What are your memories of Batman Forever? How long did it take for you to figure out the grappling hook? Do you enjoy it or not? Have a shout in the comments, and thanks for watching. :)
bro the amount of research and time u put into a video about something u clearly passionate about has to be commended Iv allways been curious do u have a background in game development?
The grappling hook was no problem because it was shown in the manual how to use it. Asmuch I remember have I complete the game just 3 times, main reason is that it was too long (it takes almost 2.5 hours to complete it) and I needed to go to bed or it was time for dinner. The hardest part was always the circus ..... damn time and I still remember the name of the clown why I failed once, it was "Patches". ^^ The worse thing was the enemy design, most of them looks and walks ugly.
I LOVED this movie and really enjoyed the game. The controls are awful, but once you learn them, it's fairly enjoyable. Nice to see some positive coverage of it for a change.
I had this game on PC and a lil' Gravis gamepad and honestly even on PC I don't remember playing it much. Been meaning to go back to that version and see how it was. Maybe this will finally push me over the edge
This is the game I use most often to explain that when we didin’t have the benefit of free emulation and millions of other people’s opinions to tell us what to play, we just played imperfect games. Even as the worst co-op Batman game on Genesis, that leaves one other co op Batman game on Genesis, which was a much rarer game. Most of us got this in the bargain bin and were happy to just get a few hours of caped crusading in without having to pass the controller.
Another excellent video Kim! there's a really good rom hack of the Mega Drive game called Batman Eternity which basically removes all of the puzzle/platform elements, making the game more of a straightforward brawler and its much more enjoyable.
omg I had the SNES version of this! I loved playing with the Chainsaw Thug in practice mode, but remember I couldn't go very far in the main story mode
38:45 Oh, don't forget about the Indented Bat-Insignia. That was a cool twist on the suit from the first two IMO. TBH, the Batsuit from Forever is actually one of my favourite designs.
@@pferreira1983 I recall Currys accepting the "wrong machine" excuse as sons would get their Mums to say a mega drive cartridge doesn't work on their snes machine. I learned this swindle from the letter page on teletexts GameCentral.
I love this game. One of the initial 5 i got for my SNES back in 96. I played it a lot, but it was too hard for me and i never got past the circus stage, the part with the timer. I loved that it had co-op and a friend of mine always liked to play as Robin. The customizable gadgets were another cool touch. I figured out the grapple hook thing fairly quickly, as i remember, i did think it was a bit weird, but having all buttons do something was pretty cool. I liked the graphics and the fighting system, but years and many games later, I do see how it is flawed. Despite all the negatives it will always have a sentimental warmth and I hope to beat it one day :D
If you want to explain to anyone what videogames were like in 1995, this is the game. Dingy, low res digitised sprites, befuddling controls, gameplay involving large, sprawling levels that are very annoying to navigate. I remember so, so many games with at least one of these faults back in those days.
When I think 1995 I mostly think arcades like maybe Sega Rally and Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo, because an irritating amount of home games were trying to make everything either about digitized graphics or full motion video.
Well, if you want to show what bad games were like that’s what you show them…but then there’s stuff like Rayforce, Chrono Trigger and Yoshi’s Island…the industries worse instincts are represented plenty, but 1995 had an incredible amount of stuff that holds up too
@opaljk4835 Yeah, you can always find great games. Thankfully the whole digitized look was short lived, soon to be replaced by low polys with stretched textures, warping, fog, lens flare etc.
@@dilbertfish hahaha, we’ll pre-rendered backgrounds stuck around a while. And weirdly enough, the recent remake of Actraiser utilized pre-rendered characters for some weird reason. Some of it looks cool though! DKC and the arcade games like MK games still look cool to me. It hasn’t all aged like milk, but dear god some of it is horrendous to look at
My "experience" with this game boils down to watching the commercial when I barely understood how video games worked, then watching unforgiving reviews of it many years later. And also not knowing there there was a DOS version until this very video. I will say that I think the film's "dark sets + neon lighting" art direction translates pretty well to the Genesis version, even if it could've used some more work.
A few notes after watching the video: - I understand now why I had such a hard time triggering the gadgets, seems like the controls on the SNES version were horrible :D - The..safe level..wow, it never crossed my mind that it was a safe. When we were kids we always called it the train car level :D My god. - On the back of the box, there was a screenshot of one of the latter levels with the green mask goons with the flesh colored jackets. I always thought they were naked :D - This is the first time I'm seeing the dos port and wow, that Robin costume is awesome. The FMVs as well. - The bug with the circus level timer makes me want to play through the level again, to see if it's present in the SNES version as well. - For the life of me, I've never seen the Raiden special move in my life XD The roll i remember triggering by chance here and there, the same as a random gadget, but they sure would have made the game a lot easier. - The combat mode was awesome. The clown had some cool moves and animations.
I did cheat a bit to get the Rocket Boots so I could show them. Normally you only get them through collecting a set of blueprints very late in the game :)
I watch your stuff for about ten years now and I have yet to be let down by even a single video. Here as well: Awesome video. Just plain amazing, that the love and enthusiasm is all still there. Thanks for your work and the fun topics you research.
I remember renting this game and I too, was a victim of not knowing how to properly use the grappling hook. It was easy to return disc based games and simply say it didn't work and replace it with a different game...that didn't work so well with cartridge rentals though. Also, you didn't mention this but I can't imagine trying to play the Genesis version with the standard 3 button controller. Surely it'd be neigh impossible, no?
Watching this has given me strength to tell my truth finally. I'm a gamer, born early 70s, brought up with a cx10 wielded backwards to account for my sinistrel limitations. I was, for want of a better term, groomed to think that up to jump was normal. In fact I remember when other options became available on the nes or master system I thought they were unnatural.
If you are playing on home computers, up for jump is absolutely normal. I also don't understand all that "up for jump is BAD!" saying. AND: if you'd play Mario and use up for jump, there would be a "free" button for something else! It's just a thing to get used to.
