And so the new Batman Arkham game will be...

[JasonPratt]

...Batman Arkham VR.

The Return to Arkham title -- delayed for a while for quality assurance before launch -- won't be anything new, only porting the first two Arkham games to PC-quality modern consoles. But industry observers speculated that this meant a new Arkham game was on the way, and looked for an announcement at about the time of release.

I didn't agree with that assessment, since the appeal of upconverting for console owners seemed obvious enough in itself (I own upconversions of several PS2 games to PS3 and I'd buy some others if they were released). Besides, Telltale games will be releasing a new adventure game based on Batman later this year, although not in the Arkham continuity, so that might have been the marketing synergy planned.

But I am allowed a few mistakes a month, and I'm glad to know I burned one here instead of on something more important!  :D Because, just as predicted (by others), around the time RetArk would have been originally released, here comes news from WB about a new Arkham game.

Not that it's good news for anyone who won't be ponying up for the new PS4 VR system, since the game will be exclusive to that platform (I doubt permanently); and being a VR game, the devs have claimed it'll only be about an hour's gameplay. I'll probably just wait and watch a film compilation on Youtube.

It also isn't good news for fans of the franchise who might buy the game, because the open secret of the mystery at the heart of the game, being investigated by Batman, is the murder of... well, I won't spoil it (although it'll be quickly spoiled by anyone who goes looking), but it's a major franchise character who appears in Arkham Knight (including in a canonical postgame story mission).

This can only mean one of three things:

1.) The game takes place well after Knight, and so will be anti-climactically answering what happened to Batman, who by all accounts is operating normally in the new game. Plus another much more solidly dealt-with character is still around causing trouble in some fashion. This can't be very satisfactory.

2.) The game takes place any time before Knight (possibly as far back as before Asylum in the game's timeline), and so the shocking murder mystery is instantly defused because we know for a fact the character can't be dead after all.

3.) The game, despite being given the "Arkham" label, happens totally out of continuity. There's some precedent for this, as the animated movie "Assault on Arkham" plays awwwfully loose with continuity to the games; but this would be continuity-breaking at a much worse level. At that point, why bother giving it a continuity connection at all?! That would be a marketing strategy that doesn't bode well for respecting the game.

I suppose there's also 4.) the early players of a few minutes at E3 universally mistook what the plot was going to be about, due to clever misleading design by the devs to protect the secret. But there seems to be dev confirmation that this is indeed the mystery; and janking the fans around this way would be cheap.


Anyway. Mechwarrior Online has almost finished a massive update, and one of these days I plan to play it, REALLY I AM NOT KIDDING!  ::) :P So I've whiled away the time sufficiently on something that won't reduce bandwidth or processor ergs.

But as often happens, this makes me want to play the Arkham series again.... I know, I know, I have dozens of other reportedly great games to work on. They're just so good. sigh.

[Nefaro]

Anyway. Mechwarrior Online has almost finished a massive update, and one of these days I plan to play it, REALLY I AM NOT KIDDING!

OT reply here, but I'm now wondering if there's any big new features in the MWO update.

[JasonPratt]

What I saw in the update note was... not much, only a new medium mech and a medium mech tournament. Granted, I think it was an omnimech and I remember those things are like gold. But still, I don't understand why such a whomping huge update (nearly 4 Gigs).

How it is I haven't played this game yet, I have no clear idea. I'm sure part of the explanation is "Batman" simply because that's the explanation for why I haven't played several other games yet.  :P

[JasonPratt]

Meanwhile, news drops today of yet another Arkham game, Arkham Underworld, for mobiles (iOS and Android) which I doubt has much of anything to do with the continuity but which does feature an interesting premise: instead of playing Batman, you'll choose one of the villains and fight over Gotham for control against other rogue gallery leaders, ultimately also against the Batman. It's a top-down slightly isometric real-times strategy game, sort of.

[JasonPratt]

NECROTHREAD ABOUT DEAD BATMAN CHARACTER ARISSSEEE!!

So, VR ARKHAM released for the PS4 VR a few days ago, and since I would sooner throw up than buy and use a VR (even on a PS4, but especially on one with no backward compatibility to speak of), I've been watching a video playthrough.

As expected, it's a pretty static game -- one that sometimes doesn't make much sense even in little details (like Bruce evidently losing the / a key to the Batcave, the entrance to which is now sitting out in the middle of a foyer in front of any visitors to the Manor  ). In fact, it's nothing more or other than a slideshow pixel-hunting adventure, albeit one with a 3D environment at every "slide" like how Myst was eventually upconverted.

