The Groginati Sales Thread

[Gusington]

And begin with Asylum...then move on to Origins...and finally Knight? I know I am missing 2-3 games but IIRC those I am missing are pretty meh.

[mirth]

The only one you'll be missing in the main series is Arkham City. You may want to get that at some point.

[BanzaiCat]

And then get Lego Batman.

[JasonPratt]

Arkham City is regarded by many fans as the best game overall, and its plot is pretty crucial for Arkham Knight. So, yeah, if it's on sale get it.

You can feasibly start chronologically with Origins, or with simpler gameplay (and work your way up in gfx) with Asylum. Honestly, on a boss PC Asylum looks very sufficiently awesome to me, but on the other hand if you start with Origins and learn how to play that you can feel ultra-competent at Asylum (like, y'know, an experienced Batman!)

So that in mind... I recommend Origins first. You'll get better effect bling (and so when you get to Aslyum and downgrade a bit the gameplay and story and music and ambience will be what you're there for), the second largest open world map in the series, and it'll still teach you the ropes. It has my overall favorite story, too.

(Once you're done with Origins, don't forget the Origins DLC Cold, Cold Heart, which is pretty mandatory for the full experience.)

[Gusington]

How many hours of gameplay do each of these have?

[Gusington]

OK so now I have Asylum, City and Origins in my cart for a total of 14.97. +the 8.00 I spent on Knight. For a total of about 23.00. Not bad.

[mirth]

A lot of gaming for $23.

[Gusington]

How long does each game run for, roughly? 20-30 hours?

[Gusington]

OK I got all of them. So now I have Arkham: City, Asylum, Knight and Origins. I will take Pratt's advice and start with Origins.

Pratt could you PM me on appropriate reading material to go along with these? I have already read the first two titles of the New 52 books (the Owls stories) so I was going to continue with those.

Can you recommend any others?

[Toonces]

My God, the nerd flows so freely.   :nerd:

And you're going to put up with this Jarhead?   ???

[Gusington]

JH is a dork trapped in a US Marine's body.

[BanzaiCat]

I played Arkham Asylum for six hours according to Steam and I don't think I made significant progress into it.

Dammit, now I'm going to need to play it again at some point.

[Gusington]

Don't worry I will play it for you.

[mirth]

The fighting in Asylum is so sweet. Wailing on thugs as Batman is very therapeutic. Swooping down on them and leaving them strung up by the ankles is also damn fun.

[JasonPratt]

Re reading material -- dang, Gus, uh... Well, the games reference no less than 75 years of various canon, so I honestly don't even. But they're also good about including references in-game to all the characters and a bunch of rogues not actually in the game. Asylum, being the first produced game, refs comic-canon when discussing who "Black Mask" or "Hush" is (for example -- they don't appear in that game, they're only a Riddler challenge.)

The games themselves are a respectably detailed alt-canon in themselves, so playing them will give you a course in Batman comics history. Some of the rogues just show up between games (like Poison Ivy who is never even hinted in Origins, but who plays a major role in both Asylum and Knight, and who has an important role in Catwoman's side story for City -- which is why there are rumors of a new game coming set after Origins which will fill in some canon blanks). Most of the villains are close to canon. Bane's story in Origins is the main exception; you may not finish the game understanding why he's important in the original comics canon.

The only reference so far that I can recall to New 52 canon (and/or whatever the heck is going on currently which isn't NuDC anymore but still kind of is, blegh), is "Professor Pyg" in Knight. But rumors are that the Court of Owls will be the main antagonist in one or both of the new coming games. In a way, the Asylum-verse's ludicrously compressed run of Robins matches the infamous New52 timeline, too. ;)

Your best bet for reading material to understand who the heck various people are, although they'll be explained pretty well in context of the game's milieu, is a wiki.