I went to see the film 8 times in the cinema when I was 11. Beaten only by Judge Dredd, which I went to 14 times. Innocent times. I still love both of them.
I find it extremely hard to believe Tim Follin worked on this soundtrack. I think he and Geoff actually composed the SNES version, as Wikipedia lists Geoff as the SNES composer and Andrew Brock as one of the DOS co-composers, not to mention Tim's OST for Time Trax on Genesis is legendary.
I remember really enjoying the game when I played it, on Megadrive (or Genesis to folks in the US), and I have great memories tied up with it too. It's one of those games that no matter what's said about it, I've never been able to hate on it. I did manage to finish it too. I think back then, as a kid, I had more patience. I was willing to overlook stuff, and I played games that had really tricky controls. And it was a batman game. Times were so much different. The Batman games up to the 16 bit era had far better quality than they had from the 32 bit era onwards. I mean, Batman and Robin is a rushed mess from a studio that was about to go under.
I had similar experience with Batman and Robin game on PS1, it is legendarily horrible in many ways, but it has incredibly fun moments of playing detective and roaming Gotham city in your vehicle of choice, finding clues and secrets then analyzing them in Batcave... it just has even clumsier combat than this (Tekken inputs with view stuck to your back and tank controls). I wonder if there's a hack to make that game less frustrating? I want to enjoy the roaming and detective part without endless level restarts... savestates do help a lot. Also bonus points for playable Batgirl.
I had confused this game with Batman & Robin on the PS1 and was wondering how you could possibly defend it. Anyway I rented Batman Forever on SNES as a kid and I thought it was OK. Some things you had to look up in the manual, but I read every manual back then, being trained by PC games where you had to have a manual to even run the game.
Haven't finished the video yet, but got to the part where you talk about other versions, the one I remember was the PlayStation version of Batman Forever being a completely different game, a beatemup like Streets of Rage (you could go into background or foreground), and it was actually really good, very fast-paced, had cool combos for both Batman and Robin, plus bosses with multiple healthbars, and tons of interactive objects on stages. I am pretty sure it was an actual arcade game just ported to PSX... which makes it the only good PS1 Batman game, ironically.
9:20 I love the fact how that quote is used so much in Forver's promo's and merch yet it was TAKEN OUT of the final film for what seems like no reason whatsoever. I think Two face just laughs instead, Why?
The fact that it isn't even as good as Batman Returns from 1992 tells you all you need to know....also the fact that digitised graphics on the Genesis/Megadrive look very bad indeed...then again you can only imagine if this came out on the Sega CD and the grainy video...
I remember seeing this on Bad Influence back in’t day and feeling wowed. Never played it tho. Damn, a lot of my comments on videos start with me saying “I remember” followed by some kind of forlorn waffle. Hope this isn’t the start of a midlife crisis. Better reminiscing on SEGA videos than riding around in a car I can’t afford with shitty gas mileage I guess 🤔
The kid down the street had this game and for some reason we called it Batman Mofo. The kid himself was a little special and he’d come up to us in school and say “y’all wanna play some mofo?” I don’t know why I remember this like 30 years later but.. there it is.
Thank you for this video! Batman Forever is still a bad game with baffling design decisions, but it's obvious that a lot of effort and passion went into it's making. It's a swing and a miss, but what a swing it is.
Have you ever reviewed the Arkham quartet? If you’re a Batman enthusiast, they’re quite excellent. They do assume some familiarity with the comics lore, but they’re really atmospheric and rich. Arkham Asylum (2009), Arkham City (2011], Arkham Origins (2013) and Arkham Knight (2015). Would love to see your reactions to them.
It's always interesting hearing more about this game after growing up with the SNES version. My brother and I could never get past the 4th level and we could never pull off any of the special moves. I always assumed its because we were kids and bad at games. But it turns out the enemy AI and the controls are just broken!
The first time I played this was in high school but on Game Boy. Its kind of impressive that they got the entire game on there minus some frustrating bits but its nothing to write home about.
I somehow had this on my Snes as a kid - no idea where it came from. Even more baffling was the fact I played it enough that I completed it multiple times.
The controls make it impossible to fight a bunch of dudes at the same time and not get juggled all over and die. I rented this on Snes as a teen and tried so hard, but even with everything memorized I couldn't make it past like the 3rd level. I avoided playing the arcade game of this movie, but it kicks ass and is different.
Another good one Kim. I personally prefer Batman Forever over Batman Returns. Yes it's a noisy, camp, popcorn blockbuster but it's fun and doesn't try to be anything else wheras I felt Returns was always trying to be something more "highbrow" than the original film but was in fact messy, disjointed and garbled (I should emphasise I mean the movies not the games). Other than the Ocean games based on the comics and the original Burton movie I've never been a huge fan of Batman games on the whole
I only liked Batman Returns, with tragic Pfeiffer, very evil Walken, and... sad DeVito, none of the other Batman movies captured that magic. Oh and people actually die in it, catwoman multiple times (that's her superpower, nine lives)... It seems people either only like the one good Batman movie (Tim Burton's second) or like all the other, cheesy and horrible Batman films (Nolan is as bad as Schumacher imo, middle one only got watch due to Heath Ledger's death, rest are just trash, well, with Cillian Murphy in a mask again in one).
Yeah my childhood experience of grappling hook issue and stop there is the same. However I picked up gameplay years later in my teens, but realized as I figured that out and went on, the game still is not a good game. It is somewhat sad really as I could see there was a lot of ambitions behind the development and that they wanted to test the waters of realistic combat fighting (as seen in the MK games) and be more in line with the comic books nature. But what KILLS the game is its relentless BAD CONTROLS! They are not smooth one bit due to its CRYPTIC button layout regardless of version and the gameplay feels very stiff, unbalanced and slow. And how they could not give Robin his proper colors and just its bland red & green combo taken right from the 60's was just lazy programing.
