thats the best way i can explain the hype for the game and it lives up to it
nice mix of stealth, action, puzzle, story, and any batman game after this should only improve on whats already there......

keep in mind.... when they finally make a superman game that plays well and not like a broken flight sim, all hell will break loose...

I think it is. I think had it not been Batman, it would have scored a solid 10 points lower.

Then again, I think review scores make ZERO sense and are entirely arbitrary. So who cares? It's a solid game.

jeez the game just came out how the hell is it overhyped. i'll be picking it up this Friday but i think it really caught people off guard. i know before the demo game out i was thinking this game might be decent at best and after the demo i was amazed at how fun it was but still wasn't sold and now after most reviewers gave it 9.0+ it looks like a must buy especially for comic book fans

of course if this was an exclusive to either the PS3 or 360 it would be the second coming of Jesus.....right? some people just dont know how to appreciate a good game.

i don't think it's overrated. it's actually good that this game got high reviews. i surely did not expect this game to have such great reviews when it came out. i was in shock. the more i played it the more the critics were right. about 90 percent of the time i do not agree with the critics, but this time around i did. i love the game! batman back in the day was horrible, now we have the best batman game to date!

of course we will always have someone hating on everything.

So every good game is overrated these days? Get off COKE and stop talking....

"BAA is a very good game, a game that any Batman fan will be happy with."

Okay......so who the hell ISN'T a batman fan ??

I love AA the only thing i hate is just the use of the ue3 engine the shiny walls are so 2006. The rest of the game was just brilliant. Mark hamill as the joker the combat system is easy to use but hard to master im still doing the challenges and they are alot of fun easily adds 5hours to the game even longer for ps3 owners. I think it almost equals Infamous

I also hope this sets a new trend instead of rushed superhero games sega learn from this and give us a real iron man game. To any1 who doubts they should buy it i will tell ya that its worth the 60bucks even if you arent a complete batman fan.

No it isn't. GOTY for me currently. I hanv't been this enthralled in a while.

One thing game review sites need to include is gamer group. Just because the game reviewer loves the game, it doesn't mean the game is a must play for every type of gamer groups.

Games like GTA4. It's not the type of game for family group even the game is rated very high and must play.

So far it's in the top 3 games I've played this year. GOTY contender for sure in my book.

Gaming "journalism" on the other hand is over-rated.

It's a damn Batman game, why would a not-batman fan play it?

to see the very people that were bashing 360 for having the non-superior version of the game (graphically, DLC, etc.) aka PS3 version.

are NOW bashing the game as being "another sh!tty UE3 game"

what a freaking joke!

This game is throughly enjoyable. The gameplay is simplistic for casuals to even just walk up and play it (much like fable, mario, etc.), the graphics are in the very few using the UE3 that actually looks impressive to me, and the voice acting is freaking awesome... plus authentic to the series/characters we batman fans wanted/love!

I don't think this game will get GOTY, I truely expect Uncharted 2 to get that nod (I freaking love the series). But this game IS indeed an easy contender. It was a great job well done!. Rocksteady deserves a huge nod for taking a comic franchise (one that rarely ever gets any freaking games worth a mention) and then rasing the bar for all the rest of the like!

It WON'T win GOTY, but it deserves a huge nod! and ANYONE bashing the unreal engine and how Rocksteady used it... is flat out lame!

wasnt impressed.

That's why i did not buy it.

But then, demos do give us wrong impressions as well.

There are plenty of people who actually believe it deserves 9/10 or better. So no, it is not overrated. The implication that a game is overrated always makes me tear my hair out. Someone sat down, played it, and said how much they liked it. How is anyone in a place to say that no, the game you think is great is actually only good?

