The Adventures of Batman & Robin (Mega Drive)

For other games with the same name, see The Adventures of Batman & Robin.

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The Adventures of Batman & Robin
System(s): Sega Mega Drive
Publisher: Sega (US,EU,AU) Tec Toy (BR)
Developer: Clockwork Tortoise
Distributor: Majesco Sales (US re-release)
Licensor: DC Comics
Sound driver: Zyrinx/Jesper Kyd sound driver
Genre: Action
Number of players: 1-2
Release Date RRP Code US 1995-06 $59.9959.99 1535 US (re-release) 199x EU 1995-06 1535-50 DE 1995 DM 139.00139.00 1535-50 UK 1995-06 £44.9944.99 1535-50 AU 1995 FBAT15SMC BR 1995 046390 AS 199x

The Adventures of Batman & Robin is a Sega Mega Drive action game developed by Clockwork Tortoise and published by Sega. Based on the 1992 American television series Batman: The Animated Series (after its 1994 rename to The Adventures of Batman & Robin), it was first released in the United States and Europe in June 1995, and was brought to Australia and Brazil later that year. It is unrelated to the identically-named Sega Game Gear and Sega Mega-CD games.

Released relatively late in the lifecycle of the Sega Mega Drive, the game is most notable for its extensive use of advanced graphical effects, and its dark, industrial soundtrack composed by Jesper Kyd.

Story

Batman and Robin must stop Mr. Freeze, who plans to freeze Gotham City. In order to keep the duo busy, he also frees the Joker, Two-Face and the Mad Hatter, each one with their own agenda. The Joker celebrates his birthday wreaking havoc in Gotham and stealing diamonds, Two-Face tries to take over the city from above, and Mad Hatter is creating a robot army in his surreal lair.

Gameplay

Batman's rogues gallery

The game is a run-and-gun platformer. Players can choose to play as Batman or Robin; in two-player games, one player is Batman and the other is Robin. Both characters play identically. They progress through linear stages where they must defeat throngs of enemies before fighting a boss at the end. Characters are moved with or and crouch with . The characters can jump with . While in mid-air, they can perform a flying jump kick by pressing again or perform a downward kick by pressing +. The flying jump kick covers more distance than a regular jump and can be used to jump farther. They can grab on to certain ledges or platforms by pressing + and then swing across them with or . They can jump on to the platform while hanging from it by pressing again, and they can jump off the platform while on top of it by pressing +.

The characters can attack with or , which can be held for continuous fire. Attacking close to an opponent results in punches or kicks, while attacking from afar results in a projectile attack. The characters are rooted in place while firing and cannot shoot and walk at same time. Instead, the player can aim in any of the eight directions while firing using the D-pad (similar to the fixed shot stance of Gunstar Heroes). Characters can shoot while jumping or hanging from a platform. They can also fire while crouching but must crouch first; the character stays standing or crouching as long as the fire button is held. When not firing a projectile, a charge bar charges up for a super shot that does more damage and penetrates multiple targets. The player can choose between three projectile weapons by collecting Weapon Disks of the corresponding color. The weapon level is upgraded, up to six times, each time a Weapon Disk of the same color is collected. Weapon levels are shared between the weapons.

In the jetpack segments, the D-pad moves the character around in any direction and aims. , , and all fire. The direction of fire is maintained as long as the fire button is held.

Each character has a health meter consisting of sixteen points, which loses points whenever the character takes damage from enemy attacks. If the character runs out of health points, the player loses a life on the next hit. The player's weapon is reset to baseline strength after losing a life. If the player runs out of lives, the game can only be continued if there are credits remaining. The game starts with six credits by default, though this number can be decreased in the options. The game supports two-player cooperative play. The second player can join the game at any time by pressing  START , except during a boss fight. Players have separate lives but share credits, and joining the game uses a credit.