I always thought this game never got a fair shake. A lot of reviewers just say it's terrible full stop, when it's obvious they didn't spend more than 10 minutes actually playing the thing. I played the PC version of this and (while it did take me ages to figure out the climbing "puzzle" in the first level) it ended up being one of my favorite games from that time. With no Internet or game manual, discovering all the moves and secrets in the game by myself (or with a friend) was a lot of fun. It was also a time when there were very few beat'em-ups on the PC, so it was a big fish in a small pond. It's certainly not a game that has aged well, but it was definitely a lot better at the time than most people give it credit for.
I mean, you can't play more than 2 minutes into it if you didn't have the manual which most people when they played this would not, and according to Urinatingtree's review of the game the manual sucks and is unhelpful anyway
I need to get the PC version. It's weird they didn't port the arcade beatemup instead, which was on PlayStation and was the only Batman game I actually finished (other than the hack of Monster in My Pocket released as Batman & Flash in Eastern Europe).
@@KasumiRINA Haha yup, I also beat that one on my Famicom clone, I thought it was strange that Batman and Flash had been shrunk without any backstory but hey, it was a fun game. (and very easy by NES standards)
Those McDonald's Batman Forever cups you see in a commercial near the beginning are LEGENDARY in our house - we've bought them a few times over years when we'd move, they're worth nothing and would always turn up at thrift stores. They're indestructible, or at least as close as any glass cup I've ever encountered. It's trashy, but they're our family's compromise between elegance and durability. Also I had the game for SNES as a kid, it's not any better... actually from what little I've played of Genesis version, I think SNES version is even worse in gameplay department. I couldn't ever figure out how to use items as a kid. I looked up guides and couldn't get it to work, even though I could do Street Fighter specials and MK fatalities all day long. Played Genesis version once in emulator goofing around many years later, and the batarangs just start flying. Loaded SNES version... still couldn't get them to work. I legitimately think SNES Batman Forever special moves are harder to pull off than the specials from the FIRST Street Fighter nobody likes to talk about.
Since I have played MK, I hoped for a game with similar controls and move set and always asked myself why they just dont make anything like that. So when this came out I was all for it. Obviously I liked the controls and the idea, but the slow and repetitive gameplay killed this game. Afterwards my dream actually came true with MK Mythologies SZ. I loved the shit out of this one and hoped for more of its kind. Always wondered why it never happened. Just recently it came to my attention, that MKM is/was widely disliked. It blew my mind....
This may just be me, but I always thought the Riddler thugs were topless which confused me. I suppose I thought that Riddler's goons would be as pseudo-intellectual as he is.
I gave up on this on the SNES version. I needed to get up to a higher level and couldn't figure it out for about 20 to 30 minutes. The training mode was pretty fun though.
I've heard a lot of bad things about this game, but I did think the concept was quite unique. Watching this video also reminded me what an exciting time 1995 was for gaming, what with the rise of CD-ROMs and the release of 32 bit consoles.
Good video I agree this game could have been so much better and I saw someone said in the comments there is a rom hack called Batman Eternity I got to try that
I get the feeling that they chose the Mortal Kombat engine, aside from saying the obvious about saving time and effort, was one of those "why didn't anyone think of this before?" deals. Like why has no one thought to make (passe) Beat 'em ups more like (current money making) Fighting games, thinking. Of course it becomes more like "why has no one ever thought to eat a rock" rationalization because there's clearly a reason why no one did it in the first place. It seems like a lot of effort went into every other aspect of the game, but when you put in so much effort into everything BUT play control, it's all wasted. The SNES Batman Returns has its issues with platforming, but it comes off much smoother than anything they attempted here. There was NEVER a good reason to use a fighting game engine for a platforming beat 'em up.
I didn't have many games growing up so I played the heck out of this on the MegaDrive and completed it many times and still have it. I didn't find the control scheme too bad on a 3 button controller, it was more intuitive than the Snes version which is a worse version for the controller layout and loading. Could of been a better game certainly but it was repayable once you put a bit of time into it. The gadgets were fun and always fun knocking the thugs down holes
This is a game that I remember well in a sense. I remember the bad GamePro review, but I never really trusted them anyway, aside from 1993, they'd always score Genesis games unfairly low. I remember all the bad comments online when I started looking into retro game reviews online in the early 2000s. However, about a year ago, I finally got a copy for my genesis because it was a good condition complete copy and I always enjoy expanding my Genesis collection. After playing it myself I have this to say. At the end of the day I compare it to ET for the Atari. People love to crap on it, because that's what one is supposed to do apparently, to prove their retro gaming cred! Is it a great game? No. Is it a good game? Probably not. Is it an acceptable game? Depends on personal taste. I've obviously played better games, but I've also played worse. Much worse. I like where the ideas behind it are trying to go. But they certainly weren't executed well. It's possible, due to the fighting game/platformer hybrid it was, that they COULDN'T be executed well. But I've played it multiple times, and intend to play it more. Not sure I'll beat it, but I'll give it what I got. Can't say the same about say... Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Ballz 3D, or (the for some reason praised) Granada, to name a few off the top of my head.
@@Boogie_the_cat The Arcade Game runs on Sega's Titan Arcade board (which is basically a Saturn in a Arcade Cab). Meaning the Saturn and Arcade versions are Identical. The Playstation version is missing a few graphical effects, the Batmobile on the first stage is missing and it has some extra load times.
