It's not just the wholly original and titular villain (presumably) that Rocksteady has been offering information on for Batman: Arkham Knight. The game's developers have been talking to multiple outlets about just as many of Knight's facets.
Director Sefton Hill was the first to spill the beans to not long after the game was announced, mostly on the enormity of Gotham, allowing for Bats to finally cruise the streets in a Nolan-esque, tumbler styled Batmobile. More recently, Hill detailed the work that went into designing the tank Batman pilots over the city's slicked black asphalt to the PlayStation Blog.
Adding in the iconic car wasn't a difficult decision. Hill seems to think that it was something of an honor, but it still came at a cost. As Hill noted, "it was with great excitement, and not a small amount of trepidation, that we decided to add the fully playable Batmobile into the Arkhamverse, knowing that it would disrupt all of our existing systems and bring with it a huge amount of pressure to deliver on expectations...As it was with taking on a character that cannot kill and is powerful but vulnerable, so it is with taking on a car that is (in most right-minded people's heads) the single greatest vehicle ever."
Gone is the hotrod look the car took on in the Burton movies of the early 90's, replaced by a mech-monstrosity that would intimidate any motorhead or street thug with ease. Seeing the car transform through the Schumacher movies (even if the movies were garbage) was fine, but when Nolan rebooted things, fans were a bit divided on the new vehicle.
Rocksteady faced a similar dilemma in designing Arkham Knight's batmobile, and changing its appearance from the studio's last two games.
"While we loved the design of the Batmobile in Batman: Arkham Asylum (its Hot Wheels model has a special place in my Batman collection!), what became immediately apparent was that it wasn't especially practical for getting around Gotham. The clearance of the wheels and suspension meant that this dragster design would struggle on uneven ground, and it was important to us that the city had dynamic terrain."
So that was scrapped, and the team set about on something new. "We actually started with ideas that were driven by a purely pragmatic approach," explained Hill. "After a number of iterations, we felt that this never captured the spirit of Batman. While he is not someone who ever shows off for the sake of it, it is very important that you know when Batman is around. He doesn't build a distinctive vehicle just because he likes to drive a flash car. He drives a unique vehicle for the same reason he wears his cape and cowl - it's part of his persona of intimidation."
"This led us to the design we have now, which I think is a great balance between a practical vehicle and one that is undeniably, uniquely a Batmobile. It doesn't matter if you know nothing about the game, you know that when you see this car, it can only be Batman's car."
Like we saw in the trailer, this thing looks like it can plow through anything: bullets, explosions, flames, and more.
Noted Hill, "We made the decision early in development that to truly feel the power of the Batmobile, this car needed to be unstoppable. It changed the way we designed and built the game from that point forward. Nothing should stop the Batmobile. If you want to stick to an open road then that is your choice, but if you want to take a shortcut through a pillar, wall or statue then that's fine too!"
Driving around in the Batmobile will be not only a joy for gamers and players alike, but will also completely change navigation. Obviously Bats' gliding won't be the fastest transportation, but it's not gone from the game. Actually, the car improves on it. The team wanted an organic connection between the caped crusader and his well-known wheeler, so if Batman ever slaps the eject button while doing mach 3 through the streets, he'll be soaring more like an eagle than a bat.
"The eject into glide takes this on to the next level, by launching Batman up into the air, but taking all of your forward momentum into the glide, allowing you to travel much further and faster than ever before. If there's a feature that is responsible for more lost development than any other, this is probably it! I've lost countless hours ejecting and gliding around the city."
Ain't physics fun?
In the spirit of spreading the word, Hill spoke with other outlets beyond the PS Blog. WorldsFactory noticed Hill offered Official Xbox Magazine UK more details on Gotham, Barbara Gordon, and even some plot points in the upcoming game. The outlet noted the power of the consoles helped Gotham sparkle with twinkling lights and rain gathering in puddles, calling it a "far more built-up and densely populated area than Arkham City."
Gotham "is full of all these different, co-ordinated attacks by the various supervillains," said Hill. "They're all designed to push Batman to his limit. We wanted it to feel like there isn't one key main path and [then] all these side missions; all of these different components and attacks by the supervillains have their own really interesting story that you can follow."
Rocksteady set the bar high with Asylum and City, which put a fair amount of pressure on Warner Bros. Montreal when the studio took the reigns. Unfortunately, the resulting game just didn't measure up.
Still, Rocksteady Producer Dax Ginn felt their work was impressive, telling NowGamer, "It was certainly pretty interesting, just to see what another team of creatives would do with Batman."
"I think they did a really solid job with Arkham Origins," said Ginn. "I personally really, really enjoyed it - I think mostly because I'm really good at the combat, having played Arkham games for so long, I got a lot of joy out of it."
Batman: Arkham Knight is listed by several retailers for an October for PC, Xbox One, and PlayStation 4.
