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Some things don’t change with time. The Joker will always be a force for chaos, ripping through Gotham City no matter what other gangs and criminals are planning. But Warner Bros. Interactive has determined how it wants to attempt to bring change to its Arkham world. Just as with comics and movies, the publisher, through its new Montreal studio, plans to return to Batman’s formative years. Doing so opens up plenty of possibilities and story threads that can not only connect to existing adventures, but lay a foundation for more to come.
This Batman, voiced by Roger Craig Smith (of Ezio, Sonic, and Chris Redfield fame) is described as being more primal, more vicious -- his fighting style raw and unrefined. Just as his enemies are younger and more vibrant, so is Batman, with an armor style that closer resembles Christopher Nolan’s films than anything we’ve seen in previous games. But despite all of these mostly thematic changes, much of what Batman: Arkham Originsis built upon is very, very familiar.
That’s not a bad thing by any means, but make no mistake: this is absolutely a successor to the open-world stylings of Arkham City.

If you’ve played Arkham City, you know exactly what to expect here. Gotham City, now bigger than ever, is still (unfortunately) packed with criminals and super villains, all up to no good. The larger story arc this time revolves around the dominant Black Mask hiring eight assassins, including Deathstroke and Deadshot, to kill Batman, who has made quite an impression the citizens of his city. In fact, while the Caped Crusader feels at home ridding the streets of wretched scum, not everyone is at ease with his arrival. The police, led by Commissioner Loeb, will pursue the Dark Knight and attempt to detain him.
But fundamentally, Arkham Origins plays very much as expected. Grappling, gliding, perching atop gargoyles, ambushing thugs, and maneuvering around Gotham works as it always has. The series’ notably fluid and flexible combat system of course returns. This time around, Warner has added a tracking system to help players assess the efficiency of their combat. Functionally this is entirely informational, as experience points, which flow into a branching upgrade system, are still awarded based on chaining hits into lengthy combos. New enemy types, such as the martial artist thug, mix up the flow and logic of a battle, requiring back-and-forth combos until the criminal makes a mistake.
Warner is building upon some of the concepts introduced in past games. Expect side quests to return in a significant way, both through a radio scanner that helps track criminal activity, and a ‘Most Wanted System’, which will allow Batman to hunt villains like Anarchy, who have stories and motivations that are separate from the main Black Mask thread. For what it’s worth, Warner wouldn’t confirm how significant of a role Joker will have in the game, so it remains to be seen if there’s more to Origins than a lesser known mobster with a grudge.
Warner is also vastly building out how Batman’s detective prowess is represented. The concept of Detective Mode is back, but now can actually be used to track observations and discoveries, allowing players to ‘scrub through’ a crime as it occurred in the past, discovering where more evidence might be. When an assassin’s bullet disables a police helicopter causing it to crash, Batman is able to deduce that a nearby SWAT sniper wasn’t responsible -- tracing the source of the bullet to what was likely Deadshot. By scrubbing through different evidence in different places, Batman assembles the truth piece by piece, allowing him to move to his next target.
In just about every way, Arkham Origins is working with what made Arkham City so successful, and then adding its own twists and improvements. The fact that a fast-travel system is being implemented speaks to the fact that the Montreal team isn’t ignoring feedback. The addition of a device like the Remote Claw, which can attach to two points or enemies and pull them together, means that the team is finding new ways to mix up established concepts.
It’s true that some things don’t change with time. The Joker will always be a force of chaos. Batman will always chase criminals through the streets of Gotham. And that is true whether a story is set in the present, future, or the past. Arkham Origins is a prequel working with a different scenario in a bigger world, but it’s still an Arkham game. Considering how brilliant Arkham Asylum and Arkham City were, however, that’s hardly a bad thing. In fact, we can’t wait for more.