GAME · 2015 · UK
Batman: Arkham Knight
- Developer
- Rocksteady Studios
- Publisher
- Warner Bros. Games
- Platforms
- Microsoft Windows, macOS
84 archived facts 6 topics 2 sources Last reviewed Nov 2026
84 Interesting Facts About Batman: Arkham Knight
Interesting Facts (13)
- #001
- #002
Gotham City was redesigned through building on the previous games' Gothic architecture, while making a more believable and dense city through adding minor elements like neon lights, billboard advertising, American-styled cars, and shops. Art director David Hego described the final design as: "feeling a little out of time. You couldn't pinpoint whether it's twenty years ago, now or in ten years' time."
- #003
- #004
In order for this game to meet next-gen qualifications, Rocksteady opted out of developing Batman: Arkham Origins (2013) in order to develop this one, thus, for both continuity and artistic reasons, Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill did not lend their voices to their respective roles of Batman and the Joker in Arkham Origins.
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- #006
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- #010
- #011
Contains a major spoiler — show
Near the end of the first segment of the weapons cache side-quest (which is completed as part of the main story), as Batman is closing the vault door to protect himself from the explosion the hallucination of Joker pretends that Batman is locking him up inside the vault, jokingly begging and pleading not to be locked in. This ends up hinting at his fate in the game when Batman purges the Joker from his mind by locking him up in a cell to be trapped in the darkest corner of his mind for eternity, with the Joker hallucination similarly pleading not to be trapped inside, only this time he's no longer kidding around.
- #012
Contains a major spoiler — show
When the Arkham Knight shows up in his chopper, he targets Batman and says "Time to die, old man." Another meaning of the term 'old man' is 'Father'. Appropriate for Jason, who feels betrayed by his father figure. He could also be calling Batman "old man" because AK knows he's significantly older than him.
- #013
Production Story (17)
- #014
- #015
- #016
- #017
The game's autumn setting necessitated a change in character designs, in contrast to the winter setting of Batman: Arkham City (2011): Scarecrow's costume looks more decayed and damaged; the Penguin lost his long coat, was made to look dirtier (his clothing shows signs of sweat and food stains) and his head was shaved; the Riddler retains his green shirts bearing question marks, but constantly modifies his own costume in response to the events of the plot; Two-Face's costume does not change too much, instead emphasizing his burnt flesh and duality.
- #018
Batgirl makes her first ever appearance in this game out of the whole game series as a DLC storyline called "A Matter of Family". The story takes place between Batman: Arkham Origins (2013) and Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009). Before Barbara Gordon had a life-changing injury to become Oracle, who's been assisting Batman in Arkham Asylum and Batman: Arkham City (2011). She also started assisting Batman in Arkham Origins as Barbara Gordon trying to assist Batman build a trust reputation with her father, James Gordon.
- #019
The game starts with Joker's cremation set to the tune of Frank Sinatra's "I've Got You Under My Skin". Later in the game, we find out Batman still has some traces of Joker's toxin in his blood which activates when hit by Scarecrow's new fear toxin. Causing Batman to see hallucinations of Joker which indeed threatens to take over Batman's personality.
- #020
- #021
In a story continuity sense, the series goes from Batman: Arkham Origins (2013) to Batman: Assault on Arkham (2014) to Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009) to Batman: Arkham City (2011), and finally to Batman: Arkham Knight (2015). In Rocksteady continuity, the Arkham series is a trilogy going from Asylum to City to Arkham Knight.
- #022
Gotham City was redesigned by building on the previous games' Gothic architecture while making a more believable and dense city through adding minor elements like neon lights, billboard advertising, American-styled cars, and shops. Art director David Hego described the final design as "feeling a little out of time. You couldn't pinpoint whether it's twenty years ago, now or in ten years' time."
- #023
In order for this game to meet next-gen qualifications, Rocksteady opted out of developing Batman: Arkham Origins (2013) in order to develop this one; thus, for both continuity and artistic reasons, Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill did not lend their voices to their respective roles of Batman and the Joker in Arkham Origins.
- #024
- #025
- #026
Contains a major spoiler — show
A sequel was planned where Damian Wayne, the illegitimate son of Bruce Wayne and Talia al Ghul, becomes the new Batman after his father's supposed death. Despite concept art being made and some initial development being started, the game was ultimately scrapped in favor of Gotham Knights (2022).
