Batman: Dark Tomorrow

Alas, the people at Kemco should have played Spider-Man before releasing Batman: Dark Tomorrow. It's a shame that such a popular character should have to go through the indignity of starring in such a remarkably [sad] title.

The cinematic introduction to the game (and most of the later cinematics) are very well animated. Unfortunately they fail to prepare you for the disappointing gameplay when you move from cinematics to taking control of the character yourself.

Within the first five minutes of the game I am certain that many players will find themselves swinging face-first into the side of a building -- and once you miss the building ledge you are destined to watch Batman fall to his death. The camera, which is usually placed in the most inconvenient location possible, makes it impossible to control your character and as a result Batman staggers back and forth through his world less like the Dark Knight and more like an intoxicated Halloween partygoer.

The combat system is, as others have observed, pretty much geared to frontal assaults with no way of defending yourself. As a result you spend much of your time being shot from a distance while you close the gap between you and your attacker. And finding the attacker can be a challenge, not because of clever positioning, but because of that darn camera.

The last aggrivation is that the game pauses constantly to load the next part of the level. It's strange that massive environments like Halo can avoid ever disrupting the game play to load another section of the level, while Batman has to do this practically every other screen. I'm guessing that the time is necessary to calculate the worst position for the camera's third-person perspective.

It's too bad that Amazon[.com] doesn't allow for 0-star ratings, as this title truly deserves one. Even renting this game would be a waste of money, except for other game designers so they can learn how not to build a superhero video game. Stick with Spider-Man. It's going to take the Dark Knight a while to recover from this embarassment.

The gameplay is slow to repond and not very well configured.
The camera views are sub standard and very jumpy.
Most of the time Batman is a little, tiny figure that is hard to control.
There is no way to control the camera views.
Your utility belt, while well stocked, is too cumbersome to use properly and while you are trying to get to something, you are getting the poop beaten out of you.
If Amazon allowed 0 stars, this would get it!

Honestly I cannot say enough bad things about this game, and only wish that it was available to rent first!

Do yourself a favor and pick-up Buffy or Indiana Jones instead - they are much better games!