Family Matters
Since the reveal trailer, Rocksteady Studios has made it very clear that this Batman game will have one strong theme that drives it: Family.
As his deceased father, Thomas Wayne, narrates what his wishes are for his son, Bruce Wayne prepares to face the streets as our Dark Knight. The villains have emptied Gotham City and have banded together under Scarecrow to finally end Batman. Helping Scarecrow achieve this is the Arkham Knight, a mysterious newcomer who boasts the ability to kill Batman. But Bruce isn’t alone. At his side are Catwoman, Nightwing, Robin, Oracle, and his allies in the GCPD; the family he’s built up over the years of crime fighting.
Rocksteady promises to end their Arkham franchise with a bang. So with a fond farewell to this series, I present to you 5 facts you should know about Arkham Knight.
1. Gotham City is 5x the size of Arkham City
Over the course of these last few games, our world has been growing larger. From the humble beginnings in Arkham Asylum to the now dizzying landscape of Gotham City, we as fans are about to jump into a large swimming pool of urban super hero-ing.
Rocksteady Studios’ marketing manager Guy Perkins has told IGN about that the larger map is the result of switching from linear gameplay to an open world. The addition of the grappling hook and the Batmobile to the gliding mechanics from the previous games will allow players to effectively turn Gotham City into their own personal jungle gym.
This city is your oyster
2. The game has a slew of DLC that changes based on where you pre-ordered your copy
Arkham Knight is looking like a phenomenal game. But your experiences may differ based on where you got your copy from. Here’s a useful to help you navigate through where you should get your game. Rocksteady Studios has not released an official statement yet if there will be a way to obtain all of the DLC later in the future.
Get to know this handy little guide if you plan on pre-ordering the game
Image from Polygon
3. The voice actors behind this game are amazing!
Did you know that the same person who voiced Timmy Turner from Fairlyodd Parents, Bubbles from the Powerpuff Girls, Rikku from Final Fantasy X and Raven from Teen Titans also voices Harley Quinn? Tara Strong has won numerous awards for her stellar voice work and it’s great to know she’ll reprising her role as Harley Quinn. Joining her is Troy Baker (https://twitter.com/troybakerva), best known for his role as Booker DeWitt from Bioshock Infinite and the Joker from Arkham Origins, voicing Harvey Dent (Two Face) and according to IMDB, the Arkham Knight. Also on board is the legendary Kevin Conroy who reprises his role as the voice of Batman. Conroy has been voicing Batman for 23 years!
Whenever you think about Batman, you’re usually hearing Kevin Conroy’s voice in your brain
His twitter account is: https://twitter.com/RealKevinConroy
4. This game will feature a character switch system
Rocksteady games dubs this system “Dual Play.” It will allow players to switch between their favorite heroes and, as the trailers suggest, pull off tag-team moves between the two characters. So far, the only confirmed playable characters are Batman, Robin, Nightwing and Catwoman. Harley Quinn, Red Hood and Batgirl are only playable through DLC.
Unfortunately for fans that want to share the experience of being the Dark Knight, Rockstead Studios has confirmed that this will be a single player game only; there will be no cooperative play. Despite that minor flaw, Arkham Knight is still shaping up to be one of 2015’s best blockbuster games.
You can finally save Gotham as the Dynamic Duo!
5. The Arkham Knight
The Arkham Knight is a brand new villain to the Batman mythos. He wears a suit of armor similar to Batman’s and has been shown wielding two pistols as his weapon of choice. In recent trailers, the Arkham Knight has been showing mocking Batman and wanting vengeance on him for some reason. He has also been shown to possess a strange amount of knowledge regarding Batman’s armor and tactics. Fans have speculated that this person is former-Robin Jason Todd, also known as the Red Hood. Although, a Red Hood DLC has been announced for Gamestop pre-orders, it could be that those DLC story missions will act as an origin story to how the Red Hood becomes the Arkham Knight.
In fact, that theory would also explain why the Arkham Knight’s army of mercenaries all have a consistent theme of red (some of them even wear red hoods).
In this writer’s opinion, it would make sense for Jason to return to Gotham City, unite all of Batman’s enemies in one place so he can kill them all/keep their crimes in check, and then get vengeance on Batman for failing to save him. It would also help explain why Scarecrow would want to empty Gotham City of all its citizens first since Jason still cares about protecting innocent bystanders; he just doesn’t care about the lives of criminals..
While this theory seems completely plausible, the only way to know for sure at this point is to wait patiently for the game’s release.
The red and white camo makes him look a lot like the Red Hood
So who's excited for Batman: Arkham Knight?
So many questions still remain. Where does the Red Hood factor into the story of Arkham Knight? Who is the Arkham Knight? How will the series end?
More importantly, has Rocksteady Studios given us a fitting end to this brilliant trilogy?
Comment below with your thoughts regarding these questions.