- #027
Contains a major spoiler — show
The idea of Scarecrow as the main villain and the Joker coming back in hallucinations was taken from the script for Joel Schumacher's canceled Batman: Unchained, the canceled sequel to Batman & Robin (1997), which would have brought the live-action film series full circle from when it began with Batman (1989).
- #028
Contains a major spoiler — show
A picture of the collector's edition showing a Batman statue with the words "From a Grateful City In Memory of the Gotham Knight" was accidentally uploaded on Amazon. It was taken down shortly afterwards and replaced with an alternative version that had the text removed.
- #029
Contains a major spoiler — show
The reason Arkham Knight received its M for Mature rating in the USA is allegedly because of gruesome cutscenes that were key points in the story, pools of blood in the game and the ability to execute hostages. Most likely, the main reason for the rating is the scene where Batman tortures a thug by almost crushing his head under the Batmobile's tyre. They kept the M for Mature rating because they didn't want to leave anything out of the story they wanted to tell.
- #030
Contains a major spoiler — show
A sequel was planned where Damian Wayne, the illegitimate son of Bruce Wayne and Talia al Ghul, becomes the new Batman after his dad's supposed death. Despite concept art being made and after some initial development was started, the game was ultimately scrapped in favor of Gotham Knights (2022).
Behind the Scenes (3)
- #031
- #032
- #033
Contains a major spoiler — show
During Batman's first face-to-face encounter with the Arkham Knight, the other soldiers are told to not shoot the bat symbol on his armour because that's where the armour is thickest. When Batman uses the remote control on the Batmobile to surprise the mercs, Knight immediately grappels out, much like Batman himself would. Or someone he trained. Much later, Gordon shoots Batman there intentionally, "killing" him and knocking him off the building in order to escape Scarecrow's machinations.
Characters & Cast (4)
- #034
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- #036
Contains a major spoiler — show
Mark Hamill said that, after Batman: Arkham City (2011), he was retiring from the role of the Joker unless an adaptation of "The Killing Joke" was made. This game features a recreation of the opening pages of "The Killing Joke" via Batman's fear toxin-induced Joker hallucination. Hamill would go on to fulfill that wish and got to play the Joker in Batman: The Killing Joke (2016), an animated film adaptation of the comic. Later, he stated he would continue to portray the character as long as Kevin Conroy voiced Batman.
- #037
Easter Eggs & References (37)
- #038
- #039
- #040
At several places in the game (most notably in the elevator that leads to Batman's lab beneath the movie studios), you can find posters for "The Gray Ghost" starring Simon Trent. In Beware the Gray Ghost (1992), a young Bruce Wayne idolized The Gray Ghost, a television hero played by Simon Trent (voiced by Adam West), and as an adult, Bruce teamed with Simon to stop a terrorist, using an episode of the show as inspiration for his attacks.
- #041
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- #043
When listening to voicemail messages in Bruce's office in Wayne Tower, Vicki Vale, Lex Luthor, and Kate Kane (Batwoman) can all be heard. Lex's message seems to be about a business deal that fell through, while Kate Kane called asking if Bruce is planning on attending her and Maggie Sawyer's engagement party. Maggie Sawyer is a police officer who features prominently in Superman-related media.
- #044
When Batman is in the ACE Chemicals processing center while Scarecrow is making his fear toxin bomb, the ACE Chemicals announcer states that the blast radius only reaches 57 miles. This means that the toxin would only cover Gotham as seen later in the game and not the entire eastern sea board, as Scarecrow wanted it to.
- #045
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- #047
At the beginning of the 'Friend in Need' sidequest, when Bruce Wayne is entering Wayne Tower, there's a hint that it isn't really Bruce Wayne: before, when listening to Bruce's voicemail, there are mocking messages from the Joker fragment, which obviously are only happening in his head; when 'Bruce Wayne' checks the messages, he only hears the four from real people.
- #048
A line of dialogue from Deathstroke that was cut from the game had him saying he had waited 8 years for this "rematch." This means Batman: Arkham Knight is set 8 years after Batman: Arkham Origins (2013), which is set two years after Bruce Wayne first became Batman. In total, Batman has been around for 10 years.
- #049
One of the three islands in the Arkham Knight storyline, Founders Island, has a district called "Otisburg." This is carried over from the Superman (1978) movie with Christopher Reeve, when Ned Beatty, as Otis, claimed a small portion of the new California coastline to be created by Lex Luthor's (Gene Hackman) plan to sink most of California into the ocean.
