The Adventures of Batman & Robin

The Game

The Adventures of Batman & Robin is based on the 1992 series Batman: The Animated Series, which was retitled in its second season to The Adventures of Batman & Robin. A game of the same name was also released on Genesis/Mega Drive, Game Gear, Sega CD, and Game Boy, but none of them were ports of the other, each game was a completely different thing with different developers and publishers, so no comparisons to be made here!

Developed and published by the one and only Konami, their first entry on our list, and what really needs to be said about Konami? One of the biggest names in the arcade world in the early 80s, before breaking into consoles in a huge way with series like Castlevania, Metal Gear/Metal Gear Solid, Contra, you could keep going and going, and they were already very well established in 1994, Turtles in Time released 3 years prior and is considered one of the best beat-em-ups on the console.

Gameplay

The Adventures of Batman & Robin does more than just your standard beat-em-up, when you get a typical beat-em-up level it is fairly standard, in fact mechanically it's very basic. Walk left to right, one button to attack which is either a punch when you're stood up, a kick when you're crouched, or a flying kick when you're jumping, you can also walk into enemies and grab them to then throw them. No combos, just one attack button and some of Batman's gadgets. The extra weapons like the gas grenades and the sonic batarang I never really used, it's a bit fiddly pressing a button to cycle through gadgets and then use it to attack all while people are coming at you. But what this game does do well is the variety, you start out with a typical level, then you end up fighting The Joker on a rollercoaster as it's whizzing along the tracks. Then you're in a museum with 3 levels, and you have to find members of staff that The Penguin has tied up, this level is all about exploration, going up and down the elevator, checking in with Robin by using a phone on the wall so he can tell you how many are left and where about in the building they are. Then there's a Batmobile level, and Riddler's maze that has you taking lefts and rights trying to find Commissioner Gordon all while The Riddler is asking you riddles, The Scarecrow's level has innocent people taken over by his gas attacking you, Batman can't kick the shit out of them so he has a spray to knock them unconscious. There's so much variety and the game never gets boring despite the basic combat.

One thing I did find was the bosses, despite looking cool and having some interesting arenas, had far too much health, once the pattern had been learned you just find yourself jumping around, not getting hit, and punching for ages before the boss is done for. The bosses are all cool though, you fight through Batman's typical rogues gallery, Joker, Penguin, Two Face, Poison Ivy, Riddler, Catwoman, then what I really liked was the final level is essentially a boss rush, but they throw in some of the villains you haven't fought before, Clayface and Man Bat. You can tell a lot of love and thought has gone into this.

There are some things I didn't like though, I mentioned before about the gadgets, some you use as part of the level and it's quite cool, a torch in the museum when the power goes out so you can see land mines, X-Ray goggles in Riddler's maze so you can see through walls, and a gas mask in Scarecrow's stage to avoid his gas. The weapons though were mostly ignored. One of the other gadgets you have is a grappling hook, and the idea is great, grapple to a surface, swing forward and jump off Bionic Commando style, problem is it's really frustrating to use and there are a couple of levels that require it to be used pretty much perfectly. One of the other issues is the wall jump, now I know this game is 32 years old, and wall jumping hadn't been as popular in games as it is now, but it was so awkward to get right, and one level makes you do it to progress, except there's vents on the walls that damage you, so you have to time your jumps to avoid them, except you have no control over the jump arc once the jump happens, so you have to get hit, drop down and try again, hoping you start in the right spot to avoid them. If you haven't seen it, check out Rob's Wheel of Shame video on Speedrunners, that reaction to wall jumping is about the same as the reaction I was having when I played this.

Graphics

Graphics are phenomenal, it's like they were lifted straight from the animated series, each level starts at the bat computer talking to Alfred or Gordon, or watching a news report, and all the characters look exactly like they do in the show, it has really nice fluid animations, Batman's cape flowing behind you when you run, or billowing above you when you fall, there's some really nice parallax scrolling in some levels, and a really gorgeous scene with you chasing Catwoman across the roof tops while search lights shine on you from below. There's colour, there's darkness, a great mix of everything, the only thing I wish there was more of was enemy variety. What you have looks great, but when you fight your 100th Tommy Gun wielding gangster it starts to look a little bit less impressive. The bosses are all designed really well, you fight on a rollercoaster, the wings of a plane, a chessboard that breaks away under your feet as you run. These games based on animated series really do lend themselves well to this era of gaming. I did get a bit of slow down in places, so either the SNES was being pushed to its limits, or my emulator was crapping out.

Sound and Music

Really nice recreation of the theme song for the show, and a decent soundtrack to go along with it. The tracks are all quite short so while they are good, you can get repetition if you linger on a level too long. The levels are fairly short so it doesn't happen often. It does make you feel like you're playing an episode of the show.

