So I ended up buying it when it released on Switch 2, but I should have waited for a sale tbh. It’s not a bad game in and of itself, definitely not. Gameplay is fun, combat is that fluid Arkham goodness, and the costume variety is decent. I think a Batman nerd would have a fun time. Would they have more fun in a regular Arkham game though? Yeah. Probably. And this is where the issues arise. As much of a good mix of the LEGO game format with the Arkham franchise this game is [b]in isolation[/b], as a big fan of both series this feels like a half-measure of each. The LEGO format is just watered down enough to lose a lot of the fun, and the parts that are like Arkham are just not deep, complex or challenging enough to be satisfying (the stealth is meaningless and the Riddler challenges are piss-easy for example). I can play it and have a fun time, but every so often I’ll think to myself “This feature would be better if it was a real Arkham game”. Obviously it being LEGO means it’s primarily aimed at kids so won’t be particularly hard or complex, but If I can find the majority of mini kits and red bricks on my first playthrough of a level, and don’t really care about going back to find the rest because they only seem to unlock skill points for a needlessly deep combat system (that perfect sweet spot of too deep for a LEGO game but not deep enough for an Arkham game) rather than characters, cheats, special areas, gameplay modifiers etc., then it’s not really LEGO enough either. The Batcave is a nice hub for all your collectibles and other random bits and pieces, and there are lots of customisable areas if that’s your jam, but because you have to go out of your way to get there in between missions it’s SUCH A FAFF to get to and really interrupts the flow of the game. Even here is slightly lacking though. Where your bat suits are displayed, the room looks lovely and it’s very satisfying to see the empty racks populate over time, but there is no way of actually switching suits here, the only way to do that is through the menu, making the feature completely pointless and clearly designed for the screenshot value only. Even the tiny amount of roleplay value in walking up to a suit and seeing the character change into it would be enough to get me going back to the batcave inbetween missions, but because they lock that feature to a menu you can access anywhere, and put the shop and upgrade benches in Gotham city too, there’s pretty much no reason for me to go there unless I particularly want to spend a lot of time arranging furniture and trophy displays, which becomes a chore very quickly. You can’t even access the Batcave until Chapter 2, meaning you’ve played enough of the game to not really give a crap about half of the features there like replaying levels or practising using the gadgets. The open world is fun, the levels themselves are fun, it’s just the worst Arkham game and the worst LEGO game rolled into one. In fact I’ve just gone and bought LEGO DC Supervillains and the Arkham trilogy for when I’m done with this half-baked amalgamation. I actually think I prefer LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, and I didn’t think I could be more disappointed in a LEGO game than that. I didn’t play LEGO Horizon, but that seemed like quite a departure from the established formula too, so if this is the trajectory for franchise-based LEGO games I might have hit my limit. Maybe that city builder game will be fun, we’ll have to wait and see.