re: Batman: Arkham Origins ***RELEASE DATE APPROACHING 10.25.2013****

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The events of Arkham Origins are set several years before Batman: Arkham Asylum, in the middle of winter in fictional Gotham City. Batman is an experienced crime-fighter, but has not yet become the veteran superhero portrayed in Arkham Asylum and Arkham City. He remains a mysterious force with even the police unsure if he is a vigilante, a myth or supernatural. Batman has battled with normal criminals and gangsters and is used to being stronger and faster than his targets, but on a snowy Christmas eve he is confronted with far more dangerous enemies: super villains tasked with killing Batman.[6][7][8] The sadistic and brutal Black Mask has placed a bounty on the superhero, and Batman must discover why the villain harbors a deep hatred for him. Black Mask is the most powerful man in the city, possessing vast wealth and resources, and controls Gotham's criminal underworld, having eliminated his opposition and begun consolidating his power. His mask conceals his identity, allowing him to operate publicly as Roman Sionis, head of Janus Cosmetics.[9] Black Mask's henchmen help instigate a rise in crime and gang activity in the city. Captain James Gordon and the Gotham City Police Department are wary of the new superhero in their midst, and are not his allies with corrupt cops actively working against him.[4][6]

Arkham Origins will feature the debut of the assassin Deathstroke, the anarchist Anarky, Alberto Falcone, and the return of the Joker, the Penguin, Bane, Deadshot, and Batman's butler Alfred Pennyworth from Arkham City.[1][2][3][4][10] The story is also intended to explore the relationship between Batman and Alfred. Batman sees Alfred as a reminder of his parents' deaths, and an overbearing parental figure, while Alfred sees Batman as a spoiled child squandering his inheritance on his vigilante crusade, causing the two to repeatedly clash in the plot.[7] The story takes place before the existence of Batman's sidekick, Robin.[11]

Old Gotham, the segment of Gotham City which will become the Arkham City prison, is not yet walled off or ravaged by flood, and contains slums, lower buildings, a large shopping mall, and docks where Penguin's ship The Final Offer is stationed. Across the bridge from Old Gotham is New Gotham, the more modern metropolitan area of the city filled with towering skyscrapers.[5][12]

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