‘Batman: Arkham City’ Writer Talks About Hopes for Next Game

Paul Dini has come to know Batman very well. He has written the character for years and his most recent achievement is the video game Batman: Arkham City.
He was a major force behind Batman: The Animated Series, Batman Beyond, Justice League and has contributed to a great number of other superhero cartoons. But his credentials don't end with superheroes; Dini also contributed scripts to and story edited for the hit ABC show Lost.

He penned both Batman: Arkham Asylum and the sequel Arkham City. Recently, Dini talked to Yahoo UK Games and hinted that he would like to be involved with a game that has a superhero with more powers than Batman:

Batman is pretty much a self-trained guy, I think it would be fun to do a character like Superman or Captain Marvel or maybe Green Lantern, somebody who's got a completely different resource for fighting crime and fighting villains, Dini said via comicbookmovie.com.

In the interview, Dini seemed most interested in taking on Superman. He said Superman is being reinvented in movies and comics and he would love to take another crack at the character. Dini also said Superman hasn't been explored too deeply in gaming.

Though it might be tough for RockSteady (the developer behind the Batman games) to take on a Superman game. Batman: Arkham City has many different factors contributing to its success that don't really translate to a Superman game.

First, The Man of Steel has carried a video game stigma for a long time. Superman 64 is widely considered one of the worst video games of all time. The game was known for its terrible controls, vexing camera angles and inexplicable fly-through-the-rings challenges. Superman 64 has tainted the character's image so much that game developers have largely avoided him for the past decade.

Batman: Arkham City has avoided such pitfalls. America is in the middle of a Batman love affair-- Christopher Nolan's Batman movie franchise is highly praised and has a lot of buzz surrounding future installments. In the late ‘80s, Frank Miller reimagined the Caped Crusader in Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, rescuing him from the ‘60s camp version portrayed by Adam West. Since then, Batman has been much more popular that Superman, mirroring the dark and gloomy American mood.

The game also benefits with a close association to the Batman: The Animated Series. It was considered one the best cartoons of all time for its brilliant writing and mature themes. Many of the same forces that made the cartoon great were also behind Arkham City. Not only did Dini write the game, but it also featured Kevin Conroy as Batman and Mark Hamill as the Joker. Both voice actors were highly celebrated in their roles on the cartoon show and reprised them for video game.
Batman: Arkham Asylum is also steeped in traditional stealth game conventions. There were already clear examples of how his type of game would work, but Superman just doesn't have any such roadmap.

But if anyone has the mojo to revive Superman, RockSteady and Dini probably have the best shot. Batman: Arkham Asylum just came out a few weeks ago, and is being well received by consumers and critics alike.