Batman: Arkham Origins Trailer

Warner Brothers have let loose the first trailer for the next game in their award winning Arkham series. Let's take our first proper look at Batman: Arkham Origins

Can I just say right off the bat just how gorgeous the CGI is? It looks, moves and sounds fantastic. I want to give WB a call and tell them to shelve the whole game thing and give us an entire film like that.

While Bats does have one of the best rogue's gallery in comics, it's really great to see some villain choices from left field. Black Mask has a great look and while he has been prominent in the books, he hasn't had much exposure on the screen. Also it's great to see Deathstroke again. DC must be really high on Slade as he's been popping up everywhere as of late with turns in Arrow and Injustice. 

The game, of course, is a prequel to Arkham Asylum and Arkham City. We take the reigns of a relatively new to the cowl Bruce Wayne. Not yet trusted by the police or truly feared (or believed) by the criminal element, it should be fun to take a raw, new Batman out to the streets. The story is shrouded with secrecy, as expected, but apparently centres around Black Mask hiring eight hitman to take out the Dark Knight, including Deathstroke and Deadshot. The Joker and Bane are also slated to pop up as well.

There's been a lot of controversy about the voice cast of the game with fan favourites Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill not slated to reprise as Batman and Joker. Personally I agree with the outrage. These two ARE Batman and Joker. No bones about it. These are the voices I hear in my head when I read the books and the voices I wish I heard in the films. Please, Bale, stop with the voice, it scares us. Fear not, however, apparently Conroy IS working on an Arkham game as we speak, just not this one. I guess WB wanted a younger Batman for this one. I guess we all do have completely different voices between our late twenties and late thirties. I hope I wake up sounding like Liam Neeson in ten years.

The game is being developed by WB Montreal rather than Rocksteady. To me it seems they are going the Call of Duty route with two dev teams working on games released on opposite years. Montreal handling prequel games and Rocksteady presumably working on sequels. I bet that's what Conroy is working on as we speak. If Montreal can keep the quality as high as the previous games, this could be pretty damn awesome with a new game every year. Early hands on reports have said it plays great, with a bigger map and an emphasise on detective work (YES!). Sounding great to this geek. Fingers crossed!