As much as the idea of a Batman game without Batman was probably a terrible idea from the outset, any potential Gotham Knights did have for greatness on the back of a half-decent premise for its plot and a select few mechanical elements is wholly squandered by boring and uninspired beat-em-up gameplay and an equally bland story, not to mention a beautiful yet empty open world full of repetitive filler content.

It’s been a hot minute since we’ve seen a high-profile DC Comics game hit the market, and the years are certainly crawling by since the sensational Batman: Arkham Knight delivered the most immersive Batman experience to date in rounding out the much beloved Arkham series – so it’s a high bar to say the least when it comes to Batman-based videogames. Although Arkham developers Rocksteady Games have their own DC project in the development, the upcoming Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League, Warner Bros. Games Montreal have taken the reins for now with Gotham Knights – a game built on the Batman mythos that doesn’t actually feature him as a playable character; instead choosing to centre on his four foremost sidekicks: Nightwing, Batgirl, Robin and Red Hood. I’ll admit I wasn’t sold on the idea, and as such haven’t really paid much attention to any of the pre-release marketing for the game beyond a couple of trailers, but I figured if the story was handled right, and the gameplay was up to scratch with meaningful differences between each character, that Gotham Knights might just make it, so I decided, with expectations sufficiently tempered, to give it a go.

Spoilers ahead!

Things don’t exactly get off to a great start as you’re forced to endure an extremely lengthy opening cutscene that details the death of Batman at the hands of his longtime foe Ra’s Al Ghul; a stage-setting for the rest of the story that would have been much better had the developers seized the opportunity to allow you to play as the Dark Knight himself in the prologue. Nevertheless, you’re soon thrust into the role of one of the four titular Knights – Nightwing, Batgirl, Robin or Red Hood – as their investigation begins into their late mentor’s final case, while hoping to uncover the truth surrounding his untimely demise. I do think that Gotham Knights takes a big risk by neglecting to place Batman at it’s forefront, but it does offer the unique opportunity to examine what that mythos and world might look like without him. Do the writers capitalise on this chance at all? Well, no, not really – there’s no sense that our heroes might be in over their heads without their mentor, or that there’s any division in their ranks that they need to overcome in order to reach their goals, so there’s virtually nothing in terms of a thematic backdrop to the story, and incredibly predictable “twists” along the way only make it feel all the more uninspired. On top of being generally unengaging, the plot is honestly just a chore to follow; starting out at a snail’s pace with a bland and drip-fed mystery plot before throwing a switch and quickly escalating from painfully slow to breakneck speed as major plot developments and big spectacular setpieces are thrown at you one after the other in the back half of the campaign, so while I did think that the premise of the story wasn’t too bad, and there’s arguably even some pretty interesting ideas thrown into the mix, the narrative as a whole suffers terribly from its sloppy execution.

The same can be said for the three smaller side-mission chains that ultimately provide nothing more than a couple of fun action setpieces at the tail end of a group of dull filler missions, despite each one taking the opportunity to focus on a classic Batman villain respectively, yet they manage to not do anything interesting with those characters at all. This applies just as much to the villains of the main story; there’s very little sense that the Court of Owls actually have any meaningful influence over the city, nor does the story create any feeling that the League of Assassins are a credible threat, so when the two factions supposedly go to war with one another in the third act; it’s no surprise that it feels decidedly underwhelming, especially when it’s hardly reflected in the game world, and with equally unremarkable villains at the forefront of the story, it’s difficult to feel much investment in the narrative whatsoever. Speaking of uninteresting characters, don’t expect much more from Gotham Knights’ writing when it comes to its titular heroes at an individual level – Nightwing, Batgirl and Robin all fit the same textbook millennial-written happy-go-lucky archetype, while Red Hood is unnecessarily aggravated for about 90% of his screentime, and all four of them act as walking dispensaries for the same sanitised liberal rhetoric that permeates so much of modern entertainment. Despite vague allusions to the opposite, none of the characters actually undergo any sort of meaningful development or introspection in the story when there was absolutely room to do so, and on top of a bunch of plot threads that don’t go anywhere, it just hammers home this feeling that the entire narrative is essentially inconsequential.