You know it's a good game when you never stop hearing about it

Yes it's first rate judging by all the buzz

Anyone who thinks GTA 4 is overrated clearly doesn't understand how rating systems work. You harp on graphics all day, and find one gameplay mechanic that you and a minority of people dislike and then reason that that's why a game can't possibly be highly acclaimed. The way to do it is to average the games Percentile ranking among comparable games in the same generation on similar hardware along the various dimensions of game development (Graphics, gameplay, storyline & overall presentation; some metrics use sound, but I consider that subsidiary to storyline & presentation).

The graphics, despite ubiquitous sheen, are really quite good, though not the best. Still, even bad graphics should really only count for a max 1 point drop on a ten point scale. Truth is, graphics shouldn't matter as much as people make them out to. Indeed, we all want high quality graphics, but even if the game looked 100% photorealistic, if it were as bad as Damnation for example, you still wouldn't want to play. I can name several games that have come out recently and that will be coming out that will probably be excellent games and still won't have graphics much better than this. Compared to Wolfenstein and (dare I say it) ODST for example, this game looks Amazing. The models may be rigid, but their level of detail is extremely high (which you would know if you played the game and got the character model trophies). I'd say, minus the sheen and some poor lighting, this games gaphics are easily as good if not better than RE5 (and those were pretty damn good, if you think otherwise, I need to upgrade to whatever 200th generation console you've been playing). I defy you to name a game that is already out with markedly better graphics on a console except Killzone 2. Really, you'd be very hard pressed to knock this game out of the 90th percentile in terms of graphics this gen so far. For those who don't see that, maybe you should enter the world of HD.

The fighting system is extremely innovative, it just seems overly simplistic, but given the right kind of enemy variation and numbers, this system works beautifully. The only thing they really should have put a bit more work into is the enemy AI, but that's still better than some. True, the boss fights were a bit too repetitive, especially the whole Titan mechanics, but once again, about 90% of games have this problem, and in terms of the intriguing change of mechanic between the titan fights, the ivy fight, and the scarecrow sections the game does vary itself sufficiently. In terms of combining these fighting elements with stealth game play, platforming and puzzle solving, the game is well paced and good enough in terms of each to make it's unique combination of them not only admirable but formidable. Strip away the Batman facade, and 90% of fans of this genre would still have fun playing this game.

Story wise, it's a classic batman scenario. If you don't like batman or superheroes in general, you're not gonna like it. If you do, you'd have read the graphic novel 10 times over within a week of its release. This is definitely the Dark Knights worst night, and he continues to demonstrate his exemplary skill as detective, scientist and fighter as well as his impeccable moral fortitude. The tale is gripping, and seeing batman's darkest fears materialize through his own eyes thanks to the scarecrow's gas was, if taken seriously, actually moving (though to feel that you might have to have a degree of prior immersion into the realm of batman and some foreknowledge of his psyche). The integration of the cut scenes, coupled with the excellent voice acting (especially for animated series fans), and good scripting (with just the right amount of cheese, remember this is not "The Dark Knight" film, batman should normally be a little campy)plus the well thought out pacing and development, it all just made sense. Unfortunately the characters are static, but that is the nature of this genre, in comic books, for the most part, you know who the good guys and bad guys are, and they stay that way. Still in terms of videogame storylines, which have more recently ascended to very great heights but generally wallow in very, very low lows, this is easily within the 90th percentile again. I submit as anecdotal evidence the fact that one of my friends who never reads comics, doesn't play videogames, and has only ever seen the Dark Knight film in terms of Batman, sat with me while I played nearly the whole thing.

At last, overall presentation. The interface was great, especially the detective mode. The layout of the map was open but not too large to get lost in. The menus were well animated and organized. The sounds were simply awesome at times. And the goodies, the goodies were too good to be true, challenge modes, character bios, character models, riddles and hidden items, and good ol' batman gadgetry galore (though I could have stood for more, and some greater customizability). Once again we're talking the the top 90 percent of games, in fact well within that group.

