Thanks for the kind words! Glad my posts are entertaining!
I feel you about the open world aspect of games these days. It seems that it's just a box to be ticked rather than add an actual layer. Alot of modern games should be linear, in my opinion, it'd serve their story better than an open world environment.
You said it well about the Arkham games, it's more a rhythm game more than fighting, and the fact that every move the enemies make is pointed out to you doesn't help. Also, you can just mash the punch button and you'll eventually win, while in Sleeping Dogs, some enemies are completely immune to some attacks, so it forces you to adapt. It might also be the fact that it's 99% of what you do in the Batman games, I mean sure there's the detective stuff, but they're way too easy to be any type of meaningful content. Arkham City was nice though, at least for me, though I generally hate superhero games. Maybe a large area to explore and do stuff in (other than fighting) is the answer? Or the setting? I dunno what exactly it is, but Sleeping Dogs was definitely a winner for me.