Well, I might just try the Genesis version, as I've only played the SNES one and did not know there was a meaningful difference in the controls. I like the idea of the game and the digitized look, I mean I tried to have fun with my version. I prefer the Robin suit in the game to the one in the movie, as well. Batman Returns on SNES is great, but it's kinda just Final Fight with a Batman skin on it, which is why even though it is half broken and less fun, I liked the Genesis one better, because that plays and feels more like an actual Batman game. I also pick the SNES Adventures over the Genesis one, because that's just Contra with a Batman skin on it, but the SNES one is a slow paced, thinking platformer. Overall I'd rank Forever as the third worst Batman game, after Dark Tomorrow and Batman and Robin (PS1), and I'd place it right below Return of the Joker, the garbage SNES version.
Been saying this for years. I had the same interaction. If you look at this as a batman game, you’re doomed. If you look at it as Mortal Kombat the beat em up (precursor to Shaolin Monks) it actually was fairly deep.
The Game Boy port looks so bad that someone would move the cart while playing for the graphics to be glitched and you wouldn't even notice the difference.
It was the last game I ever rented right at the end of primary school. Somewhat bittersweet but mostly bitter. I moved to PC soon after and got stuck into Quake, Command and Conquer and Warcraft 2
12:32 Nope. When you fuck up at presentation that badly in the first section of your game, its a bad game. It's not a well tested game, or a well balanced game. That first section being that confusing to almost everyone who played it to the point of utter frustration, no. Play Batman Returns or Batman The Animated Series. They're way, WAY, better on SNES/Genesis.
I remember Nintendo Power giving the SNES port positive reviews. But they would also defend the fact that there was loading in this version..The SNES port is the version that I played first, and I did not like the game at all. It seemed like an interesting idea, with the digitized graphics and MK style fighting engine. But the game felt rigid and clunky. It seems like an ambitious game. But I still do not care for it at all.
What the heck causes rhotacism? Does it have something to do with the shape of the tongue or how the muscle bends? Is it about the shape of the roof of the mouth. All I want to do is open my mouth as wide as possible and point at the shape my tongue is making. Is rhotacism caused by an actual physical impairment? The incapability of being able to flex the middle of the tongue upward? When I search online, there doesn't seem to be a clear answer.
@bricktop. I'm curious about it. Worry has nothing to do with it. I've done a little more research since, and apparently, there are two ways to make the R sound. With the tongue (the right way), and with the front teeth and lower lip (the wrong way). During speech development, some kids form the habit of doing it the wrong way. Some fraction of those kids are never able to correct the mistake for reasons not fully understood. I can sympathize. As a child, I never learned how to wipe my butt while seated. To this day, I sort of half-stand/half-squat when I wipe.
I really enjoyed this video and you have my subscription. I admit, I was scared at first. I thought this was going to be another eye rolling video from another younger streamer thinking he found something worthwhile in a video game that came out during my time. I can't stand those videos or viewpoints. Time doesn't make shit smell good. It's shit and always will be shit. Case in point, this game sucks and I would cringe at anyone that said otherwise.
Geez I remember getting this game randomly when I was younger I would just go to the store and see what I could get for the money I had lol...so I had no backstory of this game but the digitized screens on back of the box tricked me haha but I got some reason i still have positive memories of this game it was a good time in my life lol..good to see this game get a few props while still acknowledging it's a objectively bad game 😁
The snes was already hard to believe and then i found the genesis version. Somehow it works better while still being bad, i dont know how to explain it, but its easier on the eyes and controls. The arcade and 32 bits is another level of bad.
For me, I only really enjoyed digitised sprites in the mortal Kombat series and even then after the first two it got a bit old. Never played this tho. Probably never will!
I REALLY think that Acclaim should have had Taito develop the Batman Forever game instead of Probe and Taito would make it a fighting game using the same engine that was used in Kaiser Knuckle?
What are your memories of Batman Forever? How long did it take for you to figure out the grappling hook? Do you enjoy it or not? Have a shout in the comments, and thanks for watching. :)
bro the amount of research and time u put into a video about something u clearly passionate about has to be commended Iv allways been curious do u have a background in game development?
The grappling hook was no problem because it was shown in the manual how to use it. Asmuch I remember have I complete the game just 3 times, main reason is that it was too long (it takes almost 2.5 hours to complete it) and I needed to go to bed or it was time for dinner. The hardest part was always the circus ..... damn time and I still remember the name of the clown why I failed once, it was "Patches". ^^
The worse thing was the enemy design, most of them looks and walks ugly.
I LOVED this movie and really enjoyed the game. The controls are awful, but once you learn them, it's fairly enjoyable. Nice to see some positive coverage of it for a change.
I had this game on PC and a lil' Gravis gamepad and honestly even on PC I don't remember playing it much. Been meaning to go back to that version and see how it was. Maybe this will finally push me over the edge
I enjoy how when Robin is gliding from a height he adopts the position of a dog dragging its arse across the floor
I love how when Batman uses his grapple it encapsulates my cock really hard.
I like how when he does an uppercut, it looks like he's playing a clarinet in a mardi gras parade.
This is the game I use most often to explain that when we didin’t have the benefit of free emulation and millions of other people’s opinions to tell us what to play, we just played imperfect games. Even as the worst co-op Batman game on Genesis, that leaves one other co op Batman game on Genesis, which was a much rarer game. Most of us got this in the bargain bin and were happy to just get a few hours of caped crusading in without having to pass the controller.
Another excellent video Kim! there's a really good rom hack of the Mega Drive game called Batman Eternity which basically removes all of the puzzle/platform elements, making the game more of a straightforward brawler and its much more enjoyable.
omg I had the SNES version of this! I loved playing with the Chainsaw Thug in practice mode, but remember I couldn't go very far in the main story mode
That was fun seeing you do a full playthrough/critique? I'd be up for seeing more games where you've obviously got a bit of history with...
38:45 Oh, don't forget about the Indented Bat-Insignia. That was a cool twist on the suit from the first two IMO. TBH, the Batsuit from Forever is actually one of my favourite designs.
