The Batman: Arkham Franchise is renown for its quality. In fact, my personal favorite game of all time is Batman: Arkham City. The narratives in these games are well thought out, the exploration feels loose and free, and the combat system is revolutionary and has become an industry standard. Nearly every aspect of these games is expertly done. You really feel like you are the Batman… for the most part…

No game is perfect and the Arkham franchise, as much as I love it, is no exception. There are some improvements that could be made to the already successful formula to make players feel like Batman no matter what they are doing in game.

POPULATED GOTHAM

As the games got larger in scale, it felt stranger with each title that criminals were seemingly the main population of Gotham City. This made sense in Arkham Asylum given the restricted setting and was still plausible in Arkham City. This concept, however, did not carry over well into Arkham Origin sand Arkham Knight, as Batman was no longer in a prison setting, instead being out on the rooftops and streets of Gotham.

Arkham Originsis the least believable when it comes to a mostly empty Gotham City. The reason the streets are so empty, aside from criminals, is because of a blizzard. If you’ve ever been in the northeastern United States in the winter, you know firsthand how unbelievable that is. Arkham Knight is more plausible (ironically) as the city has been evacuated because of Scarecrow’s threat to release enough fear toxin to cover the whole city. However, it’s difficult to believe that there aren’t many stubborn citizens who stayed behind, especially jaded Gotham City citizens who seem to be dealing with a new citywide catastrophe every week.

Gotham should be a bustling city with nightlife and people. This is definitely possible in current game engines with examples such as Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey, Witcher III, Skyrim, and Spider-Man. Having a populated city could add new dynamics to the gameplay formula, like a new stealth mechanic that caters to Batman’s desire to remain in the shadows. It could also add things like impromptu hostage situations, a layer of tension to vehicle chases, and even a crime in progress mechanic like in Spider-Man.

A MATTER OF TIME

Another change the developers should consider is the time frame the game’s narrative takes place. Until now, all the Arkham games have been set in one night. For the first three (Asylum, City, and Origins), this is realistic (I know this because I’ve managed to beat all three, Riddler Trophies included, in a one night… that’s one game per night, not all three in one night… I’m not a god). Arkham Knight,on the other hand, is just too large to take place in that timeframe. An engaging Batman story could easily be spread out over multiple nights with Spider-Man once again being a prime example.

THE BAT FAMILY ROAMS

One thing the franchise introduced once but never used again is free roaming as another character besides Batman. In Arkham City, you can explore as either Batman or Catwoman. Even though Robin was in Arkham City’s story, he was only playable in challenge maps. In Arkham Knight, many members of the Batman Family make an appearance and are playable throughout the main narrative, but only in stealth or combat situations. Allowing characters such as Nightwing, Robin, other Robin, other other Robin, Batgirl, and others to be available in free roam could open new possibilities in game design, providing new ways of getting around Gotham and presenting challenges that only certain characters can overcome.

WORLD’S GREATEST DETECTIVE?

Batman is considered the world’s greatest detective. The Arkham games have tried to convey this in a number of ways, with Arkham Origins being the most successful. Unfortunately, in this writer’s opinion, the detective aspects of Batman have yet to be fully realized in video games. The difficult thing about it, however, is that it isn’t an easy topic to offer suggestions on how to improve it. The gameplay mechanics for solving crimes should be simple enough and that has already been accomplished. However, there has always been a certain amount of hand holding with these puzzles, usually for narrative reasons. Perhaps not making it mandatory to find all the evidence at a crime scene and leaning heavier on player choice/player error could make for a more engaging system. Naturally, there would have to be different outcomes to the crimes depending on how thoroughly the player did their job. So Batman may not end up being the world’s greatest detective when I’m in control, but it might make the game more engaging when examining crime scenes.

BATTY SUGGESTIONS

Here are a few smaller ideas:

  • If the game takes place over multiple days, there could be minigames that you play as Bruce Wayne. They would be similar to the Peter Parker minigames in Spider-Man.
  • You could explore the use of a stamina system where Batman isn’t always at his best if he’s tired. This could make you slower or have some other adverse effects, adding to difficulty. Resting would restore this, but it might make you run the risk of falling behind on certain crimes. This idea may be a stretch as it’s coming from a Dark Souls/Skyrim survival mode fan and may not be for everyone.
  • The police could be a threat to Batman instead of his allies. This could make Gotham more hostile without simply filling the map with criminals. You would also, obviously, have to deal with the police in a different way than the common criminals, as Batman wouldn’t just attack those he’s trying to help, even if they are getting in his way.
  • There could be a more in depth upgrade system for Batman’s tech. You could have branching paths to make distinctly different gadgets and make each playthrough different.
  • There could be a training upgrade system like in Skyrim where you level up the things you do more often and get special perks in skill trees designated to those aspects of the game.

IN CONCLUSION

This by no means was intended as a slight against the Arkham franchise, far from it. It was simply meant to be a few suggestions that could potentially improve a gaming franchise I love dearly in an attempt to fully become the Batman.

So, do you have any suggestions for potential improvements to the Arkham formula? Are the games already perfect as is in your opinion? Share your thoughts!