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Expectations were rather low as Batman: Arkham City Armored Edition booted up on our US import Wii U. Images like this one that emerged just after the launch suggested a game with fundamental compromises over the existing Xbox 360 release, while frame-rate analysis of the E3 trailer strongly hinted at a sub-par performance level.The state of the game was a cause for genuine concern once we managed to get hands-on with a pre-release playable version. A post-E3 preview event revealed unfinished code plagued with bugs and texture issues - all of which didn't quite tally with press assets showing a considerably rejigged Wii U version with some image quality enhancements over the existing game.
So it's with a mixture of relief and slight disappointment that we can report that Batman: Arkham City Armored Edition is actually a pretty close match to the Xbox 360 game, from a visual standpoint at least. Those low-res shadowmaps from the now infamous screenshot? They appear to be confined to a pre-rendered video sequence, presumably dumped from the Unreal Engine editor, and are nothing more than an oversight. Existing renders from the Rocksteady work wouldn't be useable owing to the changes in character costumes.
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