Batman: Arkham City is very much like Arkham Asylum, but on crack.

Batcrack, if you will.

It’s enough of the near-perfect formula achieved by Asylum to make it all feel like a sensible continuation, but with such a dizzying amount of new content it’s bats**t insane.

Combining a solid story fleshed out by plenty of side missions, extra gadgets, hundreds of tricky Riddles and more ass-kickery than you can shake a Batarang at, Arkham City has swept down all superhero-like from the shadows to effortlessly claim the title of this year’s best adventure game thus far.

Following a fairly textbook but well-realised narrative, Batman now roams a semi-open world metropolis where the hub is a giant prison district known as Arkham City. Like its predecessor penitentiary, this derelict suburb is home to every lawbreaker in town, giving gamers far more stuff to explore and plenty more skulls to crack in the pursuit of justice.

One thing we were all expecting when we talk of skull-cracking in developer Rocksteady’s Batman universe, is the return of the brutally simple combat system: tap one button to attack, and another to counter.

Newbies can feel incredibly powerful by tackling gangs of foes with just these two commands at hand, but more seasoned players will find a world of pain at their fingertips with quick commands to use all of Batman’s gadgets in the heat of combat, as well as new group finishing moves, diversionary smoke pellets and a mixed bag of baddies all requiring different tactics to defeat.

Also returning are the stealth sections, areas where Batman is heavily outgunned but never out-sneaked.

It’s always a joy to snatch a grunt from the ground, string him up from a gargoyle like a dirty old piñata, and cackle mercilessly as his friends panic below. Supplemented by largely the same gadget selection (though with the addition of a few shiny new toys), every encounter makes you feel as powerful as a superhero should, but vulnerable enough to keep the challenge, along with Bruce Wayne’s values, ever present.

With a play area multiplied in size and oodles of gadgets to wield, it’s unsurprising that there’s more to do in Arkham City than most players will feel they even have time for.

There are very involved side missions that are spread out over much of the game’s lifespan, and it’s easy to divert to solve these along with a few Joker Riddles before suddenly finding yourself spending hours off the designated path. The sheer quantity of the 400 Riddles alone seems insurmountable at first, but Arkham City slowly lets you tackle them as you progress and even lets you go back to them once the main story’s over.

This is one of those parts of the game that makes it so great: you’re never completely tied down to the type of Batman the game wants you to be. You can let it hold your hand and give you tips as you unlock gadgets and combat moves, or you can try most of them from the get-go and save the world at your own pace.

The entire experience lets you play it out as you see fit, whether you’re keen to see the story to its conclusion or just spend hours gliding over the city being a crime-fighting detective.

As far as comic book lore goes, this is a game that understands the legacy it’s been built on down to the most meticulous detail. It may feel a little forced to see every character from Two-Face, Harley Quinn, Penguin, Mr. Freeze, The Joker, The Riddler, Hugo Strange, Victor Zsasz, Talia al Ghul and more all jammed into one adventure, but if you’re a fan looking to have a little taste of every bit of the Batman franchise then you’ll probably overlook the somewhat rushed narrative.

It’s also difficult to knock any storytelling when you’ve got the voiceover talents of Mark Hamill and Kevin Conroy reprising their roles as The Joker and Batman respectively, and anyone who’s familiar with Asylum will know just how immersive these actors can make a trip to Gotham City.

Background dialogue from the city’s minions isn’t great though and also comes across as remarkably misogynistic (is there no one who doesn’t want a three-way with Catwoman and Harley Quinn?), but it’s a tiny drop in the ocean of awesomeness compared to the rest of the sound design.

After finally comprehending just how mammoth Arkham City actually is, and after clearly not having enough of solving scores of riddles and being distracted by side missions, I still had the awesome Catwoman DLC to work through. Bundled with new copies of the game (or purchased for R95 from the PSN), these missions weave right into the main storyline and even change the opening cinematic.

The flexible feline controls are a bit more Spiderman-like than our gravel-voiced, pointy-eared hero, but the slightly altered gameplay and fresh set of abilities make the Catwoman missions some of the best in the entire game. Wielding a whip and capable of climbing upside-down on ceilings, Catwoman is a welcome change in pace to a game that doesn’t even require it.

It’s the little things that make Arkham City the absolute treat to play that it is; small pleasures that are just enough to make the game feel different but still building on the success of the original. My personal favourites include an ability where you can disable an enemy’s gun using a disruption device: it’s always priceless when said enemy spots you and tries to fire before realising his weapon is jammed.

I also loved getting outnumbered in battle, watching in awe as Batman counter-attacks three or four guys at the same time; the number of animations for the variety of combat situations is staggering. And heck, just flying around the city is a blast; mastering the art of gliding with your cape and diving or climbing to maintain altitude.

My absolute favourite isn’t even part of the game itself: it’s an iOS app imaginatively titled “Batman Arkham City Official Map App”. This interactive map lets you track all of the Riddler’s clues and challenges via your iPhone or iPad while you play, marking ones you’ve discovered and leading you towards ones you haven’t. There’s something unbelievably cool about flicking through a digital map on your iPad while playing as the high-tech hero, a tangible example of what it might feel like to be the real Caped Crusader.

Simply put, Arkham City is more than just the Batman game it was in Asylum: it really does feel like you’re the Dark Knight himself doing his best to get by in a very real, very dangerous Gotham City.

The sheer amount of stuff to do will have most players occupied for up to 40 hours if they’re diligent, and between nifty new gadgets, fighting everyone from series stalwarts to waves of thugs and even ninjas, bonus challenge rooms and over 400 different Riddles, Batman: Arkham City is a AAA superhero of a game amongst the current slew of so many B-grade sidekicks.

Oh, and if you’re one of those people who skips to the end of reviews just to get the summary, there’s one thing you should take away from this that sums up the game better than any amount of reviewing ever could: In Arkham City, you will have the pleasure of making Batman punch a shark in the mouth.

And that, fellow gamers, should be reason enough for you to pick up what is surely going to be the best superhero game we’ll see for a very, very long time.

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