Weapons

	Batarangs
	A moderate strength, fast-firing weapon. Upgrades to a two-way and three-way spreadshot of small Batarangs; then to a single, larger, and more powerful Batarang; then to a two-way spreadshot of one large and two small Batarangs; then to two-way and three-way spreadshots of large Batarangs.
	Shurikens
	The weakest weapon but the fastest firing. Upgrades to two and then three streams of shurikens in a conical spread. The shurikens increase in power, but unlike the Batarang, never increase in size.
	Bolas
	The strongest weapon but also the slowest firing. Though the projectile is wide, the attack covers less area overall than the other weapons because of the lack of spread.

Items

	Weapons Disk
	Equips Batman or Robin with Batarangs (red), shurikens (blue), or bolas (green). Most disks cycle colors, so the player can wait until it changes to the desired weapon before collecting. If the player collects a disk of the same color as the equipped weapon, the weapon level is upgraded, up to six times. Collecting a disk of a different color changes the weapon but keeps the weapon level the same; weapon levels are shared between the weapons.
	Small Heart
	Heals Batman or Robin for one point of health. Multiple small hearts are released from destructibles or certain enemies when destroyed and float to the top of the screen unless caught.
	Big Heart
	Heals Batman or Robin for eight points of health (equivalent to half of the health meter).
	Destruction
	Destroys all enemies on the screen.
	Super Charger
	Fully charges the weapon charge bar for a duration, making every shot a charged shot.
	Life-Up
	Gives the player an extra life.

Stages

Happy Birthday to Me!

	Stage 1
	Stage 2
	Stage 3
	Stage 4

A Two-Sided Story

	Stage 1
	Stage 2
	Stage 3

Tea Time!

	Stage 1
	Stage 2
	Stage 3
	Stage 4
	Stage 5

Snow in July?

	Stage 1
	Stage 2
	Stage 3
	Stage 4

History

Development

Being a relatively late Mega Drive game, the game uses a number of programming tricks to achieve graphical effects not thought possible on the console at the time, including simulated transparency (through the highlight/shadow mode), pseudo-3D flight stages, and the tilting and rotating of sprites in software (unlike the hardware scaling and rotation capabilities added by the Sega Mega-CD). Most known for its extensive used of advanced Sega Mega Drive graphical effects, The Adventures of Batman & Robin is often cited as one of the system's most technically proficient games. Some of the graphical effects:

• Advanced vertical and horizontal line scrolling which simulates the sides of objects appearing and disappearing from view.
• Shadow/highlight mode usage which allows for more realistic lighting and color effects.
• Three-dimensional sprite effects which simulates movement of certain objects and enemies from a realistic perspective.
• Full-screen rotation of both the background and the separate upper and lower foregrounds.
• Vector animation which allows for certain elements to be displayed through a vector cropped into the display, notably with a later use involving a textured vector.
• Additional layers of horizontal scrolling created with cleverly-produced backgrounds and artwork.

Production credits

• Producer: Bert Schroeder
• Product Manager: Jaime Wojick
• Developer: Tortoise Clockwork, Inc.
• Game Designers: John O'Brien, James Maxwell, Stephen Thomson
• Programmer: John O'Brien
• Lead Artist: Stephen Thomson
• Artwork by: Steven Thomson, Chris George
• Additional Artwork by: Robert Hemphill, Noel Hines
• Clockwork Producer: James Maxwell
• Level Layout & Triggering by: James Maxwell, Allen Fernandez
• Batman & Robin Line Art: Tokyo Movie Shinsha
• Music & SFX Creator: Scavenger
• Music & SFX Composer: Jesper Kyd
• Sound Programmer: Jens Albertsen
• Lead Tester: Chrisi Albertson
• Assistant Leads: Mark Subotnick, Don Carmichael, Noah Mackenzie
• Testers: Rachael Bristol, David Dodge, Chris Lucich, Phil Co, Dana Green, Aaron Loichinger, Randy Norfleet, Lloyd Kinoshita, Aaron Bandur, Steve Bourdet, Maria Tuzzo, Sam Saliba, Joel Breton
• Special Thanks to: Holly Stein, Catherine Sollecito, France Tantiado, Clint Dyer, Nemer Velasquez, Sara Holihan, Trish Dunne, Christine Bertoglio, Wayne Leonard, Scott Compton
• Manual by: Carol Ann & Neil Hanshaw

Source:

US manual

• Andy Armer

Source:

Rotation Corporation

Magazine articles

Main article: The Adventures of Batman & Robin (Mega Drive)/Magazine articles.