Still, taking all of that into consideration, the other major factor that people are missing is that, yes, the bar is comparatively low because it's a licensed game (i.e. game based on an intellectual property that did not originate in the videogame genre). Yet, among licensed games (not just batman games or superhero games) this is hands down the absolute best one ever conceived, let alone made. It didn't just reach the bar, it is the new bar. Set the percentile rating here at 100 (that's right 100, you can't even have a rating of 100 in a percentile system). So if we average these out, assuming that it's at the bottom of the 90th percentile along all the major aspects and we value each aspect rating equally, adding in our wild card category here, we're looking at ([90x4+100]/5) 92%. Damn, isn't that the same as the metacritic score?

I rest my case.

Click through to find my incoherent answer to a question no one is posing.

Wrong zone.

WHAT? THERE'S A REPLY BUTTON?

Most of the "AAA" titles out there right now are overrated. He brings up Half Life and GTA. I'm sorry but they may be good games, but they aren't the standard developers should be shooting for. I am a comic fan, and AA proves that the comic industry should be heavily involved with comic book games. This is why the game is so good because its authentic.

seriously? this game is really really good. I'm enjoying the hell out of it, I like the graphics. I like the combat. I like the story. I like how the game unfolds and you face bane, croc, scarecrow and so on. Its a real cool game. Definitely deserves to be held in high regard.

I tell ya, Batman AA is the best thing to happen since hotcakes.

The author is clearly smoking crack

yep
a lil bit overrated

This game is not overrated. The graphics are very well done along with the art style especially for a game that uses the unreal engine. There's a lot of browns and greens instead of different shades of gray. A very well done story, fantastic voice acting. The combat is balanced almost to perfection, providing a very low learning curve, but at the same time rewards more advanced players. The stealth game play isn't tacked on. I can't even begin to tell you how incredible the pacing is. Action, mixed with stealth and survival horror, it's all done extremely well. I feel like this is a 2009 version of Bioshock. If it wasn't for Uncharted 2 and Modern Warfare 2 i'd say this would get GOTY. It's very hard to find fault in this game. Even the riddles were handled well, they are rewarding, and offer insightful background into the Batman universe. Batman is fun and rewarding two of the things that I think gamers these days lose sight of.

Some people just like attention, like whomever is behind this sorry article.
It's so annoying, you know, the use of the word "overrated" and how behind the internet, everyone feels like their opinion is gospel.
**** this attention-grabbing article.
It's so typical...we get a great game, it gets great reviews almost universally....and the "meh, it's not all that" I-want-to-appear-cool-and-uniq ue" crowd appears.
You gotta give credit where it's due. This is Rocksteady's SECOND game and they created not THE best game of the year, but certainly one of the best, and stupid articles like this one annoy the piss out of me and disrespect the hard work of the developers.

This game deserves all the accolades it's getting, and I'm not trying to pass this as a FACT, I'm just looking at the majority of PROFESSIONAL reviews out there.

it's just that this is one of the best "super-hero" game after a long time... that's why the whole world is celebrating as if christmas has arrived.

and IGN can really be off most of the times.. like GTAIV.

Underrated. No one dares give it tens because it's not hyped enough. I'd give it 10/10. It's a perfect adventure game.

I don't think it is overrated, it is defiantly a GOTY contender in my books.

This article is a bit pointless, the writer says "For gamers without interest in the characters; collecting all voice recordings, solving all riddles and playing all the challenges will get tiresome soon." But then why would someone buy the game in the first place, if they had no interest in the characters or doing anything else?

all i will say is this....

i am loving it.

after a hard days work, i am really enjoying sticking it on challenge mode and just beating the crap out the of the punks ( customers )...

I love the combat system its not as complex as most, but for some reason it still delivers the same level of satisfaction if note more. I don't know, there is just something about it.

The story is quite good as well. I just hope there is some way of unlocking the second batsuit in the campaign. I like it a lot more then the very plain looking original.

Batmans voice acting is a bit off, but come on there have been much, much worse.