Gameplay-wise, don’t expect a much higher level of quality on the part of Gotham Knights – right away you’ll notice that the combat feels extremely sluggish and dulled down compared to the likes of the Arkham series’ fast and fluid fighting, especially with the limited opportunity for creating seamless combos. The game instead chooses to focus on attack variety and an elemental damage mechanic that only remains relevant insofar as you have the correct gear equipped, while counterattacking and stun moves are severely diminished in favour of a janky dodge mechanic that slashes right through any sense of fluidity in the combat. Still, it’s not the worst gameplay I’ve ever seen – it might not be sophisticated (or even all that fun) but it’s at least functional, and a solid variety of enemies keeps you on your toes when you have to learn and apply individual strategies to take them down. Unfortunately I didn’t find the same could be said for the boss fights – barring the two from the Mister Freeze side quests, they suffer heavily from bland mechanics and a diminished level of difficulty, even on the game’s Hard setting, which left them feeling decidedly unsatisfying. Gotham Knight‘s gear system is similarly unfulfilling – you’ll never want for resources so long as you just play the game, and although it’s simple and understandable, it manages to feel unnecessarily obtuse despite having little perceivable impact on the gameplay. I do always enjoy the inclusion of customisation mechanics that allow you to make each character your own, but pointless obstacles make it harder than it should be to create the look you want, which is all the more frustrating given that the majority of the outfit designs kind of suck.

There are a few other visual design choices I wouldn’t have gone for myself, but to tell you the truth this game is actually pretty nice to look at – the graphics are great, and it leverages bright and bold colours and strong architectural design to give its levels and game world a surprisingly memorable veneer where they might fall short from a gameplay standpoint. Though you’ll spend the majority of Gotham Knights in and around its vast and vibrant open world, once you realise the extent to which Gotham City is either padded out with repetitive, copy-and-paste side activities that make up the entirety of the endgame, or is otherwise just functionally empty, you’ll soon realise there’s very little to keep you there; especially once that well of specially curated narrative experiences has run dry. Despite a range of traversal options, it’s also kind of a chore to get around the map, especially if you pass on the side quests that unlocks fast travel points around the city and provide each hero with their own unique traversal mechanic. Although it’s a neat idea, and I’ll take anything that helps to differentiate the four playable characters as a plus, these traversal skills, as well as the grapple and Batcycle mechanics, just feel incredibly slow and clunky in practice, where games like Arkham Knight and Spider-Man (you can read my review of the Remastered PC version here) take pride in their ability to make their traversal fun to the point of taking preference over the quicker and easier fast travel options. In spite of falling short when it comes to the gameplay mechanics, I still have to praise the fact that they at least work (not a high bar, I know, but you can always be caught short given the state of modern gaming), and the game as a whole is pretty technically sound beyond the odd dip in performance or a minor bug here or there.

Still, I think at the end of the day the problem with Gotham Knights is that it just isn’t fun – not ideal for a videogame, I know, but when the story runs with an already risky premise and doesn’t do anything interesting with it because the writers are too preoccupied with inserting the same old retrodden political rhetoric into the script, it quickly became hard to feel engaged with the title, but then with the gameplay proving to be just as uninspired, I honestly struggled to find the motivation to even sit down and play. The few good qualities the game does bring to bear certainly aren’t enough to redeem it, and although I remain hopeful that potential post-launch content could build on those better elements, in reality I doubt that the game has much of a future as it is, especially seeing the practically universal lukewarm reaction to its release. While it might not be the worst game I’ve ever played, it certainly wasn’t worth the effort, and in the end I think it’s safe to say that even for the most diehard of DC Comics fans you’d be far better off saving your money, and most importantly your time, by giving Gotham Knights a miss.

4/10