Batman Arkham Knight and the Scourge of Scale | Game Design Critique

Hi, this is Mark Brown with Game Maker's Toolkit,
a series on video game design.

If you ask me, Rocksteady's Batman games are
a good example of why bigger isn't always better.

The first game in the trilogy, Arkham Asylum,
was a pleasant surprise. Not only was it a

great game, and a great licensed game, but
it was a killer Batman game. The developer

figured out what made this dude interesting
- how he was more than just a rich guy who

punches hooligans while his underpants are
showing.

For starters, Arkham Asylum had truly loony
villains who got inside the dark knight's

head. And it also had free-flowing combat
that mimics the martial arts of the animated

films, and when Batman fought goons with guns
he'd hide in the shadows and use fear to trip

up his opponents. Like a reverse horror game,
as if you're playing as the Xenomorph in Alien: Isolation

Those two main mechanics simply didn't require
the massive open city that had, at the time,

become synonymous with super hero games.

(Nowadays,
they're all endless runners for iPhone).

So, instead, we got the smaller, more intimate
environment of the Arkham Asylum mental hospital.

But then we got sequels. And things, inevitably,
got bigger. Arkham City gave us a few urban

blocks, and switched the structure from Metroidvania
to full open world. And in Arkham Knight,

we get a mini Grand Theft Auto.

But does Batman really benefit from the extra
square footage? I'm not convinced.

For one, the main gameplay systems in Asylum
didn't actually gain anything from going open

world. In actual fact, they kind of suffered.
The predator mode got lots of new gadgets

and wrinkles in the sequels, but it always
worked best in the purpose built rooms of

Asylum, that encouraged you to play smart
to isolate your foes, rather than the random

rooftops of City and Knight.

And the combat got plenty of new features,
but it quickly becomes tiresome when you have

to fight dozens of random goons who are littered
about the open world.

Sandbox games should ideally contain mechanics
that need a sandbox. Like attacking bases

in any way you wish in Far Cry, or the elaborate
cop chases in Grand Theft Auto. Otherwise,

you've just built an incredibly elaborate
menu system to jump between gameplay moments.

To its credit, Rocksteady did add more mechanics
that made better use of the larger play space.

But was anyone really asking for Batmobile
tank warfare, or Assassin's Creed-style tailing

missions, or - that old favourite - liberating
towers?

One of the biggest victims of an open world is story. A strong narrative can quickly lose

its structure and focus when players are given
so many distractions. In Arkham Knight, the

urgency of stopping Scarecrow is undermined
by the huge wheel of side missions which see

you stopping bank robberies and blowing up
gun caches and training Azriel and tracking

down a man bat.

JIM GORDON: Look, I know you're busy. But anything you can do to help is going to save lives.

In a way, it emulates the feeling of Batman
being overstretched and having to put out

fires - sometimes literally - but the simulation
is revealed as being quite hollow when you

realise that there's no need to prioritise
missions or act quickly.

Take two events that happen early in Arkham
Knight. Two of Batman's allies are kidnapped,

almost simultaneously, but unlike in the Dark
Knight where Batman has to make a choice of

who lives and who dies, there are no such
stakes here. The Riddler will patiently wait

for you to come back to his bonkers underground
race ways, and all his posturing about killing

his detainee are hot air. Take your time,
detective. It's just a side quest.

Open worlds can harm the pacing of gameplay, too. Ultra linear games like Uncharted 2

can smartly dole out moments of shooting and
climbing and story and puzzle solving at just

right time to stop you getting bored and to
ramp up challenge and slowly teach you mechanics.

Sandbox games aren't so good at this, and
you can find yourself doing repetitive tasks

or facing a weird, wobbly difficulty curve.

I can see the case for open world games, of course.
Players get more freedom, they can tackle

missions in any order they want, and they
get a lot more content for their cash. And

games like Fallout and Skyrim make terrific
use of massive great worlds to faff about in.

But these days, I'm finding the promises of
bigger and wider worlds a bit of a turn off.

TRAILER V/O: Just Cause 3 is a huge open world game with over 400 square miles of complete freedom.

You either end up with Assassin's Creed which
has so much stuff to do that your map looks

like someone spilled a tub of glitter on it.
Or Codemaster's Fuel which holds a Guinness

World Record for largest game world, but hasn't
got a single interesting thing in it.

So maybe Arkham Asylum proves that open world
doesn't necessarily need to mean open "world".

And that game environments should be measured
by how much meaningful content is inside,

rather than in square metres.

Arkham Asylum was tiny, but it had better
pacing than Arkham Knight and a more focused

story than Arkham City. It was claustrophobic,
but the game's mechanics suited that. Spider-Man

needs a big open world to swing about in,
but Batman is at his best when he's locked

in with his opponents.

So for every monstrously massive open world,
we need a few sandbox games that are tiny

and intimate. More games like Resident Evil
with its cramped Spencer mansion or Gone Home

with its Portland town house.

Game worlds that are packed with details but
free from padding. Worlds where you learn

all the nooks and crannies and shortcuts as
you retread familiar ground, instead of whizzing

past it all in a sports car. Game worlds that
are memorable, not just cold, dull environments

filled with content and features.

Because, as Arkham trilogy director Sefton
Hill said, back at the release of Arkham Aslyum,

"It's easy to see how people fall into the
trap of having so many features. It's natural

to equate features with quality."

DAN STAPLETON: This has got to be number one for me, followed by Asylum

DAN STAPLETON: Purely because of the amount of content there is.

"You want to do less, but do it amazingly
well, rather than do more and have a load

of average stuff. There are too many games
out there that deliver lots of average content."

Thanks for watching. Agree or disagree with
my take on the Arkham trilogy? Let me know

your thoughts in the comments. Plus, please
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