The ability to level up your Joker or Bane thugs also belatedly brought paid-for supply drops to the Arkham franchise - another reason to grumble about Origins. It offered reasonably modern, if asymmetrical, warfare, with rival three-man gangs shooting each other up in benighted funfairs while Batman and (campaign absentee) Robin lurked in the shadows attempting to stage sneaky takedowns. Origins introduced a brand-new multiplayer mode developed by specialist studio Splash Damage. That repeated marketing message, like a media version of the classic Arkham cape-sweep-then-percussive-beatdown, helped seed the idea that Origins had somehow not earned its place in the saga. And not even a particularly veiled one, as the hype campaign for 2015's Arkham Knight endlessly referred to that game as the long-awaited completion of Rocksteady's trilogy. But in a series characterised by abrupt, emphatic violence, it feels a lot like a takedown. There is the argument that a game from 2013 is simply too recent a release to justify pouring resources into refreshing textures for PS4 and Xbox One.
But what about poor Origins, the stopgap game developed by WB Montreal to help ease the long wait while series architects Rocksteady delivered Arkham Knight? Why not just "do an Uncharted" and go for a triple-bill Arkham remaster? Both were critically adored on release, and are viewed as hugely influential titles, vital to securing developer Rocksteady's rock-solid reputation, even if the (outsourced) process of updating them does not appear to have gone particularly smoothly. This week's Return To Arkham package remasters the dynamic duo of Arkham Asylum (2009) and Arkham City (2011) for current-gen consoles. It is the increasingly obscured story of Batman Arkham Origins, a game that could plausibly be retitled Mixed Batsignals. This is a different sort of orphan, a stepchild being discreetly disowned seemingly to aid its fade from popular memory. Not Bruce Wayne, the crusader shaped by the murder of his parents and forced - like the rest of us - to endlessly relive that traumatic night of scattered pearls and chalk outlines in a benighted alleyway. Oh, BTW, this piece contains some major spoilers for Origins and Arkham Knight. As a couple of Batman's Arkham adventures are getting the remaster treatment this week, we thought it might be interesting to ponder the fate of the one game that didn't make the cut.
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