Gotham Knights Should Learn From Batman Arkham’s Sound Design

Gotham Knights Should Learn From Batman: Arkham’s Sound Design

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Rocksteady’s Batman: Arkham trilogy had amazing sound design, which WB Montreal would do well to incorporate into their new game Gotham Knights.

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Gotham Knights Should Learn From Batman Arkham’s Sound Design

Rocksteady’s Batman: Arkham series has been praised for many reasons, including its well-crafted story, dark atmosphere, ambitious level design, and captivating combat system. But one of the game’s aspects that is rarely talked about is it sound design, which is a shame because the tunes and tones that make up the Arkhamverse were crucial for turning the series into the critical and financial powerhouse players know today, and if WB Montreal’s Gotham Knights is going to aim for similar heights, they better follow Rocksteady’s example on this one.

The first and most obvious element of sound design has to do with voice acting. For their first game, Batman: Arkham Asylum, Rocksteady employed voice actors from Batman: The Animated Series, including Kevin Conroy as Batman, Mark Hamill as Joker, and Tara Strong as Harley Quinn. These people knew their characters inside out and used that experience to turn their child-friendly performances for the animated show into darker, more adult-oriented iterations. When WB Montreal’s own Batman: Arkham Origins was unable to procure Conroy and Hamill for their own cast, they replaced them with the equally talented Roger Craig and Troy Baker, respectively.

The actors who played Batman’s rogues gallery did a great job, but their input was only half the work. The other half was done by the games’ sound mixers. One of the most iconic features of the Batman: Arkham games, the radio network, allows Gotham’s supervillains to talk to both their goons as well as the Caped Crusader himself, whom they know is listening. Throughout Batman: Arkham Asylum, Joker taunts, misleads, and ridicules Batman via the facility’s intercom. In Batman: Arkham City, Hugo Strange fulfills a similar, though very different, role. Unaware of Batman’s exact whereabouts, his booming voice pops up every hour or so, counting down to the mysterious and ominous “Protocol 10.”

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Why Batman: Arkham’s sound design worked so well

The Batman: Arkham games not only used sound design to create ambiance, but also to enhance gameplay. In Batman: Arkham Asylum, players have to venture down the building’s sewers in order to collect a certain item that will allow them to progress. The sewers, of course, are Killer Croc’s domain, and as Batman tiptoes his way across thin and shaky wooden boards, players must sharpen their ears to catch the earliest tunes of Croc’s terrifying theme before the reptile can emerge from the murky waters to devour them alive.

Soundtracks are another core pillar in the world of video game sounds that the Batman: Arkham polished to sheer perfection. Ron Fish, the composer for Batman: Arkham City, expanded on the sounds of Batman: Arkham Asylum just like the developers expanded on its gameplay. Using a sweltering chorus for the game’s main theme, Fish created a song of biblical proportions that casts the Batman into the light of a religious figure. As a lonesome warrior faced with a Herculean task, Bruce Wayne certainly deserves no less.

Nick Arundel and David Buckley, who composed the music for Batman: Arkham Knight, also enriched gameplay experiences through their enticing work. One of their tracks, “For the League,” which plays over a DLC mission concerning the League of Shadows, is a perfect example of how music can compliment story and vice versa. Throughout the song, an abrasive horn blasts through the composition, breaking up the melody like one of the League’s warriors coming at the Dark Knight with a sneak attack. If Gotham Knights wants to be remembered as well as the other games which take place in Gotham, the developers should do well to keep these ideas in mind.

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Link Source : https://screenrant.com/gotham-knights-batman-arkham-voice-acting-sound-design/

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