip instead of a jump when you finally managed to jump at the next ledge you were trying to get to. All that for a blasted Minikit - I was expecting a Red Brick at the very least.
But this complaint aside, I still think the game is simply fantastic. The music is wonderful - very Batmanesque without being completely given over to Elfman or Zimmer - the graphics are stunning for a console frequently derided for its less than perfect graphical capabilities, and overall it is extremely entertaining to play. A lot of customer reviews on Amazon or Play mark it down because it doesn't last long, but as each of these cretins go on to admit that they don't actually go back to find all of the little secrets, Minikits, Red Bricks or unlockables, this tiny whinge can hardly be credited as valid.
YEAR: 2008.
SYSTEM: Nintendo Wii.
RATING: 5/5.
Lego Batman is the first game (aside the requisite Wii Sports or Wii Sports Resort) I have played on the Wii. After railing against the console for years because of the dubious nature of its motion sensor controls ("I'm a gamer, I don't need exercise! Especially not whilst playing games!") I finally gave in and pledged my loyalty completely to Nintendo. Thanks to games like Lego Batman, it's a commitment I'm glad I made.
First and foremost, it's a pleasure to play for comic-book geeks. As a massive DC fan, I was glad to see that the characters were treated with gentle stereotyped derision (Robin's stupidity, Killer Moth's penchant for lights, Catwoman being tempted into a police van with a bowl of milk) without going overboard. Equally, I was happy that the entire game did not revolve around the Joker. Thanks to the success of films like Tim Burton's Batman (1989) and Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight (2008), I was concerned that the story-line in its entirety would revolve around Batman's ongoing dualism with the Clown Prince of Crime, with the other villains skirted to the periphery. No need to worry: Batman's three main villains (the Riddler, the Penguin, and the Joker) get equal treatment, whilst the somewhat demoted villains (Two-Face, Clayface, Poison Ivy, Mad Hatter, Manbat, Killer Croc, Bane, Killer Moth, Harley Quinn and Scarecrow) nevertheless get their own chance to shine in levels and boss missions. Batman's team is equally well represented, with characters like Batgirl, Nightwing, Commissioner Gordon and Alfred included in the unlocking mix.
So, now that we've sussed out the characters are all present and accounted for, the game-play is next under the microscope. For the most part the on-foot missions work well with the Wii controls - as someone who had never as much as held a Wii Remote or Nunchuck before, it was startlingly easy to pick up what each hand was doing - and the vibration and sound effects built into the Wii Remote made swishing and kicking and powing and zapping far more enjoyable than should be legally allowed. (Insert vibration joke here?). Leaping around Gotham City wreaking havoc on all who got in my way (and that was just as the Dynamic Duo) is really, really fun with the detailed scenery, clever level designs and cute little side puzzles. The casual nods to other geeky enterprises (such as being able to ride Doctor Who's K-9 in a Riddler/Two-Face mission) is a nice little touch, and the cutscenes are beyond adorable. The unique properties each character brings to the Free Play missions are all well decided (Poison Ivy being immune to toxic waste, the Riddler able to mind-control, the Mad Hatter able to double-jump with the aid of another wacky hat) and the customisable character palette is about as unique as you can get without allowing you to draw on the screen itself.
But where the game fell down for me was, as is apparently typical of Lego games, the vehicle levels. And it wasn't really the vehicles themselves (the Riddler's Jet is the best to fly, the Batplane was the worst) or the design of the levels (Flight of the Bat was challenging without being ridiculous, whilst Batboat Battle was fun but a little repetitive): it was those blasted mines. In every level, one of the two vehicles you controlled had a system of latching onto a mine via tow-cable and flying it to its destination. Unfortunately, most of the time this involves grappling a mine, flying all of two centimetres, and either a) getting blown up (Flight of the Bat); b) having an enemy suicide-fling themselves into the mine and blowing both of you up (Batboat Battle); or c) hitting a lamppost you didn't quite think was in your way and having the mine skid back to another section of the level, where it would then blow itself up by the time you'd managed to turn the unwieldily Batmobile around on the narrow street (Two-Face Chase). Initially challenging, the idea quickly dissolved into sheer frustration and it was a miracle that I made it through Flight of the Bat at all considering how many balloons appear from nowhere to claim yet more studs from my Super Hero total.
This clumsiness is also, sadly, present in some on-foot levels. There would be the odd jump that was slightly misplaced, a ledge made to make your character slide as opposed to land, or even instances where the Batarang would completely ignore a target right in front of it. There was a level where all that was required was for Poison Ivy or Harley Quinn to double-jump onto a ledge, but as the ledge hadn't quite been told that it was actually a ledge, there followed a fifteen minute trial-and-error session whereby the little Lego gal would jump up, slide on the ledge's perfectly flat surface, and fall off the other side. Eventually you discovered there was a tiny square in the centre of the ledge that wouldn't make you slip...only to have Ivy perform a back-flip instead of a jump when you finally managed to jump at the next ledge you were trying to get to. All that for a blasted Minikit - I was expecting a Red Brick at the very least.
But this complaint aside, I still think the game is simply fantastic. The music is wonderful - very Batmanesque without being completely given over to Elfman or Zimmer - the graphics are stunning for a console frequently derided for its less than perfect graphical capabilities, and overall it is extremely entertaining to play. A lot of customer reviews on Amazon or Play mark it down because it doesn't last long, but as each of these cretins go on to admit that they don't actually go back to find all of the little secrets, Minikits, Red Bricks or unlockables, this tiny whinge can hardly be credited as valid.