I still watch the games master episode where the boss review’s the CDI portable but at 1200 quid they were bound to fail
I remember working in Electronics Boutique when it was released and getting a lot of returns on it "because it wasn't working" on their machine 🤔
That's a very weird excuse if it's the console version.
@@pferreira1983 I recall Currys accepting the "wrong machine" excuse as sons would get their Mums to say a mega drive cartridge doesn't work on their snes machine. I learned this swindle from the letter page on teletexts GameCentral.
I love this game. One of the initial 5 i got for my SNES back in 96. I played it a lot, but it was too hard for me and i never got past the circus stage, the part with the timer. I loved that it had co-op and a friend of mine always liked to play as Robin. The customizable gadgets were another cool touch. I figured out the grapple hook thing fairly quickly, as i remember, i did think it was a bit weird, but having all buttons do something was pretty cool. I liked the graphics and the fighting system, but years and many games later, I do see how it is flawed. Despite all the negatives it will always have a sentimental warmth and I hope to beat it one day :D
Same exact boat brother
If you want to explain to anyone what videogames were like in 1995, this is the game. Dingy, low res digitised sprites, befuddling controls, gameplay involving large, sprawling levels that are very annoying to navigate. I remember so, so many games with at least one of these faults back in those days.
Yeah, poor Road Rash never recovered.
When I think 1995 I mostly think arcades like maybe Sega Rally and Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo, because an irritating amount of home games were trying to make everything either about digitized graphics or full motion video.
Well, if you want to show what bad games were like that’s what you show them…but then there’s stuff like Rayforce, Chrono Trigger and Yoshi’s Island…the industries worse instincts are represented plenty, but 1995 had an incredible amount of stuff that holds up too
@opaljk4835 Yeah, you can always find great games. Thankfully the whole digitized look was short lived, soon to be replaced by low polys with stretched textures, warping, fog, lens flare etc.
@@dilbertfish hahaha, we’ll pre-rendered backgrounds stuck around a while. And weirdly enough, the recent remake of Actraiser utilized pre-rendered characters for some weird reason. Some of it looks cool though! DKC and the arcade games like MK games still look cool to me. It hasn’t all aged like milk, but dear god some of it is horrendous to look at
My "experience" with this game boils down to watching the commercial when I barely understood how video games worked, then watching unforgiving reviews of it many years later. And also not knowing there there was a DOS version until this very video.
I will say that I think the film's "dark sets + neon lighting" art direction translates pretty well to the Genesis version, even if it could've used some more work.
wait there is dos version wtf . i never encountered it anywhere
35:12 Another World (Out of this World in the US) and Mickey Mania also have loading screens that the Genesis version doesn’t have
A few notes after watching the video:
- I understand now why I had such a hard time triggering the gadgets, seems like the controls on the SNES version were horrible :D
- The..safe level..wow, it never crossed my mind that it was a safe. When we were kids we always called it the train car level :D My god.
- On the back of the box, there was a screenshot of one of the latter levels with the green mask goons with the flesh colored jackets. I always thought they were naked :D
- This is the first time I'm seeing the dos port and wow, that Robin costume is awesome. The FMVs as well.
- The bug with the circus level timer makes me want to play through the level again, to see if it's present in the SNES version as well.
- For the life of me, I've never seen the Raiden special move in my life XD The roll i remember triggering by chance here and there, the same as a random gadget, but they sure would have made the game a lot easier.
- The combat mode was awesome. The clown had some cool moves and animations.
I did cheat a bit to get the Rocket Boots so I could show them. Normally you only get them through collecting a set of blueprints very late in the game :)
I watch your stuff for about ten years now and I have yet to be let down by even a single video. Here as well: Awesome video. Just plain amazing, that the love and enthusiasm is all still there. Thanks for your work and the fun topics you research.
I remember renting this game and I too, was a victim of not knowing how to properly use the grappling hook. It was easy to return disc based games and simply say it didn't work and replace it with a different game...that didn't work so well with cartridge rentals though.
Also, you didn't mention this but I can't imagine trying to play the Genesis version with the standard 3 button controller. Surely it'd be neigh impossible, no?
Nigh* impossible
Watching this has given me strength to tell my truth finally. I'm a gamer, born early 70s, brought up with a cx10 wielded backwards to account for my sinistrel limitations. I was, for want of a better term, groomed to think that up to jump was normal. In fact I remember when other options became available on the nes or master system I thought they were unnatural.
If you are playing on home computers, up for jump is absolutely normal. I also don't understand all that "up for jump is BAD!" saying. AND: if you'd play Mario and use up for jump, there would be a "free" button for something else! It's just a thing to get used to.
Kim Justice doing a recap of the great forgotten genre that is terrible Full Motion Video(tm) titles would be worth the price of admission.
I went to see the film 8 times in the cinema when I was 11. Beaten only by Judge Dredd, which I went to 14 times. Innocent times. I still love both of them.
I find it extremely hard to believe Tim Follin worked on this soundtrack. I think he and Geoff actually composed the SNES version, as Wikipedia lists Geoff as the SNES composer and Andrew Brock as one of the DOS co-composers, not to mention Tim's OST for Time Trax on Genesis is legendary.
I remember really enjoying the game when I played it, on Megadrive (or Genesis to folks in the US), and I have great memories tied up with it too. It's one of those games that no matter what's said about it, I've never been able to hate on it. I did manage to finish it too. I think back then, as a kid, I had more patience. I was willing to overlook stuff, and I played games that had really tricky controls. And it was a batman game. Times were so much different. The Batman games up to the 16 bit era had far better quality than they had from the 32 bit era onwards. I mean, Batman and Robin is a rushed mess from a studio that was about to go under.
Yeah genuinely only found out the game wasn't outright broken when I saw that speedrun. I assumed I had a broken copy from Blockbuster at the time.
I love these videos, a genuine pleasure to watch
Never bought this game, but I somehow got a copy of the strategy guide.
