BATMAN - The Telltale Series - Episode 5: City of Light Reviews
City of Light may shine on occasion, but it too often slips into the darkness of bad writing, plot development, and characterization. A season finale that finally kills the hope of redemption for what has been a thoroughly disappointing Batman outing.
Episode 5 is an overall disappointment for the end of the season. Batman is victorious, but the villain’s motivations are tired. The detective and fight choreography scenes only ask the player to draw lines, and the entire season feels like a setup for later seasons, sacrificing a more focused story with deeper character interaction. I can only hope the next season will avoid some of the problems in season one.
A disappointing finale to an underwhelming series.
An underwhelming finale to what has been a consistently disappointing season of Batman adventures, with weak storytelling and bland visuals.
Telltale’s Batman season finale, City Of Light, didn’t leave a memorable mark that I was hoping to have like how The Walking Dead and Tales from the Borderlands did. Telltale didn’t impress me this time with their first season finale of Batman, and I hope that Season 2 will be different especially with the Joker coming in.
The entire of Batman: The Telltale Series has been an exercise in disappointment. While there are some solid design choices and fresh takes on the characters, the world this is set in feels shallow and the story fails to capture and keep the interest of those playing. The Telltale gameplay has some fun moments, particularly the odd fight scene, but it just feels too safe - by the numbers, and 'just another Telltale game' crafted to the template of all the others. Batman fans will enjoy this original Year One tale, Telltale fans, too, but there's nothing special here, even in the final part, Episode 5: City of Light.
All the plot points needed are resolved, however can feel rushed, with characters not really getting the development they deserve. At an hour and a half to play this could leave you wanting more, but will probably just leave you wondering what could have been.
The path that led to this episode wasn't the best that the Caped Crusader could follow, and, as a result, although an otherwise more-than-decent ending, Batman: The Telltale Series - Episode 5: City of Light can't do much to redeem the series' flaws, with the weak application of the choice system taking the biscuit.
Not a great ending for a game that we've been enjoying. It is a shame.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
This review will contain spoilers for all previous episodes and the current episode of Batman The Telltale Series. Here are our previous reviews for episode 1, episode 2, episode 3, and episode 4.City of Light isn’t a disappointing ending by itself, but it’s a ham-fisted conclusion to an unfulfilling take on an overplayed hero. Batman in the traditional sense just isn’t interesting anymore. He’s expected. And the unexpected is also expected, to the point that we’re looking for those things that will be different. We’re looking for the younger Cobblepots, the surprise villains, and the Wayne family twists. We’re expecting everything that any new Batman can throw at us, whether it’s the same or a twist. If there is a season two, there need to be some serious refinements to the structure and approach to make it work, and if Telltale doesn’t do something about their failing engine, it won’t matter what type of Batman story they try to tell next. Engine trouble may just end up leaving them stranded.
Batman's final Telltale outing — well, for this season, anyway — is a mostly-satisfying conclusion to a fascinating, dark and unusual take on Gotham. It doesn't quite fulfill all the narrative promise of its intriguing themes, but it does wrap things up in an effective enough way.
Batman: The Telltale Series - Episode 5: City of Light ends the first season with an attempt to create a noisy blockbuster, but the most part of it looks like an Indian movies parody, where characters do strange things, trying to hide the bad acting and plot behind bright flashes of drawn explosions. And even usually saving a story Joker resembles a drunk cosplayer who has fallen asleep alone on the floor at a closed game show, clutter by schoolchildren. Of course, the nonlinearity could pull the story out, but having tried both variants of events development, it never happened, which is particularly sad due to the weak script and characters.
Review in Russian | Read full review
City of Light is an underwhelming epilogue that fails to impress. Most of the time it's enjoyable to play, but it lacks an actual ending for the series.
Review in Italian | Read full review
"It still annoys me to no end that Telltale prefers to churn out more licensed property games than not instead of just focusing on just slightly upgrading their engine. I’m sure they can come up with something better that still works on my cell phone if they really want that. I also wish we had more meaningful puzzles and environment interactions. I wish choices meant a damn more. City of Light was a step in the right direction but there is room for much more. Overall the episode reflects the entirety of the series very well: it’s fine. It has its moments. It has some weak parts. It’s satisfactory. It deserved better."
An enjoyable experience with a disappointing final act. There's still plenty of potential left, if Season 2 ever comes along.
Judged against its peers, this version of the Dark Knight is only average; DC's best hero has seen far better stories but he's seen far worse, too.
The finale is an inconsistent episode, but its highs are memorable
Batman: The Telltale Series proves once again that Telltale are still one of the best game development companies at doing what they do best, telling tales, and keeping you on the edge of your seat throughout the 5 episodes
City of Light is a substantial improvement over the fourth episode, ending a unique and interesting series on a strong note despite some technical and pacing issues.
Batman: The Telltale Series - Episode 5: City of Light concludes one of the better series by Telltale Games, even if it is the rare instance where the earlier episodes were stronger than the last ones. The final chapter was enjoyable, but reminded me again that it generally worked best when operating as Bruce Wayne and not Batman himself.