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

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A retailer listing has revealed that downloadable content will add Deathstroke as a playable character in Batman: Arkham Origins. An ad on Amazon indicates that those who pre-order will receive a $10 credit as well as “playable Deathstroke DLC.”

Previous rumors about Origins suggested that the game may have multiplayer that would see you “play as a member of Joker or Bane's gang while trying to take down Batman and Robin.”

That mode is still unconfirmed, and even if it does exist, it’s unclear whether Deathsroke would factor into multiplayer or be part of the single-player campaign.

Deathstroke was previously confirmed as one of the game's eight main villains and appears in the first teaser trailer. This wouldn’t mark the first time a villain has been playable in the franchise, as The Joker was playable in Arkham Asylum for PlayStation 3 players and Catwoman was playable in Arkham City.

We’ve reached out to WB about Deathstroke and will update this story with any comment we receive.

Batman: Arkham Origins will hit Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC and Wii U on October 25th. Look out for the first full-length trailer on IGN tomorrow.

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Update: Contrary to what we reported earlier, it seems Kevin Conroy will not be returning as the main voice actor for Batman in Arkham Origins.
A Warner Bros. spokesperson provided IGN with the following statement: "Roger Craig Smith is confirmed as the voice of Batman and Troy Baker is confirmed as the voice of The Joker in Batman: Arkham Origins."
Listening to the video of Conroy at the conference, he clearly says, "I can talk about it now, we've been working for about 9-10 months on the next Arkham."
This leaves us with three possibilities. Either Conroy is present in Origins in a framing sense, providing the voice of an older Batman reflecting on his youth, or he's providing the voice of another character in the game, or he's talking about the next-generation Batman: Arkham game speculated to be in development.
To our minds, it's likely to be one of the first two options as he clearly states he couldn't talk about the game before as it hadn't been officially announced, whereas he now can. We've reached out to Warner Bros. for more information, though it doesn't seem like the company is going to give us much more information at this stage.
Original story follows.

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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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the fact that this game takes place in one night scares me. I mean, in reality, there's only, at most, 12 hours in a night time.

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If this is supposed to be early in Batman's career, how is Bane going to work out? Guess we just throw out what we know about him from the comics.

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