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SPOILER ALERT! This article contains SPOILERS for Batman: Arkham City.
So, Bruce Wayne gets captured at gunpoint live on national television, and Robin doesn’t immediately break into Arkham City to save him?
Really?
Don’t get me wrong, Batman: Arkham City is a phenomenal game, but sometimes, it pushes my suspension of disbelief to its absolute limits.
SPOILER ALERT! Stephanie Brown is not in Arkham City, but she is all over this article.
The existence of Arkham City itself is a bit of a hard pill to swallow. It’s hard to imagine a world where a city sequesters a large urban area to turn it into a prison run by a private military company. Then again, this is also a world where a man dresses up in a costume fashioned after a bat with his underwear on the outside, and is vain enough to name all of his gadgets and vehicles after himself, and constantly paint his symbol in explosive gel. So, I can buy the concept of Arkham City.
In fact, there are a bunch of otherwise illogical things in Batman: Arkham City that I can accept.
Catwoman strung upside down by Poison Ivy for almost half the game? I can buy that.
Oracle not chiming in until about a quarter through the game? That’s fine.
Batman admitting that after everything, he still would have saved the Joker? Because of Batman’s unwavering moral code, that makes sense.
Nolan North as a cockney Penguin? Surprising, but acceptable.
Robin doing nothing while Bruce Wayne is captured sans Bat-suit and gadgets? No. Don’t buy it. What’s the point of Robin if he can’t help Batman when he’s in a pinch?
Admittedly, my desire to play as Robin stems in part from my general disdain of Catwoman, but Robin would have allowed for a more connected narrative. While Catwoman’s story was about her getting her loot back, Robin’s could have been about helping Batman fight the good the fight. Whenever Batman went down, you could have played as Robin in a section that crossed paths with the Dark Knight and helped him out. That’s what Robin is for.
Rocksteady created the coolest looking Robin ever, and it seems like such a waste for Robin to be confined to the challenge maps. Possessing different gadgets than Batman and fighting with a staff, Robin is a lot of fun to play with, but the game is more fun during the campaign than in the challenge maps.
Here’s to hoping that Rocksteady makes Robin playable in the campaign of the next game.