Voice talent from the Arkham game series returns, notably Kevin Conroy (!yay!) as The Best Batman Ever, and the guy who has been doing legitimately the best job as Penguin ever, too. (Um, light spoilers there. Although the Penguin actor doesn't seem to be fully up on his game; this isn't his best performance.) And secret spoiler voice acting (somewhat unexpectedly) from another Best Batman Character Actor Ever, toward the end. (I mean I didn't really expect the actor to do the voice; I kind of expected the character.)

Addressing some points in as non-spoilery a way as possible, allow me to requote from my summary information above:

[The game] also isn't good news for fans of the franchise who might buy the game, because the open secret of the mystery at the heart of the game, being investigated by Batman, is the murder of... well, I won't spoil it (although it'll be quickly spoiled by anyone who goes looking), but it's a major franchise character who appears in Arkham Knight (including in a canonical postgame story mission).

This can only mean one of three things:

1.) The game takes place well after Knight, and so will be anti-climactically answering what happened to Batman, who by all accounts is operating normally in the new game. Plus another much more solidly dealt-with character is still around causing trouble in some fashion. This can't be very satisfactory.

2.) The game takes place any time before Knight (possibly as far back as before Asylum in the game's timeline), and so the shocking murder mystery is instantly defused because we know for a fact the character can't be dead after all.

3.) The game, despite being given the "Arkham" label, happens totally out of continuity. There's some precedent for this, as the animated movie "Assault on Arkham" plays awwwfully loose with continuity to the games; but this would be continuity-breaking at a much worse level. At that point, why bother giving it a continuity connection at all?! That would be a marketing strategy that doesn't bode well for respecting the game.

I suppose there's also 4.) the early players of a few minutes at E3 universally mistook what the plot was going to be about, due to clever misleading design by the devs to protect the secret. But there seems to be dev confirmation that this is indeed the mystery; and janking the fans around this way would be cheap.

Well, the game uses Arkham Knight art assets, and takes place shortly before the events of that game. This isn't obvious at first, but about 5 minutes into the game (which is padded as hell for that glorious VR experience of not really putting on the Batsuit and testing out minor things you shouldn't need testing out and slloowwwwlllly descending into the Batcave :P ) the game suddenly throws up footage from Knight and also points so heavily toward the identity of the mystery villain (for anyone who has played Knight or who even knows some important Bat-canon back into the 90s) that I could only hope the story was trying to pull a bait-and-switch game on the audience. One so huge that it would feel janky to be playing our expectations so hard on information Batman as a character couldn't have.

45 minutes of vomitcam later -- most of it inspired by the detective portions of Knight where you scan three levels into dead bodies and reconstruct crime scenes in an even more unrealistic fashion than anything clever shown in the series so far...   ::) while Batman fumbles and shakes and jerks like he has advanced palsy or a degenerative disease, and requires the Batwing to snipe thugs... (rubber bullets, honest)...

Oh, nice quick shock-cameo from another classic villain (if not one well-served by Arkham games so far, including this one).

...anyway. The mostly-non-spoiler answer is that the game is an alternate-continuity prequel to Knight where something from the main game's plot happens a few days or weeks sooner, ending the plot in effect before it begins. I did think it was at least a little clever, even though if you're buying the game to be able to be Batman in VR... well, I'd be freakishly disappointed in that case, but obviously I wasn't expecting much from the game anyway. ;)


Edited to add: other reviewers have noted that the game may be actually in canon, as a dream sequence instead of alt-continuity prequel.

[Batman]

NECROTHREAD ABOUT DEAD BATMAN CHARACTER ARISSSEEE!!
tl;dr

batman is sad now

but i'm always sad

so carry on mister jason pratt

i am watching

I AM THE KNIGHT

(swoosh)

[Gusington]

^better

[Steelgrave]

Who was that masked man?  :dreamer: :dreamer: :dreamer:

[Batman]

i'm one fabulous man, wearing my leotards under my underwear like this

[JasonPratt]

{squinting} ...why does part of your new eye-gouging plaid suit (though props for the tactical advantage there) resolve into one of those 3D perception puzzles spelling out the name "Martha"?

[JasonPratt]

Also, you haven't even seen a tl;dr rant yet.

Not until you find the 30+ reasons why The Dark Knight Rises had to be annoying.

>:D

(Or my review of the recent TellTale game.)

[Batman]

please, tell me everything that's wrong with the telltale game

[Gusington]

 

[JasonPratt]

Even I'm too lazy to go searching for that tank to shoot.  >:D (But a search for "Telltale" here in the "Computer Wargaming" category should uncover the thread eventually.)

[Batman]

are you sure

i was really wanting to read your thoughts on it