Tim Burton's Batman film was the biggest box office hit in the summer of 1989. It (along with a few key graphic novels released around the same time) revitalized a broad public's fascination with the iconic Dark Knight Detective of Bob Kane. It was also a massive merchandising phenomena, with every manner of tie-in imaginable, the most important of them being a video game on everyone's favorite 8-bit Entertainment System. The developer fortunate enough to nab the coveted license was Sunsoft, which at that time was a small team comprising the software development wing of Sun Denshi Corpooration.

Sunsoft was still a relative newcomer in 1989, having only a handful of Golden Age arcade titles and Famicom/Disk System adventure games on their curriculum vitae. Seemingly an odd match for a license that clearly called out for a linear side-scrolling action game. Though they didn't have the experience, they did possess all the other necessary components: money, talent, motive, a little inventiveness, and an inspiration: Akumajou Dracula.

Batman: The Video Game only loosely adheres to its source material, so much that it can't really be called a proper adaptation. Often seen as a cause for lambast by some ("I don't remember that in the movie!"), in reality it should inspire only gratitude. Instead of lowly thugs, dumb muscle, and an inept swordsman, Batman will have to face a daunting army of robots, cyborgs, soldiers, motion-tracking bombs, biologically-enhanced warriors, and...an inept swordsman, on top of a variety of environmental hazards. And where Burton's Batman was inflexible and incapable of anything more than a basic kick, Sunsoft's is an agile martial artist of ninja-like abilty, unleashing punch flurries; whipping batarangs, missiles, and dirks; and acrobatically scaling walls, the lattermost being the games defining feature.

Not long after Batman first descends onto the streets of Gotham City should Batman: The Video Game spark a feeling of familiarity among many gaming veterans. The way Batman moves, jumps, and attacks is all very reminiscent of Konami's classic horror-themed action game Akumajou Dracula (or Castlevania, if you prefer,) though a number of improvements have been made in the name of maneuverability. Batman's punches have a quicker startup and can be thrown quickly. The forward jumps still lacks nuanced adjusting but he can turn around and attack during the jump, and vertical jumps can be adjusted slightly. It's also important to note that the jumps and wall-jumps have different gradations of height depending on how long the button is held. This mechanic in particular plays a crucial role in later stage when the platforming challenges become more intricate.

And speaking of the wall-jumps, this is without a doubt the coolest aspect of the game. Not only is it fun and innovative (I only know of one game before it with a wall-jump, the obscure arcade game Ninja-kun: Ashura no Shou by UPL) it serves as a way for Sunsoft to pack even more action and strategy into the platforming segments, in a way merely climbing a ladder or jumping a gap can't match.

The sub-weapon system is also a nice development. Pressing the Start button cycles through the items of your utility belt, which includes batarangs (short-range,) missiles (long-range, thin shot) and the oddly-named dirks (long-range, wide shot.) Just to save you a trip to the dictionary, "dirk" is a Scottish word for long daggers. When one is selected it becomes your main weapon so long as you have the sufficient amount of sub-weapon units required to use them, which are collected straight from defeated enemies. They can also be used while crouching, an upside compared to the "Up plus Attack" method. The downside is that you can't switch between using punches and projectiles on the fly, so it'll take a couple plays to know when to switch between the various attacks.

Batman: The Video Game is usually marked for its fiendishly-conceived stage layouts, sometimes with renown and other times with notoriety. I can't think of any NES game more often mentioned for instigating controller-throwing tantrums, coupled with aspersions of "cheapness" and unavoidable hits. In actuality though, you couldn't find a more organized game in the system's catalog. It's true that players who rush into a new group of enemies and obstacles without a plan and thinking reflex alone will allow them to obtain success will generally obtain only a smaller life-bar. To be successful in Batman requires a certain level of forethought; surveying the next obstruction and picking up cues as to the correct time and place to jump into the fray, what weapons to use, or if the situation would be easier to deal with just by avoidance. As a matter of fact, with the proper strategies there isn't a single flamethrower blast, grinder, acid droplet or pool, leaping mutant, gear, or even boss you can't regularly overcome without taking a single bit of damage.

Equally remarkable is the games presentation, which is rendered well enough to make Batman one of those lucky handful of NES games to effectively aestheticize the limitations of the hardware. The visuals of Gotham are appropriately gritty yet saturated, with deep shadows dousing the game's environments. At times it resembles a moving noirish figure playset or a panel from a Mike Mignola comic viewed at a distance. The sprites are small but are clearly defined, with nice animation, especially those of Batman (check out his cape flapping after a long jump.) The music is, as anyone who's played the game will tell you, some of the most memorable of its time, in a time when every major game coming out of Japan had a catchy soundtrack. Most of the tunes are anthemic theme-song style melodies (as that's what the NES does best) but there are occasional downbeat moments. A lot of them are particularly aggressive for 8-bit with pronounced percussion. This is especially true of the second stage's theme, which starts out sounding like a punk rock song and was apparently charismatic enough for someone to move it to the first stage for the American and European releases.

Adding even more flavor are the cinematic scenes which are interspersed between stages and the opening demo, sporting robust comic book-style graphics and accurate likenesses of Kim Basinger and Jack Nicholson. Not to give away too much, but the ending sequence is uniquely haunting and should have been how the film ended had the director been a little more courageous.

Enjoyment of Batman: The Video Game relies heavily on the determination of a player. For those without much, they will find it to be a frustrating and unpleasant experience that will end with either hair-pulling, controller-throwing, Genie-abusing, or power-switching; resigning themselves to be one of the many skeletons lining the game's proverbial dungeon in it's now decades-long reign. But for action game aficionados willing to endure temporary hardship on the way to the reward of mastery, they will no doubt discover that Batman: The Video Game is one of the finest experiences around. And to them, us, it comes as a bonus that it also envelops us into an 8-bit world like few of its kind can.

SHOCK VALUE: ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