This year's Bioshock...even better in my book. I am really really enjoying this game. Good pace, plenty of unique and creepy elements and characters. Batman AA is the best game I have played all year thus far, and I have played many.
Frenzied Batman noisily munching on a rat...that's beautiful stuff right there, and it just keeps coming. Love it.

On the PS3 it's overrated.
360 on the other hand it's a AAA godly game.

i have only played the demo and enjoyed it. But i think alot of the hype around it has to do with the severe lack of anything else good coming out around now.

The demo didn't scream 'BUY ME' the way others have to me in the past.

Its a rental for me. That said, playing it more will probably change my mind seeing how much it gets raved about.

Definetely not overrated. The only thing that disappointed me was the graphics. They could've been a little better imo.

In my opinion, Arkham Asylum is the only game that has lived up to it's hype in a loooong time. The last few games I bought have left me feeling a little disappointed or underwhelmed. Don't get me wrong, they were great games. But I guess I expected a little more in the end.

Arkham Asylum left me feeling satisfied and desperately wanting a sequel. It's been a while since I've felt that about a game.

Got to the scarecrow part and thought WTF! That part was so amazing and not expected whatsoever. I am finding the game very good but fairly easy. I don't think it is over-rated really.

I find that the exact opposite is true. People don't want to give it the praise and admiration it deserves because it was so hyped and because they have a chip on their shoulder for Batman in general. These same people probably said, "The Dark Knight was an okay movie."

Truthfully, I'm only about eight hours in so far and it's one of the best games I've ever played. The depth, the mood, the control...everything about the game is amazing. And Mark Hamil deserves w/e the equivalent of a voice acting Oscar is because his work on this game is better than anything I've seen/heard him in.

i thought the demo was terrible and was wondering what all the hype was about. i know it isnt the whole game but i thought it was boring clunky and generally a bad game.

Shut the F UP! My god I feel as if every one is a damn critic now a days. "I love the presentation of this game BUT, this could be better, this makes the game seriously lag behind others, that could have turned right instead of left."

Seriously no one cares. Im sure a lot of people will agree that we need to just enjoy the games being provided instead of bytching about what you would of done or liked to do. If that is the case, go get a damn degree and do it!

I don't care if the game has a simple combat scheme..ITS A GAME..I don't care what seems realistic..ITS A GAME! It doesn't matter if the game isn't your style, it doesn't make it any less good than your style of game. Its total execution is what counts, not what you think someone will or will not like.

This wasn't entirely pointed at this "journalist" but at a lot of people as well.

i dont really care about what you people say i like the game and youre saying to rent or wait for a price drop i got the game for 38.89 bucks on walmart new. that the best it gets

I didn't have high expectations so this game is SWEETAH!!!!

I'll go ahead and say THE BEST SUPER HERO GAME I'VE PLAYED IN A WHILE.

If your picking on the game because of the UE3 engine you've been bashing all year, then you can go F45k yourself.

Critics and Fanboys can go suck a phat one..

a great is game is a great game

My only complaints:
Batman walks like he has a stick up his butt (he runs fine though).
Menus are unintuitive and a little clunky.

Personally I think the game is great. The combat is simple but that's why it's so good. You can take on a crowd of enemies and kick major ass without too much stress. It's enjoyable.

I love Mark Hamill's voice acting for the role of The Joker too.

Very good game imo, won't be on the same level as Uncharted for me but it's most definitely a great game.

I'm glad I rented it from Gamefly.

Should have been 17+

I never pay too much attention to reviews preferring the opinions of the few people I trust.

My own opinions of the game:
1: It fits well within the Batman story-lines of recent
2: It feels like a Batman game in respect of the mood and the well written story.
3: Its bloody good fun which is the most important bit.

What people overrate is the Joker content.

I bought AA for the Ps3 thinking you played through Jokers part in Arkham but it was only a challenge mode.......

And challenge mode is pretty freaking boring...while it is fun to play as him I don't see it as any buying factor unless you were like me uninformed.