In my gaming career, Batman has always been one of my favorite most awaited games, so much so this was the first time I preordered a title in my life.
I'm a long-time fan of the series, knee-deep into comics and movies, and could not wait for the latest and final installment after years of, as a kid, having to wait for the prices to drop.
Sadly, as it's common knowledge, this was one of the worst launches in gaming has ever seen and one of the most infamous. The game was poorly optimized, had to be taken off of Steam, and came back months later with little to no difference.

One of the biggest issues was the scope of the game, in Unreal Engine 3, with a studio that didn't have the ability nor manpower to optimize it. A game that almost a decade later remains one of the most stunning games ever made!
If you read this in 2024, "Iron Galaxy", hasn't improved at all[www.gamerevolution.com] and is the name that we PC gamers dread when seeing who has Sony employed for a said PC port.
It got so bad that Naughty Dog had to get involved in optimizing the PC version of TLOU1 anyway...[www.pushsquare.com]
What really helped this game is that, with time, the hardware had become so good that when I finally came back to it, it performed really well regardless.

Ignoring that, the game is a wonderful open world that builds over the foundation of Arkham Knight City and Origin, while trying to add some more detective stuff for the World's Greatest Detective. It still is not at the level of Asylum sadly, making looking for clues more or less like in The Witcher 3, but still better than in previous games.
A new addition is also the car for mobility, with full map destructive capabilities, on a much bigger map. Driving the Batmobile in Goatham City completely fulfills the dreams of a Batman fan, as if grappling hook and gliding were not enough.
Everything, from collectibles to side missions is an upgrade compared to the other titles with a lot more depth to them, having more interesting objectives, bosses, and storylines.
The combat system is more complex and fun, yet still not as technically difficult as Asylum, but fun nonetheless!

The story is wonderful and is a great ending to the series, especially including the DLCs that add enough new content to the game that I'd strongly suggest them to get the full experience.

Overall, this is a beautiful game that I strongly suggest, especially when after all this time it still holds this well on all fronts!
But sadly, history can't be erased and PC ports should not rely on hardware becoming so unbearably stronger that it cuts through bad work, and sadly the publisher clearly hasn't learned their lessons years later when looking at Gotham Knights[www.dsogaming.com].

6.9