With Rocksteady's first two Batman games already a huge success, Batman: Arkham Knight promises to be even bigger and badder than before.
A combination of the first game's forensic detective capabilities and the second's caped crusader storyline, Arkham Knight is a healthy dose of both - along with a totally suped up Batmobile and next-gen Gotham City world.
Though Rocksteady and Warner Brothers have always been capable of developing a next-gen Batman thanks to the PCs' ever evolving tech landscape, the introduction of the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One allowed the developers more freedom to create for both the PC and consoles alike.
After watching an hour-long demo of Batman gameplay during GDC, we spoke with Gaz Deaves, a member of the Rocksteady team, about the process of bringing the last Arkham story in this series to a next-gen end.
That Batmobile
The inclusion of a drivable Batmobile is probably the most talked about feature of the game. Deaves explained it was even a key factor in creating a next-gen Batman game:
"It was a lot about bringing the Batmobile into an open world setting to making that feel really awesome and make it behave in a way that would make you go 'yeah that's horsepower,' that feels like a part of the Batman mythology. That kind of made the decision for us about moving to next-gen - because we wanted to build this big, open Gotham … and smash it up."
Much like the rest of the game, the Batmobile is fully integrated into the gameplay allowing for seamless travel around the map.
You'll also never have to worry about leaving it behind. Once you're done rescuing hostages from nameless henchman, simply call up your ride and it'll zoom right on over to you like the faithful companion it is. Then you can carry onwards to your destination without worrying about any fences, walls or parked cars - your Batmobile can handle it all (oh, and its bulletproof too).
The demo made this last part very clear. The sheer destruction you can wreck in Gotham is on a much higher level than the past games, something that the older gen consoles probably wouldn't have been capable of.
Deaves notes the obvious in that PCs could have handled the graphics-heavy game without breaking a sweat but the latest consoles have allowed the devs to reach a much larger audience:
"PCs are constantly evolving that aren't subject to the same generations that consoles are [in] but it's great to release on PC as well as the next-gen consoles to ensure that we can reach as many gamers as possible."
