Batman: Arkham Knight

It’s a shame Origins is the only one that hasn’t been ported onto the modern consoles, being flat out ignored in the Arkham bundles.

Origins got overshadowed by the polish of City, while also being largely based on the City engine framework. But I felt the detective scrubbing mode was some of the coolest immersion experiences in the IP. I was disappointed in how it was mostly ignored for the blander deep tissue scanning in Knight.

Especially in retrospect, the storyline for the main games were very linear and contrived in the way it integrates as many villains as it could. I liked Origins for having a more open world approach to the story allowing for a more natural integration of the various enemies. Batman is trying to track down Black Mask and the assassin's attack him on the side, rather than having to ping pong between all the villains because of plot coupons taking you that way. Being hijacked by Joker is a disappointment in terms of being the third game where he's at the top, but taken by itself it's some of the best characterization and storytelling for not only Joker but Bane and Deathstroke. Funny enough, having a little less polish in the gameplay made the boss battles more fun, where Bane is a clumsy brawl rather than a simple Press X to Not Die encounter.

Now I just remembered, Origins also had a Suicide Squad Sequel Hook. Maybe intentional, but that's a long time ago.

Didn't they follow that up in a side game or something. Or something about trying to force those animated Suicide Squad movies into the Arkhamverse up until the point where they decided they didn't want to do that any more.

I don’t think Assault on Arkham is supposed to be a direct sequel to Origins.

I mean was it?

Edited by slimcoder on Aug 7th 2020 at 11:45:26 AM

The Wikipedia page says otherwise.

Joker even mentions working with Deadshot once.

Referring to the events of Origins.

Anybody good at morse code?

CONTEXT: WB Games Montreal are teasing us with a morse code(?) message and a cryptic website. Going to the website (or playing the video on the tweet) gives us a quick flash of some kind of coat of arms featuring an owl... We should be learning more on August 21st, the day before DC's FanDome event.

Edited by TargetmasterJoe on Aug 17th 2020 at 1:18:51 PM

Well, we already knew the bad guys were going to be the Court of Owls.

Beware the Court of Owls, that watches all the time, Ruling Gotham from a shadowed perch, behind granite and lime. They watch you at your hearth, they watch you in your bed. Speak not a whispered word about them, or they'll send the Talon for your head.

Reminder that I gotta read my 2 Court trades.

Rocksteady accused of inaction after a majority of its small number of female employees sent a letter to management about sexual harassment back in 2018 and nothing was done.

Goddamn it.

Another one?

"The signatory cited recent changes at the French games firm Ubisoft as another reason for sharing the letter. Last month several executives, including the chief creative officer and second-in-command, Serge Hascoët, resigned amid allegations of misconduct and inappropriate behaviour at the company.

“I think a good outcome [of publicising the letter] is basically showing the games industry in general [that] no matter how big your company is, how much you promote it as supportive of diversity, if you keep putting your head in the sand you will eventually be outed,” the woman said."

Meanwhile, at Rocksteady: Oh no! Now everyone's going to gang up on us because we don't play nicely with girls! Quick, emphasize on how awesome the girls are in our Suicide Squad game!

Almost made a joke related to the Gotham Knights game that's allegedly also coming soon, but Rocksteady isn't doing that one. (But hey, Cassandra Cain and Spoiler, please WB Games Montreal?)

Jokes aside, this is a total dick move on Rocksteady's part. If (God forbid) this is going to be a normal recurring thing for video game devs, they better wake up and smell the coffee or else the coffee is going to get poured down their groins.

Kim Mac Askill the former script writer of the Suicide Squad Game has made a 13 minute video detailing the sexist behavior at Rocksteady.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sG6QVmYGddQ&t=16s

You joke, but they probably would have ended up doing that anyway given how much criticism the female characters in the Arkham games got. Whatever else one can say about Western video game companies, they are now at least trying to make female something other than glorified pin-ups.

Wait, "former"? What are you talking abou—

(*Pokes around Kim's Twitter to find a tweet from her asking Rocksteady not to credit her.*)

GOD. F*CKING. DAMN. IT.

Admittedly, the back of my mind questions this move, but I guess it's so she doesn't accidentally set an example of knuckling down and submitting to the video game industry's dudebro side.

At this point, I got half a mind to force some change over there. Because when the writer of your new upcoming game actively asks to be uncredited, you KNOW you're f*cking up.

Quite. I can't remember the last time I've seen a game writer un-credit themselves. That's usually not a good sign.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Aug 19th 2020 at 9:16:38 AM

Ah game industry, so toxic.

Oh well, at least it’s out on the table now so that’s a good thing at least.

Edited by slimcoder on Aug 19th 2020 at 9:21:35 AM

Robert Pattinson's Batsuit from The Batman (2021) has been officially added as DLC for this game (through the Epic Game Store, for now).

Edited by XMenMutant22 on Oct 26th 2023 at 5:26:01 AM

The Arkham Trilogy collection for the Switch is currently out, which comes with an early unlock of the aforementioned Pattinson suit before other consoles.

Generally, it seems that Arkham Asylum and City are more than serviceable, being ports of their original PS 3 and XBox versions, rather than the recent Return to Arkham versions.

Arkham Knight, on the other hand, definitely needs stability patches. It's impressive that it runs on the system at all, but there are some concessions made (no photo mode; missing textures).

Edited by XMenMutant22 on Dec 3rd 2023 at 5:37:47 AM

Speaking of Batsuits, this entry in the Arkham Knight YMMV has me puzzled:

The Batman: Gotham Knight skin has [...] prompted some mockery, with the stylized anime design not translating well to the game's realistic look (including body armor that looks suspiciously like hockey pads).

I can't seem to find any info online about a Batman: Gotham Knight skin for Arkham Knight. Is this a typo?

They're referring to the suit featured in Batman: Gotham Knight's "Field Test" short (the suit's description even makes a pun out of the title). The nature of the film, being an anthology, meant that Batman had different looks in the films.

The source material:

In game:

I had a bizarre Arkham Knight-esque dream.

In it, Batman was tracking Joker and Harley Quinn to a statue of liberty esque hideout. Once inside, he was locked in, and Joker and Harley had hostages and boobytraps everywhere.

• If Batman hung from a gargoyle, he smiles at the camera and cracks a joke.
• Murals of the Joker stare at the player and move around.
• Harley clones start appearing all over, and at a certain checkpoint/hostages Batman has saved she becomes an unkillable, 1-hit hammer swinging red enemy.
• Going on a gargoyle, Joker spots me immediately and counts, but giggles instead of blowing up the gargoyle.

Can't remember all of it, but there was a constant eerie feeling. Like all the gameplay mechanics were getting countered by Joker and Harley just knowing they exist.

Edited by FOFD on Mar 3rd 2024 at 8:57:29 AM

The Line Launcher is so underutilized in this game. It feels like you only need it a grand total of 5 times, and 2-3 of those are for the main story/side missions.