The new game follows the tropes established in the earlier LEGO: Star Wars and Indiana Jones games, pitting the superheroes Batman and Robin against a host of LEGO enemies, including Riddler, Penguin and Joker. Each archvillain has henchmen such as Mr. Freeze, Poison Ivy and Two-Face, who help carry out their master plans and star as the mini-bosses of each game level.

Batman's propensity for creating "all those wonderful toys" is reflected in eight different "Bat" suits that allow the dynamic duo to navigate and manipulate the battlefield. They include Batman's "glider" suit, which lets him fly around the board, and an "explosives" suit that lets him detonate obstacles, as well as Robin's "magnetic" suit, which lets him climb metal walls, and his "technology" suit, which enables him to control mini-vehicles scattered throughout the game. When not bypassing or re-engineering the environment, Batman and Robin can destroy it, unleashing showers of collectible coins that can be used to buy upgrades (such as game cheats) and extras (including unlockable characters such as Nightwing and Batgirl).

As with the earlier games, LEGO: Batman offers two play modes: Players battle through the Story mode first, unlocking a Free Play mode. Free Play is essentially the same as Story mode, but it allows players to use any of the characters and suits they've unlocked in the regular game.

Where LEGO: Batman differs from its predecessors is its Villain story mode; after beating each of the three Hero chapters, players can go back and play the same story from the villains' perspective. The levels are different from the heroic ones (though they do intersect with the originals in certain places), and completing them unlocks the villains as playable characters in Free Play mode.

The game includes jump-in-style cooperative play; anyone can join the game simply by grabbing a controller and pressing Start. What they can't do, however, is play cooperatively online.

Another day in the brickyard

LEGO: Star Wars was a surprise hit when it came out. While LEGOs and Star Wars have always been popular, combining them in a video game could have been a frustrating, unplayable disaster. Instead, it was a blast for both adults and children, providing gamer moms and dads with a cooperative game that they could play with their children—and providing everyone else with a video-game experience that evoked countless hours playing LEGOs as kids.

LEGO: Batman offers more of the same. That's a good thing ... but it's also a bad thing. All of the familiar standbys from previous games are here, from the Batcave, where players launch their missions (the equivalent of the cantina in LEGO: Star Wars), to the mini-fig construction kits to the unlockable hidden levels. Those who haven't played a LEGO video game before won't mind this, but those who have will find the gameplay getting all too familiar at times, even with the divergent hero-vs.-villain storylines and Bat toys.

Visually, the game has the same sharp plastic production values of its predecessors, though the fact that it's Batman means that many of the levels are darker as the game's designers seek to re-create the shadowed streets and alleyways of Gotham City. This can make it difficult to keep track of the black-suited Batman on screen, but in these cases it's easy enough to switch out to Robin (at least in single-player mode).

The game's music draws upon Danny Elfman's soundtracks from Batman and Batman Returns rather than the newer films by Chris Nolan. It's a nice throwback to the movies, especially since, unlike Star Wars or Indiana Jones, the video game doesn't try and re-create any of the cinematic storylines. Not tying the game to the movies gives the designers more freedom to come up with innovative levels, but it also strains the nonverbal acting chops of its plastic protagonists and antagonists. In Star Wars, the game could riff on classic onscreen moments from the movies; in Batman they're on their own. This leads to an over-reliance on slapstick comedy and giggling/maniacal laughter from its characters—and to scenes that are more amusing than outright funny.

LEGO: Batman's environments represent a good cross-section of Batman's traditional Gotham stomping grounds, but the artificial intelligence of the LEGO sidekicks frequently has trouble navigating the challenges. There are quite a few times when the game requires Batman to activate some device so that Robin can then access some out-of-reach area, but more often than not the Boy Wonder wanders back to Batman instead of doing what he's supposed to do.

As always, cooperative play is a blast, but it's disappointing that online co-op is unavailable in this title even though Traveller's Tales managed to get it working in Star Wars: The Complete Saga. Online multiplayer, either in co-op or battle modes, would have helped break LEGO: Batman out of its all-too-familiar groove.

Fans of Batman and the LEGO games in general should enjoy the game, but those who've grown tired of smashing bricks won't find anything to reignite their excitement for the games.