Batman Forever walked so that MK Mythologies could… run?
Run and then fall off a cliff cuz the hitboxes are so janky XD
I had similar experience with Batman and Robin game on PS1, it is legendarily horrible in many ways, but it has incredibly fun moments of playing detective and roaming Gotham city in your vehicle of choice, finding clues and secrets then analyzing them in Batcave... it just has even clumsier combat than this (Tekken inputs with view stuck to your back and tank controls). I wonder if there's a hack to make that game less frustrating? I want to enjoy the roaming and detective part without endless level restarts... savestates do help a lot. Also bonus points for playable Batgirl.
When I was a kid I knew this games was worst than every other Batman videogame I've played. Give me the Nes Batman every day.
I had confused this game with Batman & Robin on the PS1 and was wondering how you could possibly defend it. Anyway I rented Batman Forever on SNES as a kid and I thought it was OK. Some things you had to look up in the manual, but I read every manual back then, being trained by PC games where you had to have a manual to even run the game.
never made it past the circus level and jeez I tried and tried. Ridiculous game
The SNES version of Batman Forever was total garbage!! It reconfirmed my opinion that movie based video games are almost always a waste of money.
Haven't finished the video yet, but got to the part where you talk about other versions, the one I remember was the PlayStation version of Batman Forever being a completely different game, a beatemup like Streets of Rage (you could go into background or foreground), and it was actually really good, very fast-paced, had cool combos for both Batman and Robin, plus bosses with multiple healthbars, and tons of interactive objects on stages. I am pretty sure it was an actual arcade game just ported to PSX... which makes it the only good PS1 Batman game, ironically.
30:02 things like this is is why I love your content
MegaDrive's 61 simultaneous colors was NOT a good match for digitized graphics. All that dithering makes my eyes water.
9:20 I love the fact how that quote is used so much in Forver's promo's and merch yet it was TAKEN OUT of the final film for what seems like no reason whatsoever. I think Two face just laughs instead,
Why?
The fact that it isn't even as good as Batman Returns from 1992 tells you all you need to know....also the fact that digitised graphics on the Genesis/Megadrive look very bad indeed...then again you can only imagine if this came out on the Sega CD and the grainy video...
Where can I find the behind the scenes video of the enemies shown? I've been trying to do so on RUclips, and I can't find it.
I remember seeing this on Bad Influence back in’t day and feeling wowed. Never played it tho.
Damn, a lot of my comments on videos start with me saying “I remember” followed by some kind of forlorn waffle. Hope this isn’t the start of a midlife crisis.
Better reminiscing on SEGA videos than riding around in a car I can’t afford with shitty gas mileage I guess 🤔
The kid down the street had this game and for some reason we called it Batman Mofo. The kid himself was a little special and he’d come up to us in school and say “y’all wanna play some mofo?” I don’t know why I remember this like 30 years later but.. there it is.
I really like you Kim Justice.
Thank you for this video! Batman Forever is still a bad game with baffling design decisions, but it's obvious that a lot of effort and passion went into it's making. It's a swing and a miss, but what a swing it is.
Have you ever reviewed the Arkham quartet? If you’re a Batman enthusiast, they’re quite excellent. They do assume some familiarity with the comics lore, but they’re really atmospheric and rich. Arkham Asylum (2009), Arkham City (2011], Arkham Origins (2013) and Arkham Knight (2015). Would love to see your reactions to them.
Would be an intriguing one. Love Asylum and City, not played the other two.
It's always interesting hearing more about this game after growing up with the SNES version. My brother and I could never get past the 4th level and we could never pull off any of the special moves. I always assumed its because we were kids and bad at games. But it turns out the enemy AI and the controls are just broken!
The first time I played this was in high school but on Game Boy. Its kind of impressive that they got the entire game on there minus some frustrating bits but its nothing to write home about.
I somehow had this on my Snes as a kid - no idea where it came from. Even more baffling was the fact I played it enough that I completed it multiple times.
But how do you go down a level
The controls make it impossible to fight a bunch of dudes at the same time and not get juggled all over and die. I rented this on Snes as a teen and tried so hard, but even with everything memorized I couldn't make it past like the 3rd level. I avoided playing the arcade game of this movie, but it kicks ass and is different.
Batman Forever: The Arcade Game (brought home on the Saturn) is B-A-N-A-N-A-S. A beat 'em up neon explosion!
wasn't gonna watch this till I saw its a Kim video
Another good one Kim. I personally prefer Batman Forever over Batman Returns. Yes it's a noisy, camp, popcorn blockbuster but it's fun and doesn't try to be anything else wheras I felt Returns was always trying to be something more "highbrow" than the original film but was in fact messy, disjointed and garbled (I should emphasise I mean the movies not the games). Other than the Ocean games based on the comics and the original Burton movie I've never been a huge fan of Batman games on the whole
I only liked Batman Returns, with tragic Pfeiffer, very evil Walken, and... sad DeVito, none of the other Batman movies captured that magic. Oh and people actually die in it, catwoman multiple times (that's her superpower, nine lives)... It seems people either only like the one good Batman movie (Tim Burton's second) or like all the other, cheesy and horrible Batman films (Nolan is as bad as Schumacher imo, middle one only got watch due to Heath Ledger's death, rest are just trash, well, with Cillian Murphy in a mask again in one).
What was the other version like control wise
Me and my friend spent so long resetting the game just to get the character select screen to say 'WHO IS robin?'
That's a thing!?
Some of the music just sounds like it was not programmed correctly or there’s a bug or some kind of glitch making is so strange
Yeah my childhood experience of grappling hook issue and stop there is the same. However I picked up gameplay years later in my teens, but realized as I figured that out
and went on, the game still is not a good game. It is somewhat sad really as I could see there was a lot of ambitions behind the development and that they wanted to test the waters of realistic combat fighting (as seen in the MK games) and be more in line with the comic books nature.
