Discussing Batman: Arkham Origins Remaster/Reboot Rumor

[Winter]

... Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League has not gone over well with most people. It has it's fans and I'm not judging anyone for what they like but the general consist is pretty negative at this point and I doubt it's going to get any better. The game had an uphill battle right from the start from the moment the TITLE was announced.

For all the ups and downs DC has gone through over the years the Justice League is still well loved, these are our childhood heroes, people we aspire to be who bring out the best in us and the whole point of this game is to have them all killed. That's a hard sale which is not helped by the now overused "Superman but Realistic" aka "No one with this power would be a good person".

As hammerofglass said, because they said it best

At this point "evil Superman" has been so done to death and so ubiquitous for so long that "what if a good person had the powers of Superman and was not corrupted by them" feels like a subversive idea on its own.

And the reception reflects this, with it getting so bad that WB and DC had to make a public statement that this WASN'T Kevin Conroy's final performance as Batman THE DAY AFTER THE GAME WAS RELEASED!!! When you are publicly trying to assure people that this will not be the final performance of an iconic actor you made a mistake.

Now I personally I have not played the game or watched many cutscenes so I'm not going to give my opinion on the game because I don't actually have one yet and may never have it because I had zero interest in this project back when it was announced and nothing has made me changed my mind on that. I'm just going over the reception of the game to help set up the real reason for this post.

The rumor that WB is planning to release either a Remaster or a "Remake" of Batman: Arkham Origins.

Arkham Origins is a game with a rather mix reception that has sense been reevaluated with many going over it's strengths and what it did right which has since only increased drastically in the last few days along with Gotham Knights. Given the poor reception of KTJL odds are good that DC and WB are going to be doing everything in their power to try and win back some good will from the fans and a Remaster of Origins could help with that.

The rumor was that this would be more in line with a Graphic and Gameplay Update similar to The Last of Us Part I. Basically it would take Arkham Knights Graphics & Gameplay and transplant over to Origins and from what I understand that would include some gadgets from AK like the Distributor and other gameplay features like environmental take-downs. The remake would also retain the game's popular boss fights with these new gameplay. All the dialogue will be the same audio from the original game so the story will remain the same.

This rumor was from 2 or 3 years ago and never backup by WB, Rocksteady or DC but given their track record post Arkham City they might end up going for this and there are a couple of reasons I think this. One the studio needs to win back as much good will as possible as quickly as possible and reusing assets they already have and used as recently as last month with the Arkham Trilogy release on the Switch.

And two, Origins getting a Remaster has been requested by fans for a while because it's the only game in the series that cannot be played on current gen counsels. So a remaster of Origins is pretty much a sure fire way to win back some good will and almost certainly will make them a LOT of money.

I also think they may go for the remake angle because, let's be honest, Origins looked a little dated even at the time or release though I doubt it will be quite as amazing looking as Knight I do think this will include real time graphics instead of pre-rendered and that there will be some gameplay updates like nerfing the Shock-Gloves (either by making them charge slower or doing less damage or still needing players to work around shield and tasers or all of the above). And fixing the upgrade system so it's not so shit anymore.

But those are my thoughts, what about you?

[hammerofglass]

I haven't played Suicide Squad and don't intend to but all the negative reviews I saw barely mentioned the plot, they were too busy saying the actual gameplay loop was terrible.

[stryke]

I'm watching a cutscene compilation on youtube out of morbid curiousity, and it's not great.

A couple of moments of mild amusement so far but that's about it. Killer Shark has an interesting characterization where he's kinda naive and a bit slow but not the simpleton of the movie or the cuddly niceguy from the Harley Quinn show.

It feels very much like a Garth Ennis work where it's all super tryhard edgy superheoes are the worst shite all the time. I'm not even talking actually good Ennis stuff like Hitman, but him when he hasn't got an actual editor and all his worst impulses come out to play.

Flash's exit is just upsettingly crass and nasty. Man, I need to go rewatch the Justice League cartoon where he taps into the speedforce to take out Lexniac to wash the taste out of my head.

