Poor superhero games. Long have spandex crusaders been maligned by interactive entertainment connoisseurs as poor examples of the medium. Even video games featuring superheroes that do well, such as Iron Man earlier this year, still are received poorly by the critical community at large.
Now, Batman games have not been an exception to the rule of superhero video games; most of the games featuring the Dark Knight have been panned or generally considered untrue to Batman's character. Lego Batman isn't going to be the game for those yearning for "The Detective," but at least it is true to the Batman mythos in its own way. We take a look at the title's success.
Why so serious?
According to the NPD, Lego Batman SKUs placed twelfth, eighteenth and nineteenth on the top 20 games in the month of September. The game was the second best selling title on PS2 and PSP, third best selling on DS, fourth best selling on PS2 and sixth best selling on Wii and Xbox 360. Overall, Lego Batman sold 551,000 copies across all platforms (including PC).
While these results are certainly encouraging, Lego Batman has a long way to go to catch up to its predecessors; both Lego Star Wars and Lego Indiana Jones sold around 1.1 million units in their respective first months of availability. Lego Batman had less than half that support, for a number of likely reasons, such as the lack of a tie-in movie (Dark Knight doesn't really count), and a likely saturation of Lego action titles in people's libraries at this point.
Where does he get all those wonderful toys?
Anyone who has played Lego Star Wars or Indiana Jones will feel right at home with Lego Batman. You and a partner advance through a level, beating up bad guys and picking up studs while occasionally building objects and using special abilities in order to pass obstacles. While not based around any movie or existing plot, the game is broken down into three different storylines with 30 levels in total, an increase over the 18 available levels in previous Lego titles.
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