The Cartridge Thief Blog

  It's been a long time since 2009 when Batman: Arkham Asylum first released and yet, despite the passage of time eroding my psyche like the patience of an exhausted parent, it has maintained a podium position as one of  my favourite games of all time.  Even after its sequel, Arkham City,  received oodles of praise and awards, there has always been something that brings me back to Asylum  for my preferred dose of billionaire baddie beating. (Image property of Rocksteady Studios and Eidos Interactive) I'd like to state, for the record, that I was planning on writing this retrospective before the Nintendo Direct announced the Rocksteady developed  Arkham Trilogy  coming to Switch.  That said, I shouldn't complain about timeliness. In fact, this poses the perfect opportunity to reflect on what made Arkham Asylum the kind of monolithic game that justifies a re-release almost 15 years later. Thus, let us discard our post-truth, late capitalist cyn...

Ever since 3D graphics became realistic enough to render any level of human emotions, many writing and development teams have aspired to make ‘cinematic’ gaming experiences.  In all honesty, some brave pioneers tried to make cinematic experiences before that point and are the reason why a large chunk of the PS1’s library hasn’t aged very well. In recent years, the cinematic game has been exemplified by titles like God of War: Ragnarok, The Last of Us and, before that, Uncharted.   Beyond Playstation exclusives, we also have titles like the A Plague Tale series and shades of the cinematic experience can be seen in many shooters like Call of Duty and Gears of War ’s linear action set pieces. (Image property of Naughty Dog and Sony Interactive Entertainment) It is a difficult type of game to pin down and define but, much like a human turd, you just know one when you see it.  They can usually be identified by their heavy story focus with long cutscenes of serious, emotion...

  Nintendo is one of the most successful, most beloved and most innovative video game companies out there.  They revived the industry in 1985 with the NES, they've pioneered new console designs and gameplay innovations with systems like the Wii and they've managed to compete with, on paper, much larger competitors in the form of Sony and Microsoft. (Image property of Nintendo) That being said, like all companies, Nintendo isn't immune to its own brain farts and over the years there have been some pretty noxious ones.  As such, I wanted to take a break from sacrificing what's left of my youth to Tears of the Kingdom  and perform a little retrospective (or autopsy) on all the decisions that Nintendo's made over the years that really make me question how they're still in business. The Virtual Boy (Image property of Nintendo) This was inevitable.  At this point, kicking the Virtual Boy isn't even beating a dead horse.  It feels more like digging up the dead hor...