...okay, fair play to the game, having pretty decent timing as there's one legit genuinely awesome comic book moment that is rather neat. They can have that one I'll admit.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

There are so many good points to the game that most obviously don't come together or gel for a comprehensive product. At the center of it all is just the motions of playing the game itself. A quick example for starters is the updated map. You have the area from City and it's taken down a step in artistic direction. Then the south side of the city is just three semi stacked block grids that didn't get the same attention as the north end's art direction carried over from City.

I think it's a fine idea, but the game itself just did not do strong enough with the good elements to suggest that a revamp with just ps4 engine modeling would be that hot of a ticket, and that is after a major artistic rehaul which would have to stay confined to the design of the map and dungeons. If anything they will attempt to make another action RPG title, given the general strength of their branched out cut-scene influenced or RPG heavy gameplay products.

[stryke]

Okay finished the Suicide Squad compilation. Wow, was that it, really? Man I'm glad I didn't pay money for that bollocks if the story is supposed to be this thing's saving grace.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

With sskjl I think I look most forward to having to fight the justice league. More so than any mayhem gameplay or rpg leveling.

Doesn’t seem to be a selling point of the game really, but being like a random thug in the Arkham predator map would be a cool idea.

[CharlesPhipps]

It's an utterly shit concept that shits on Arkham and has the idea that people want to kill their beloved childhood icons.

[Thebestoftherest]

Yeah kinda show how little the people at WB understand why these characters works and how we react to them.

[Winter]

It's an utterly shit concept that shits on Arkham and has the idea that people want to kill their beloved childhood icons.

It honestly reminds me a lot of Punisher Kills the Marvel Universe and NOTHING should remind me of Punisher Kills the Marvel Universe. This honestly feels like it was written by Garth Ennies, needlessly violate, seems to actively hate the series and fans of said series and is just too dark.

Actually I take that back Garth Ennies has written these characters before and even he wrote them better then this.

Yeah kinda show how little the people at WB understand why these characters works and how we react to them.

I would say that this seems to be more of Rocksteady then WB. Consider Gotham Knights from last year. Not the best game but you do get a sense that the people writing that game were fans of Batman and the Batfamily, pretty much nailing Dick, Barbara, Jason and most notably Tim. Tim often gets screwed over in pretty much every adaptation I've seen where literally any series that writes him either gives his overall personality to someone else or gives him the name Tim Drake but acts more like Jason or Dick.

Hell I think GK has the best Harley Quinn since the DCAU which including the one from Harley's own TV show. Hell GK went the extra mile and gave all the characters unique dialogue depending on who you play as which is over 11 hours of dialogue. Combine this with Arkham Origins and I feel that WB Games Montréal has a real understanding and love for this series.

By contrast I feel that the Arkham games have only a surface level understanding of Batman and DC as a whole. Just look at Batman, they keep insisting he's a loner who would refuse help from anyone when even Frank Miller knew that Batman would and has sought out help from others. Arkham Origins is all about Batman excepting help from Alfred and Gordon with Barbara even playing a small role in that arc and Cold, Cold Heart is all about Bruce trying to help and reform one of his villains which we never see in any of the Rocksteady games even though that is a central part of his character.

I think even Arkham Asylum is guilty of this to an extent as Bruce never really tears into Young and Sharp for them abusing their power and keeps demeaning his villains every chance he gets. Arkham City is the one exception but this was the game Paul Dini apparently had the most say in how the story was shaped with Bruce showing a more caring side and even trying to reason with some of his enemies.

[Madner Kami]

I never felt a disconnect in Arkham Asylum, between a caring and a "Vengeance-Batman". The situation is tight, there's death all around you and it's overall just a bad time to peacefully discuss things out. Except for one moment: Confronting Sharp. And Sharp getting off scot-free isn't really adressed in City either, where he somehow managed to become Major, despite being the primary cause for the Asylum to blow up like that (and being part of a secretive cult, if you managed to find the hidden room).