Sound is about what you'd expect for a beat-em-up, grunts and groans as you kick seven shades of shit out of a villain's goons. Nothing majorly stand out, but nothing offensive that will have you turning the volume down. Weirdly the boss fight with The Scarecrow seemed to have the exact same sound when you hit him versus when you got hit, so it was hard to tell if I was landing a blow or getting hit myself. Not sure if that was an intentional thing or a mistake, but it was odd.

The People

A lot of people worked on this game! 7 people on sound effects and music alone. Jun Funahashi had previously worked on TMNT for the NES, Castlevania III, and Batman Returns (had some experience with Batman music already!) among other. After this he went on to work on a lot of modern Frogger games of all things, and his last game was Stranglehold in 2007. Kazuhiko Uehara was obviously a mainstay for Konami, working on Metal Gear 2, Turtles in Time, Parodius, and he had a great credit on Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance as part of the "Skateboarding unit"

6 people worked on the graphics, Yoichi Yoshimoto was credited on the most other games, he'd mainly worked on smaller NES titles or Japanese exclusives, but after this went on to work on Brave Fencer Musashi for PS1, various Kingdom Hearts games, Final Fantasy IV: The Complete Collection on PSP, and Mario Sports Mix on the Wii.

The game also had 4 programmers, obviously not a case of too many cooks spoiling the broth because the game came out great. Makoto Sato still works in the industry today programming a companion app for Final Fantasy XIV.

All these Japanese people working hard on such a good game, and it never even released in Japan.

Box art

At first glance the front cover is lovely, lifted straight from the animated series, and would be eye catching on any game shop shelf. Upon closer inspection there are a couple of things I noticed, number one, how is The Joker not on the front cover? The most iconic villain, and is the first and last villain you see in the game, just an odd choice. Second, what is going on with The Riddlers arm? I thought he was aiming a shotgun onto the floor but I'm not even sure what he's holding, not got a clue what he's up to. The third, damn is Batman's hand not huge? Also, I love that Two Face is just holding a pistol, on the front cover of a Nintendo game, taken directly from a children's animated series. Villains used guns back then in kids shows back then!

As for the back, they've broken the 4 screenshot rule and gone for 6! They've chosen really nice ones too, the search light while leaping across the buildings, the rollercoaster, swinging from the bottom of a blimp, they really make you want to play the game. No bullet points, but reading the description they do go into a bit more detail talking about the amount of levels and the gadgets and all that, and every part of it is completely true, so…

I give this box my rating of - Accurate. The game does exactly what it says on the tin, and it does it amazingly well.

The Press

GameFan Magazine:

Wow! Now this is what action/adventure is all about! In every category Batman and Robin delivers. The graphics, sound and especially the level design are pure genious. Special effects are waiting around every corner! Konami does it again!

95/100

GamesMaster:

Whether you're a fan of Batman or not, this will still have you begging for more. It's a very tough game to do well at, but there are a lot of goodies to help you through the game.

91/100

Computer & Video Games:

This is a great SNES game, and Konami has more than done the licence justice with a cracking soundtrack that helps set the tone for the accurately depicted Batman characters and sets. Many of Batman's psycho enemies have been included and the prerequisite Mode 7 touches are here - the roller coaster section is very similar to a stage in Probotector. But the scene-setting pieces of text can irritate after a while, and more variations on the levels would have been appreciated; but on the whole what you get is a well-rounded package.

91/100

Video Games & Computer Entertainment:

Talk about bang for the buck! The levels are wildly inventive and varied. Check out the driving levels, the Riddler's maze and Batman's freefall flight with Catwoman (to name a few) and prepare to be impressed. In addition to these features, The Adventures of Batman and Robin features rock solid action gameplay. No, Konami didn't pay me to write this review, The Adventures of Batman and Robin is that good.

9/10

Digitiser:

Batman and Robin is a tough and original platformer. Graphically it is outrageously good, though it tends to peak rather early on with a stunning 3D roller-coaster battle against Joke-o. The art deco backdrops are faithful to the cartoon, as is a soundtrack which perfectly recreates the brooding score. This is one of the few games we regret not reviewing in time for Crimbo, and it's one we'd recommend you to consider as an irregular New Year purchase.

89/100

GamePro:

With the steadfast controls, you'll blast through each stage - except behind the wheel of the Batmobile, where the twitchy steering and weak graphics harken back to eight-bit games. Regardless, there's enough depth in this fun, intriguing game to keep you dashing across Gotham City for quite some time.

4/5

Game Players/Ultra Game Players:

Sadly, Batman & Robin falls short of super-heroic stature. Parts of the game can be frustrating and Batman's slow movement doesn't help. But if you're a fan of the show, you still can't go wrong with this cart. It does most things right and it's always fun to don the cape and cowl. Now if we could only get the Adam West Batman game.

80/100