But what KILLS the game is its relentless BAD CONTROLS! They are not smooth one bit due to its CRYPTIC button layout regardless of version and the gameplay feels
very stiff, unbalanced and slow. And how they could not give Robin his proper colors and just its bland red & green combo taken right from the 60's was just lazy programing.
I always thought this game never got a fair shake. A lot of reviewers just say it's terrible full stop, when it's obvious they didn't spend more than 10 minutes actually playing the thing. I played the PC version of this and (while it did take me ages to figure out the climbing "puzzle" in the first level) it ended up being one of my favorite games from that time. With no Internet or game manual, discovering all the moves and secrets in the game by myself (or with a friend) was a lot of fun. It was also a time when there were very few beat'em-ups on the PC, so it was a big fish in a small pond. It's certainly not a game that has aged well, but it was definitely a lot better at the time than most people give it credit for.
I mean, you can't play more than 2 minutes into it if you didn't have the manual which most people when they played this would not, and according to Urinatingtree's review of the game the manual sucks and is unhelpful anyway
It plays way better than the console versions!!
I need to get the PC version. It's weird they didn't port the arcade beatemup instead, which was on PlayStation and was the only Batman game I actually finished (other than the hack of Monster in My Pocket released as Batman & Flash in Eastern Europe).
@@KasumiRINA Haha yup, I also beat that one on my Famicom clone, I thought it was strange that Batman and Flash had been shrunk without any backstory but hey, it was a fun game. (and very easy by NES standards)
Wasn't it in Saturn 🪐 as well (though a port of the arcade game)?
Another great video!
Those McDonald's Batman Forever cups you see in a commercial near the beginning are LEGENDARY in our house - we've bought them a few times over years when we'd move, they're worth nothing and would always turn up at thrift stores. They're indestructible, or at least as close as any glass cup I've ever encountered. It's trashy, but they're our family's compromise between elegance and durability.
Also I had the game for SNES as a kid, it's not any better... actually from what little I've played of Genesis version, I think SNES version is even worse in gameplay department. I couldn't ever figure out how to use items as a kid. I looked up guides and couldn't get it to work, even though I could do Street Fighter specials and MK fatalities all day long. Played Genesis version once in emulator goofing around many years later, and the batarangs just start flying. Loaded SNES version... still couldn't get them to work. I legitimately think SNES Batman Forever special moves are harder to pull off than the specials from the FIRST Street Fighter nobody likes to talk about.
Ah Kim, I cannot tell you how much one of your excellent deep-dives is *exactly* what I needed today!!!!!!
hello from buenos Aires, Argentina!
Since I have played MK, I hoped for a game with similar controls and move set and always asked myself why they just dont make anything like that. So when this came out I was all for it. Obviously I liked the controls and the idea, but the slow and repetitive gameplay killed this game.
Afterwards my dream actually came true with MK Mythologies SZ. I loved the shit out of this one and hoped for more of its kind. Always wondered why it never happened. Just recently it came to my attention, that MKM is/was widely disliked. It blew my mind....
Create distance and spam the Baterang as fast as possible and the game is easy. The thing I got stuck on was not knowing how to dodge the train.
I remember renting it after seeing the trailer on the Batman Forever VHS, needless to say it went back to Blockbuster that same day
You should do a movie review of the Christmas Classic "Rudolf The Red Nosed Reindeer" just for something different.
This may just be me, but I always thought the Riddler thugs were topless which confused me.
I suppose I thought that Riddler's goons would be as pseudo-intellectual as he is.
Fuck yeah Dan Bell shout out! Love his channel, and yours as well
please do a review of that Blade movie game!
Cine fusion is surely pronounced “Sinnee Fusion” isn’t it? As in Cine-ma?
after all these years, Kim is still extremely underrated. I blame Trump
I gave up on this on the SNES version. I needed to get up to a higher level and couldn't figure it out for about 20 to 30 minutes. The training mode was pretty fun though.
I've heard a lot of bad things about this game, but I did think the concept was quite unique. Watching this video also reminded me what an exciting time 1995 was for gaming, what with the rise of CD-ROMs and the release of 32 bit consoles.
Does the baddy in sunglasses remind anyone else of a young to middle aged Elton John?!
Two things I didnt expect to see in this video: teabagging Jim Carrey and the 1995 England World Cup Squad on a helicoptered safe!
Good video I agree this game could have been so much better and I saw someone said in the comments there is a rom hack called Batman Eternity I got to try that
Man the 90s editing in that promo video really takes me back. The early days of digital non linear editing stations was wild.
I get the feeling that they chose the Mortal Kombat engine, aside from saying the obvious about saving time and effort, was one of those "why didn't anyone think of this before?" deals. Like why has no one thought to make (passe) Beat 'em ups more like (current money making) Fighting games, thinking. Of course it becomes more like "why has no one ever thought to eat a rock" rationalization because there's clearly a reason why no one did it in the first place. It seems like a lot of effort went into every other aspect of the game, but when you put in so much effort into everything BUT play control, it's all wasted. The SNES Batman Returns has its issues with platforming, but it comes off much smoother than anything they attempted here. There was NEVER a good reason to use a fighting game engine for a platforming beat 'em up.
I didn't have many games growing up so I played the heck out of this on the MegaDrive and completed it many times and still have it.
I didn't find the control scheme too bad on a 3 button controller, it was more intuitive than the Snes version which is a worse version for the controller layout and loading.
Could of been a better game certainly but it was repayable once you put a bit of time into it. The gadgets were fun and always fun knocking the thugs down holes
cine fusion..... as in cinema :D
This is a game that I remember well in a sense.
I remember the bad GamePro review, but I never really trusted them anyway, aside from 1993, they'd always score Genesis games unfairly low.
I remember all the bad comments online when I started looking into retro game reviews online in the early 2000s.
