CAUTION: Minor spoilers for the episode follow, along with some violent descriptions.
As a fan of Telltale Games’ previous episodic series, I was hyped when this game was announced. They always do an amazing job of creating a good game out of famous movies, TV shows, and other pop culture media. Their latest game is Batman: The Telltale Series, a five-part episodic game centering around the Dark Knight.
The first episode was released on August 2nd, and I recently picked up the Season Pass disc, which grants me access to each episode upon release. The first episode is a strong start for the series, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. It took me about two hours to play, about 15-30 minutes for each chapter. The episode, titled Realm Of Shadows, opens with armed thugs breaking into City Hall and eventually being stopped by Batman. He finds Catwoman there, and a rooftop fight ensues, with Catwoman eventually escaping and Batman retrieving the data drive she attempted to steal. This opening was very good, but also very hard. With any game made by Telltale, you can generally expect an overflow of quick-time events, but Batman: The Telltale Series has the most I’ve ever seen. I’m all for a challenge, but it got pretty ridiculous after a while. The game also has one of the worst framerates. It can go from 60 frames to 30 to 20. It bothers me a great deal, because we are three years into the 8th generation of gaming. The PS4 console has been out for about three years, and Telltale has released plenty of games in that time: The Walking Dead: Season Two, Game Of Thrones, Minecraft: Story Mode, and a few others. The fact that they haven’t perfected the framerate 
on their newest release really bugs me, and I hope that an update will fix this.
The game itself is very good, aside from the framerate. It has a great story, littered with plot twists. The voice acting is also spot-on, with Troy Baker as Batman and Laura Bailey as Catwoman. Telltale’s well-known cel-shaded graphics are still fresh, and look better than ever. Another thing I also enjoyed was Batman’s detective gadgets. In the chapter “World’s Greatest Detective”, the Caped Crusader goes to an abandoned warehouse and must use his gadgets to solve the murders of the men in the warehouse. I had to examine every piece of evidence, and then link each person to a piece to see if they would connect. One dead police officer had bloody hands, and I linked him to a thug who had his throat torn out. I then linked him to a chemical blast, concluding the chemicals made him vicious and rip out the throat of the thug. Then I had to find the spot where the barrel was shot from, by using a scanner to detect the phosphorus level in each area. It’s these moments that I cherish, instead of the QTE-filled action sequences. I always enjoy being strategic, and while the action sequences are still fun, they aren’t as satisfying as the slower detective sequences.
In every Telltale game, there’s another very unique element, and that is the timed response. Basically, the game gives you three choices of response, along with a silence option. Sometimes, the decisions aren’t hard, like picking something to say in front of the guests at a party. But there are other times where your choices really do matter, like choosing to let a thug go unharmed or breaking his arm. It also affects those around you, and breaking the thug’s arm results in the cops being more hostile to you.
Overall, I think Realm Of Shadows is a strong start to what I think will be an amazing series. It has great story elements, superb voice acting, and while it doesn’t have a good framerate, the good overshadows the episode’s shortcomings. I’m going to give Batman: The Telltale Series – Episode 1: Realm Of Shadows an 8.5/10.
Batman: The Telltale Series is available on PS4, PS3, Xbox One, Xbox 360, and PC.
