The year 2025 marks the 10th anniversary of the release of Batman: Arkham Knight. The game is the fourth main installment of the Arkham series from Rocksteady Games, and managed to be one of the biggest game releases when it originally came out. To many, the Batman games from Rocksteady are landmark titles that set the bar for future games based on superheroes. Whether you were a fan of DC Comics or simply great video games, these Batman games had a significant impact that got everyone’s attention across entertainment.
But after all these years, is Batman: Arkham Knight still a peak for the genre and the series? While many other games based on various superheroes have been released on different platforms, following in its footsteps, Arkham Knight still manages to outshine its competition in ways that keep people coming back to play it. Not only does it have a reverence for the Batman mythology, but it makes bold decisions in its gameplay that still resonate with players today. Simply put, The Dark Knight has never been rendered more accurately and beautifully than this. Here’s why on its 10th anniversary, Batman: Arkham Knight is still a peak for modern superhero games.
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Becoming the Batman fully
Going beyond Arkham City
Many fans of these games will argue that Batman: Arkham Knight is a better experience than the rest of the series, mostly because it was the first time that scaling the rooftops of Gotham City felt accurate in video game form. Looking down onto a group of enemies from a tall building in the dark is something that fits well to the character of Batman, and it’s done very well in the game. But Batman: Arkham Knight takes a lot of the foundation that its predecessor established and pushed the limits of what was possible even further. On top of a vast map to explore within a large portion of Gotham City, filled with many details, players could do so in a fashion that was even more accurate to Batman this time around.
Besides jumping and gliding across rooftops, the Batmobile was a viable option to get around and fight crime. Controlling the power and speed of Batman’s greatest weapon against crime is a euphoric feeling for anyone. With this, the game gives players more options than previous entries in the series by doing this, both in terms of exploration and even in combat situations. After all, the next logical step for any Batman game was to grant players the ability to control the Batmobile and tons of other gadgets at Batman’s disposal. All of those wonderful toys can be used when and where you want.
Design choices like this push the fantasy of becoming the Batman even further, more so than anything that came before. The first game gave players the gadgets, the second game gave them the city, and now they had everything else in-between. It wasn’t enough to patrol the streets of Gotham, but now everyone could do so in a way where they could choose how to do it. And with Batman: Arkham Knight having an already critically acclaimed combat system, and beautiful presentation, it was a recipe for success. Some aspects of the game have been criticized over the years, like small sections involving the Batmobile or certain plot points, but none of it takes away from how big of an advancement everything was when accurately portraying Batman and his world in a video game. It was fun, interesting, and worth coming back to many times over for any fan of Batman.
The fan service continues
All those wonderful references
Source: Rocksteady Games
If there’s one thing that the Arkham series did so well, it was paying homage to the history of Batman. Other big superhero games, most notably the Spider-Man games from Insomniac Games, have adopted the same approach that the Rocksteady Batman games had when building out the character’s world. References of all kinds to the comics, specific characters, events in their history, and so much more can be found throughout the Arkham series, and Batman: Arkham Knight continues this. Simply exploring the city and looking into the finer details of locations, or even listening in on conversations between NPCs, can yield an incredible amount of fan service. Hardcore fans of DC Comics can definitely spot plenty of information about other areas around the DC universe within the game, including references to other heroes like Superman and more.
Why this matters significantly is because it rewards people for being longtime fans of the character. And while Batman: Arkham Asylum started this trend in the genre, Batman: Arkham Knight still managed to make it feel special and not played out. There’s a big difference between games that throw in references for the sake of having them, and other games that make them a part of the universe organically. It’s the latter that people love to see and discover for themselves that makes playing through the game for hours very much worth it.
Source: (YouTube) Hollow 2.0
In addition, Batman: Arkham Knight manages to pull a lot of references and homages from throughout Batman’s cinematic history in a big way. Some of the downloadable content allows players to choose the look of Batman based on various movie and television costumes. Although not solely based on anything specific from the comics, these are still a major part of Batman’s ongoing history that fans love to see. And Batman: Arkham Knight managed to have the most inclusions as bonuses. No matter what era of Batman you might be a fan of, Batman: Arkham Knight has something to let you become the version of Batman you always loved.
Definitive voices and visuals
What we see and hear is ultimately Batman
Source: Rocksteady Games
Something about Batman: Arkham Knight that is nearly perfect for many players is how the game looks and sounds. The voice talent behind the characters is often viewed as the definitive voices of the characters, with Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill voicing Batman and the Joker respectively. But it’s not solely the voice of Batman that makes the experience so good; it’s how that voice sounds in a world that appears tailored perfectly for the character. Gotham City has always been seen as a dark, gothic location that has many dangers within it, ideal for a character like Batman to thrive in when fighting crime. But that same essence hasn’t always been captured in video game form. It wasn’t until Batman: Arkham Asylum had a tone and atmosphere that fit so well with what people had read in the comics.
Batman: Arkham Knight does this on a larger scale, letting every inch of the city feel like it can be pulled straight from a graphic novel like The Dark Knight Returns or Batman: No Man’s Land. This is something that very few other superhero games can achieve, much less accomplish in a way that is accurate to their own universes. And every aspect of Batman: Arkham Knight is consistent with this, even when more light-hearted characters show up to interact with Batman himself, the gothic tone and visuals remain constant. There is simply no other version of Batman in a video game, other than the Arkham series, that does its best to make things feel unapologetically fitting to the character’s universe in every way possible.
Staying Batman forever
Even after 10 years following its original release, Batman: Arkham Knight is still one of the best superhero games ever made. It set a new standard for how superhero games are rendered, and how accurately their universes can be portrayed. The game remains one of the best Batman games ever released, especially in the aftermath of Batman’s voice actor Kevin Conroy passing away, and is consistently used for comparison to other new games. While any superhero fan should play the entirety of the Batman Arkham series, Batman: Arkham Knight is the culmination of everything that was built upon for the series in one release. It will be very hard for a new game to top what this one has done for Batman fans and the superhero genre, because on its 10th anniversary, Batman: Arkham Knight is still absolutely peak for the genre.
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