However, about a year ago, I finally got a copy for my genesis because it was a good condition complete copy and I always enjoy expanding my Genesis collection.
After playing it myself I have this to say. At the end of the day I compare it to ET for the Atari.
People love to crap on it, because that's what one is supposed to do apparently, to prove their retro gaming cred!
Is it a great game? No. Is it a good game? Probably not. Is it an acceptable game? Depends on personal taste.
I've obviously played better games, but I've also played worse. Much worse.
I like where the ideas behind it are trying to go. But they certainly weren't executed well. It's possible, due to the fighting game/platformer hybrid it was, that they COULDN'T be executed well.
But I've played it multiple times, and intend to play it more. Not sure I'll beat it, but I'll give it what I got.
Can't say the same about say... Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Ballz 3D, or (the for some reason praised) Granada, to name a few off the top of my head.
Back in the day, I loved this game. I even took the time to find all the hidden areas and secrets.
This game is as grim and bad, as the Ps1/arcade game is campy and exhilarating
And Saturn. It's best on the Saturn.
@@Boogie_the_cat The Arcade Game runs on Sega's Titan Arcade board (which is basically a Saturn in a Arcade Cab). Meaning the Saturn and Arcade versions are Identical. The Playstation version is missing a few graphical effects, the Batmobile on the first stage is missing and it has some extra load times.
Well, I might just try the Genesis version, as I've only played the SNES one and did not know there was a meaningful difference in the controls. I like the idea of the game and the digitized look, I mean I tried to have fun with my version. I prefer the Robin suit in the game to the one in the movie, as well. Batman Returns on SNES is great, but it's kinda just Final Fight with a Batman skin on it, which is why even though it is half broken and less fun, I liked the Genesis one better, because that plays and feels more like an actual Batman game. I also pick the SNES Adventures over the Genesis one, because that's just Contra with a Batman skin on it, but the SNES one is a slow paced, thinking platformer. Overall I'd rank Forever as the third worst Batman game, after Dark Tomorrow and Batman and Robin (PS1), and I'd place it right below Return of the Joker, the garbage SNES version.
Been saying this for years. I had the same interaction. If you look at this as a batman game, you’re doomed. If you look at it as Mortal Kombat the beat em up (precursor to Shaolin Monks) it actually was fairly deep.
The Game Boy port looks so bad that someone would move the cart while playing for the graphics to be glitched and you wouldn't even notice the difference.
@@Imgema hey you forgot to like this comment bozo
Good 😊work Kim :)
It was the last game I ever rented right at the end of primary school. Somewhat bittersweet but mostly bitter. I moved to PC soon after and got stuck into Quake, Command and Conquer and Warcraft 2
Someone was paying Mean Machine with Bat Bucks!
12:32 Nope.
When you fuck up at presentation that badly in the first section of your game, its a bad game. It's not a well tested game, or a well balanced game. That first section being that confusing to almost everyone who played it to the point of utter frustration, no. Play Batman Returns or Batman The Animated Series. They're way, WAY, better on SNES/Genesis.
I remember Nintendo Power giving the SNES port positive reviews. But they would also defend the fact that there was loading in this version..The SNES port is the version that I played first, and I did not like the game at all. It seemed like an interesting idea, with the digitized graphics and MK style fighting engine. But the game felt rigid and clunky. It seems like an ambitious game. But I still do not care for it at all.
I didn't think sunsoft had any part of batman returns on genesis.
This is one of those bad games I completed many times as a kid. I got it for Christmas in 96 just like you Kim.
Wise Angry Rant from Avgn
"BATMAN FOREVER IT SUCKED BACK THEN & IT SUCKS FOREVER!
In other words the game is absolute crap.
What the heck causes rhotacism?
Does it have something to do with the shape of the tongue or how the muscle bends? Is it about the shape of the roof of the mouth.
All I want to do is open my mouth as wide as possible and point at the shape my tongue is making.
Is rhotacism caused by an actual physical impairment? The incapability of being able to flex the middle of the tongue upward? When I search online, there doesn't seem to be a clear answer.
Ah..but have you tried maybe just not worrying about it though?
@bricktop. I'm curious about it. Worry has nothing to do with it.
I've done a little more research since, and apparently, there are two ways to make the R sound. With the tongue (the right way), and with the front teeth and lower lip (the wrong way).
During speech development, some kids form the habit of doing it the wrong way. Some fraction of those kids are never able to correct the mistake for reasons not fully understood.
I can sympathize. As a child, I never learned how to wipe my butt while seated. To this day, I sort of half-stand/half-squat when I wipe.
Kim asking the right questions.
I really enjoyed this video and you have my subscription. I admit, I was scared at first. I thought this was going to be another eye rolling video from another younger streamer thinking he found something worthwhile in a video game that came out during my time. I can't stand those videos or viewpoints. Time doesn't make shit smell good. It's shit and always will be shit. Case in point, this game sucks and I would cringe at anyone that said otherwise.
Hey have you tried the arcade Batman Forever game? It’s completely different but equally as bizarre. It is at least better ii guess
Geez I remember getting this game randomly when I was younger I would just go to the store and see what I could get for the money I had lol...so I had no backstory of this game but the digitized screens on back of the box tricked me haha but I got some reason i still have positive memories of this game it was a good time in my life lol..good to see this game get a few props while still acknowledging it's a objectively bad game 😁
I still have those batman forever cups!
The snes was already hard to believe and then i found the genesis version. Somehow it works better while still being bad, i dont know how to explain it, but its easier on the eyes and controls. The arcade and 32 bits is another level of bad.
For me, I only really enjoyed digitised sprites in the mortal Kombat series and even then after the first two it got a bit old. Never played this tho. Probably never will!
I REALLY think that Acclaim should have had Taito develop the Batman Forever game instead of Probe and Taito would make it a fighting game using the same engine that was used in Kaiser Knuckle?