It almost seems like WB Montreal wants to have its cake and eat it too, with marketing that helps fans draw a throughline between the Batman: Arkham games they love and this new property while also claiming complete originality. The Bruce Wayne of Gotham Knights even died in pretty much the same way as Arkham Bruce: in an explosion. In fact, judging from the trailer, pretty much the only thing separating the Gotham Knights universe and the Batman: Arkham series seems to be the fact that WB Montreal said they’re not connected.
“ Gotham Knights is an original story set in DC’s Batman Universe and not connected to the Arkhamseries,” WB Montreal told Comic Book hours after the game’s reveal at DC FanDome, which heavily suggested that Gotham Knights would pick up after the death of Bruce Wayne at the end of Arkham Knight. While the initial trailer and press release for Gotham Knights seemed to indicate that the new Batman-less Batman game was connected to Batman: Arkham Knight, it sounds like WB Montreal’s title only takes inspiration from Rocksteady’s trilogy closer. Except Gotham Knights is surprisingly not set in the same universe or continuity as the Arkham games… The extended Bat-Family taking on the Caped Crusader’s duties as protectors of Gotham City is the logical progression of the story put in place by Rocksteady’s own Arkham series, which ended with Bruce activating the Knightfall Protocol and dying in the process. Batgirl, Nightwing, Robin, and Red Hood must now work together to take on new threats to Gotham, including a mysterious new criminal cabal known as the Court of Owls. Instead, Gotham Knights is set after the death of Bruce Wayne, which leaves the city in the hands of his surrogate crime-fighting children.
At long last, we have a new Batman game to look forward to, only WB Games Montreal’s new Gotham-set open-world co-op adventure doesn’t actually feature the Dark Knight.