Promotional material

File:The Adventures of Batman & Robin MD US TVAdvert.mp4

US TV Advert

File:The Adventures of Batman & Robin MD US TVAdvert.mp4

Print advert in Game Players (US) #0807: "Vol. 8 No. 7 July 1995" (1995-0x-xx)

Print advert in Velikiy Drakon (RU) #60: "xxxx xxxx" (2002-09-05)
also published in:

• Velikiy Drakon (RU) #61: "xxxx xxxx" (2003-02-07)

Artwork

• 

  Mega Drive US prototype box art

Physical scans

Sega Retro Average
Publication Score Source

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Based on 0 review

Sega Retro Average

Publication Version Score 1700 igr dlya Sega (RU) 70 CD Consoles (FR) 68 Consoles + (FR) 78 Cool Gamer (RU) 70 Computer & Video Games (UK) 78 Electronic Gaming Monthly (US) NTSC-U 69 Entsiklopediya luchshikh igr Sega. Vypusk 1 (RU) 70 Fusion (US) 58 GameFan (US) NTSC-U 79 Game Players (US) NTSC-U 43 Game Players (US) NTSC-U 66 GamePro (US) NTSC-U 65 GamesMaster (UK) PAL 63 Games World: The Magazine (UK) PAL 80 Game Informer (US) NTSC-U 75 Joypad (FR) 85 LeveL (CZ) 50 MAN!AC (DE) PAL 68 Mega Force (FR) PAL 81 Mega Fun (DE) PAL 65 Mean Machines Sega (UK) PAL 87 Next Generation (US) NTSC-U 0 Player One (FR) 87 Play Time (DE) 67 Power Up! (UK) 85 Sega Magazine (UK) PAL 82 Sega Power (UK) PAL 79 Sega Pro (UK) PAL 75 SuperGamePower (BR) 70 Sega Mega Drive Review (RU) 66 Sonic the Comic (UK) PAL 82 Todo Sega (ES) 86 Top Consoles (FR) 85 Tricks (RU) 70 Tricks 16 bit (RU) 78 Última Generación (ES) 86 Video Games (DE) PAL 85 VideoGames (US) NTSC-U 70

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Based on 38 reviews

The Adventures of Batman & Robin (Mega Drive)

Mega Drive, US (Cardboard)
Cover
Cart Manual

Mega Drive, US (Cardboard) (Majesco Sales)
Cover
Cart Manual

Mega Drive, US (Value Pak)
Cover

Mega Drive, EU
Cover
Cart Manual Manual (back) PCB

Mega Drive, AU
Cover
Cart Manual

Mega Drive, BR
Cover
Cart Manual

Mega Drive, Asia PAL
Cover

Technical information

Main article: The Adventures of Batman & Robin (Mega Drive)/Technical information.

External links

• Sega of America webpage: Mega Drive

References

Batman games for Sega systems / published by Sega
	Batman (1990) | Batman: Revenge of The Joker (1992) | Batman Returns (1992) | The Adventures of Batman & Robin (1995) | Justice League Task Force (1995) | Batman Forever (1995)
	Batman Returns (1992) | The Adventures of Batman & Robin (1995) | Batman Forever (1995)
	Batman Returns (1993)
	Batman Returns (1993) | The Adventures of Batman & Robin (1995)
	Batman (1991) | Batman Forever (1995)
	Batman Forever (1996) | Batman & Robin (unreleased)
	Gotham Knights (2022) | Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League (2024)