After eyeing the recent release of Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight, and playing Arkham-inspired indie gem Replaced, I finally decided to sit down and start playing Rocksteady’s 2009 foray into the Batman’s dark, cinematic universe. I know, it’s about time.
Batman: Arkham Asylum is a moody, somewhat Metroidvania, fully-3D adventure that’s contained amongst a sprawling, island-bound psychiatric facility reserved for the criminally insane. It’s quite linear, in a sense, although there are tons of secrets to find, many of which you’ll need to backtrack to discover as you unlock new gadgets and new areas.
What’s strange is that I think I actually own an Xbox 360 copy of Arkham Asylum, which is lost somewhere in my endless retro library, and I simply never got around to actually playing it. Story of my life. Asylum was also originally released for Sony’s PS3, by the way.
While I haven’t been experiencing Arkham Asylum through my wayward Xbox disc, I have instead been playing it via Warner Bros.’ 2016 remastered collection, Return to Arkham, which also contains the original’s successor, Arkham City. So I’m playing a PS4 game on my PS5 Pro, essentially, and it immediately struck me that Arkham Asylum was running at what seemed to be a relatively locked 30fps on beefy hardware. Not exactly ideal, but this is a game from 2009, after all. I do wonder how the PC port runs, as 60fps would be grand.
Lackluster framerate aside, this remaster looks pretty decent, even by today’s standards, minus some obviously aging texture work. The atmosphere in this game is second-to-none, and the attention to detail really shines through, even all these years later. I very much noticed how eerily and intentionally quiet Arkham Asylum can be at times, and the stormy ambiance of the spooky environments, combined with both a general sinister tone and the Joker’s loudspeaker maniacal chaos, make for what feels like an unintentional horror game. The orchestrated soundtrack is very solid, too.
While the story is relatively interesting, I found the writing to be somewhat sophomoric, especially the caricatured depictions of mental illness. Besides the glowing green Riddler trophies, one of the game’s many other collectibles are audio tapes of therapists and doctors speaking with various asylum patients, and some of these conversations are downright laughable. You can tell the writers had little to no experience with actual mental disorders and were drawing mostly from TV show and movie representations. Shallow, to say the least. The voice-acting is pretty good, however, which sort of makes up for it.
Besides the brooding atmosphere, and the neat 2D side-scrolling Scarecrow segments, combat is where Arkham Asylum truly shines, and it’s what initially led me here from the aforementioned Replaced. I enjoyed the free-flow, impactful feel of the enemy encounters in Replaced, and I’d heard the developers had based their own fighting system on Rocksteady’s previous Dark Knight work. As soon as the street brawls began for me in Arkham Asylum, I knew I’d made the right choice.
There’s a ton of strategy involved in knowing when to attack, when to parry, when to use gadgets, and when to dodge, all while you’re stringing everything together into uninterrupted, marathon combos that end in slow-motion, cinematic finishing moves.
Admittedly, in 2026, the controls in Arkham Asylum feel a tad floaty, but they generally get the job done, and it’s a blast taking out bad guys and seeing how long you can go without getting hit. It’s also fun to stealthily pick off enemies, one by one, as you swing from stone gargoyles. Hanging down and tying them up is especially satisfying.
After I bested the Joker at the end of Arkham Asylum, I felt the need to immediately jump back in and start playing it on Hard difficulty, so that should say something about my time with this retro classic. The game remained intriguing throughout, despite some lukewarm writing and dated controls, and I think I’ll try going for the Platinum as I inevitably start chipping away at Arkham City next. I finally understand what all the Asylum hype has been about. Better late than never.
It goes without saying that we’re currently experiencing a flood of excellent video games, including 007 First Light, Forza Horizon 6, and of course, Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight, which I hope to play soon, if only to complement my ongoing dive into Batman’s past. As much as I love the newer stuff—and really, it’s a fantastic time to be a gamer—I get a kick out of going back to older titles like Arkham Asylum to explore our industry’s rich history.
Go ahead. Play a retro game. You won’t regret it.
