Rocksteady used the same programmer to make sure it doesn't end up with a racing game

Mar 27, 2014 18:41 GMT  ·  By

Batman: Arkham Knight developer Rocksteady has talked a bit about one of the major new features in its upcoming game, which is the Batmobile, and how, in order to live up to the fantasy of driving the famous vehicle, plenty of different decisions had to be taken.

The Batman Arkham games in the past focused specifically on the Caped Crusader and his exploits on foot in the Arkham Asylum or Arkham City. While vehicles like the Batwing or even the Batmobile were present slightly, they didn't have a big impact on gameplay.

With Arkham Knight, Rocksteady is focusing specifically on the Batmobile, bringing a great-looking design and promising that it will live up to the fantasies of Batman fans about driving the all-impressive vehicle.

"The fantasy of driving the Batmobile is, I think, of being unstoppable, of being a wrecking ball. So the evacuation of the city and Scarecrow’s chemical weapon threat is a narrative construct in order for us to achieve the gameplay objective that we’re driving towards. So really it was the decision to go for it with the Batmobile that drove a lot of technical and creative decisions," Rocksteady's Dax Ginn told Metro.

The developer has also confirmed that the world of Arkham Knight is five times bigger than the one from Arkham City and that it is a completely urban one, without any sort of countryside or suburbs, for example.

In order to ensure that Arkham Knight doesn’t end up an open world driving game and retains the action adventure feel, Rocksteady also deliberately tasked the programmer of Batman to work on the Batmobile, instead of bringing in someone with a racing experience.

"The way that we have coded the behaviour of the Batmobile, and thought about the Batmobile, is we used the same team that created Batman. So the core gameplay programmer that created Batman for Arkham Asylum and Arkham City, he’s the guy that’s working on the Batmobile. We didn’t want to just bring in a driving team because then we would’ve ended up with a Batman game that had a driving component; we wanted the two things to feel married," Ginn said.

"We wanted that man and machine connection between the two of them. And actually we were terrified of ending up with a driving game, we wanted to make sure it felt like the Batmobile could’ve been there all along, in either Arkham Asylum or Arkham City, but we’ve only just now unveiled it."

Last but not least, Ginn shot down the possibility of seeing bonus DLC skins for the Batmobile, as Rocksteady won't apply the same strategy it did with Batman, who got plenty of different skins as add-ons.