Source: youtube.com
7. Good Bosses
I’ve briefly touched on Arkham Asylum’s boss battles, but I think they deserve a deeper look here.
The standouts are the Scarecrow fights and the battle with Killer Croc, both of which are super engaging, but for different reasons. The Scarecrow fights take place in the nightmare realm and test your platforming, stealth, and combat abilities to their fullest extents.
There’s even more of this here than in the regular game, since the surrealist marketecture and landscape design caused by the nightmare provide unique jumping and grappling puzzles that would be otherwise impossible to realistically integrate. Using the Bat Signal to defeat Scarecrow is great symbolism and it allows the game to use the Bat Signal a little, when it wouldn’t otherwise.
On the other hand, the Killer Croc fight is a version of the making Batman prey concept, but from a very different angle. In the Scarecrow boss fight, you can always see Scarecrow, towering over you. But Croc is lurking below, out of sight. You never know what direction he’s going to come from. It’s all suspense and dread, until that giant crocodile man leaps out of the sewers and tries to eat you.
