PS3 Review: Batman: Arkham Origins – Cold, Cold Heart

Ice to see you Batman!

The Mr Freeze story is one that’s tragic, but shows that anyone can be driven to madness trying to protect the people they care about. Cold, Cold Heart takes place after the events of Origins and is set on New Years’ Eve where Bruce Wayne is giving a humanitarian award to the head of GothCorp when Freeze bursts in and kidnaps him from the ceremony. Obviously, Freeze has a bone to pick with the guy that we later find out about, but really the story doesn’t add anything that we haven’t seen before, in fact it’s a little too close to what was already done in Arkham City that I wonder about the need for this addition.
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The DLC won’t take you too long to get through; the only tough bit I came across was the last fight against Freeze which is essentially a déjà vu of the one in Arkham City. You will come across the odd tough section where enemies have freeze rays, but I got my combo up to 5x and dispatched them quickly. There are a number of hidden Anarky tags scattered across the city and frozen civilians to rescue once you get your Thermal gauntlets later on in the story.

Most of the trophies can be earned in one playthrough, but some you may have to replay it for like if you took any damage as Bruce in the beginning, be prepared to play through that section again, what’s worse is that these trophies are secret ones so unless you found out online, you wouldn’t know what you’d need to do.
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Visually, the game still looks nice but it doesn’t have the same level of polish as the Rocksteady games. It’s also a shame that WB have decided not to release any more patches for Origins as the game is still glitchy, luckily I didn’t come across any in Cold, Cold Heart other than one enemy getting stuck in a pillar.

The Verdict

Cold, Cold Heart doesn’t add anything new to the Mr Freeze saga and it’s only a few hours long, but it is a nice addition to those craving more Batman before Arkham Knight descends on us. I’d recommend it, but don’t expect anything groundbreaking.

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