Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker was a direct-to-DVD movie based on the Batman Beyond (or Batman of the Future) cartoon, which stars a new Batman taking over from an older Bruce Wayne. The videogame adaptation takes a couple of stills from the film and a few bits of text (so, no Kevin Conroy or Mark Hamill) in order to make a classic style beat-’em-up.

At the start of the game, you’ll get a bit of enjoyment: the movement and animations are laughably bad, with Batman’s attack looking pathetic, and everything moving in unnatural ways. Oddly, the third level changes Batman’s walk to something even more ridiculous.

But the gameplay itself is just really boring. You’ve got a small number of attacks (and zero jump attacks, it’s not like Batman is known for attacking from above) and little enemy variety. The game can only cope with having two enemies on screen, so you get a list of portraits showing enemies waiting off-screen, ready to join when one of the two on-screen enemies has been dispatched. Even worse, when you’re attacking an enemy, the second one just stands back, so you never have to deal with more than one enemy at a time. It also won’t be long until you find a technique to easily beat everything.

On top of all the issues, the entire game is roughly 30 minutes long, I made a cup of tea before playing and it was still warm when I finished the game. You can complete it twice in the time it takes to watch the film. However, there’s zero incentive to do so: there’s no new suits to unlock, no collectables to find. A short length isn’t unheard of for fighting games, but they need to be fun, and they tend to have a high score to encourage replaying, but Batman Beyond has absolutely nothing. It’s extremely bare bones, and the only good point is how appalling the animation is.

Worst

After discovering the technique of using the Defensive suit’s special attack in conjunction with Blocking, the fight against the final Joker was over in a good 15 seconds. Positively dreadful, and proof of what a deeply pitiful game this is. Don’t waste your money.

Alan Maddrell, N64 Magazine #49. Review Score: 16%

Remake or remaster?

No.

Official ways to get the game.

There is no official way to play Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker.