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The Dark Knight rises again in first screens for Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate

Batmanvania

The Dark Knight rises again in first screens for Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate

The first screenshots for the recently announced 3DS and Vita game Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate have surfaced online.

Pulled from a feature in this month's Game Informer magazine, the images show what appears to be the Vita build of Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate.

Rather than get Batman: Arkham Origins developer WB Montreal to ape the third-person mechanics of the upcoming console prequel, Warner Bros. decided to hand off development of the handheld tie-in to the folks over at Armature Studio.

The result is a 2.5D Metroidvania game. This is hardly surprising, given that Armature was founded by three of the key guys responsible for the Metroid Prime trilogy.

Narratively, Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate will pick up from where the forthcoming Batman: Arkham Origins game leaves off.

With echoes of the setup in the original Arkham Asylum, an inexperienced Batman must quell an uprising in Blackgate Penitentiary in this upcoming portable instalment.

Though the game will be the first side-scrolling Arkham title, it will still contain the franchise's recognisable visual style, free-flowing combat system, and grappling mechanics.

Weapons management will be handled noticeably differently in this handheld adventure, however, with Batman gaining new gadgets and weapons via item drops, rather than through levelling abilities.

Despite the game taking place primarily on a 2D plane, Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate's criminals will come at the Dark Knight from both the foreground and the background.

Whether you choose to beat down the perps in brutal hand-to-hand combat or use your batarang to perch upon a gargoyle for a sneak attack is entirely up to you, however.

Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate will debut on 3DS and Vita alongside Batman: Arkham Origins on home consoles this October.

Images republished from Game Informer.
James Gilmour
James Gilmour
James pivoted to video so hard that he permanently damaged his spine, which now doubles as a Cronenbergian mic stand. If the pictures are moving, he's the one to blame.