- #050
- #051
In the Batman: Arkham Knight "The End Begins" trailer, released on June 19th, 2015, Game Director Sefton Hill is said to have made a cameo in game form leaving a diner. His cameo in the game can be spotted as Officer Owens enters the diner in the opening prologue - a man passes Owens after turning away from the bar: this is Sefton Hill's likeness.
- #052
- #053
Contains a major spoiler — show
Garfield Lynns/Firefly appears for the second time in an Arkhamverse game. Although Rocksteady do not consider Batman: Arkham Origins (2013) (developed by WB Montreal) part of their Arkham Trilogy, its continuity is acknowledged and referenced by Firefly, referencing the bridge where his respective boss fight in Origins took place.
- #054
Contains a major spoiler — show
At one point during the main story when Batman and Robin are saving the "Jokers", Johnny Charisma is hiding on the stage section of the movie studios. In order to gain access to the stage, Batman reviews the CCTV footage to reveal Charisma inputting the passcode. The mirror reveals the code is 0539. Studied more closely, 05 stands for May and 39 stands for 1939, which is the first appearance of Batman (May 1939).
- #055
Contains a major spoiler — show
Relating to the disappearance of Henry Adams: There's a flyer on the refrigerator at Pauli's Diner stating that a local man named Henry Adams has gone missing. Sure enough, it's revealed later that he's been abducted by Batman himself; as the only transfusion recipient with natural immunity to Joker's blood, he was instrumental in Batman and Robin's attempts to synthesize a cure. Out of all the Jokerized citizens, Henry is the one whose physical appearance most closely resembles the real Joker, to the point that it looks like he could almost be an older relative, only without the skin or hair coloration. Turns out to be a hint that he's the most Joker-like of all of them, and not immune after all. A hint that Henry isn't quite as immune as originally believed (and the one who hacked the security system) shows up when Batman asks him to help with hacking a security camera. He makes sure to tell Batman that he doesn't really know anything about computers to throw him off, before proceeding to do as Batman asked much faster than anyone who's genuinely computer-illiterate could be expected to. He does state that the interface is much simpler than a normal computer layout, though in hindsight, this appears to be a taunt of sorts. Similarly, billboards for the cocktail singer Johnny Charisma's live Halloween show appear throughout the city. While some fans' initial interpretations of a hidden message note seemed outlandish, it's later revealed to be somewhat true; Johnny, another infected blood recipient, is slowly becoming more Joker-like in his appearance, complete with a similar hairstyle and an equally ostentatious lounge-lizard suit. Batman even later hallucinates variations of the billboard where Joker's the one hosting the show.
- #056
Contains a major spoiler — show
Joker's first lines after he reveals himself to Batman in the ACE Chemicals building, "We're going to give Gotham the Batman it deserves. A new Batman. A better Batman. A darker, more- well, we can come back to this later." As seen in the Golden Ending, Gotham got just that.
- #057
Contains a major spoiler — show
When the Arkham Knight appears with the drill machine, he says "I did ask if it came in black, but then I thought: nah you'd just get all jealous," it is a reference to the Dark Knight Trilogy, where Bruce Wayne often asks if the gadgets and vehicles "come in black?"
- #058
Contains a major spoiler — show
The very first thing we see in the game is the label on Joker's cremation chamber - "ROBINSON". Or "ROBIN SON", if you read it with a space in there. A major theme of the game is that Batman sees his sidekicks as family. The game's main villain is ex-Robin Jason Todd lashing out at his old mentor and adopted father for replacing him. It could also be a reference to Jerry Robinson, who co-created the character of The Joker.
- #059
Contains a major spoiler — show
After Batman has a dose of fear toxin, some of the billboards and other advertisements around Gotham City have a chance to change into a more fearful, Joker version of the ad when you look at it. Then, when you look away, it changes back to normal. For example, the "Johnny Charisma Live!" ad on Grand Avenue can change to a red background with the Joker instead of the normal green background with Johnny.
- #060
Contains a major spoiler — show
When Batman is being taken in the back of the tractor trailer, the cinematic is a shot-for-shot remake of the opening sequence of Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009), substituting the Batmobile with the truck and updating the exterior of the asylum to show decay and overgrowth.
- #061
Contains a major spoiler — show
Despite referring to Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009), Batman: Arkham City (2011) and Arkham Knight as a trilogy, at multiple times throughout the game, Rocksteady acknowledges the events of Batman: Arkham Origins (2013) as being canon. Inside the GCPD you can find items that belonged to villains from Arkham Origins, including The Electrocutioner's Shock Gloves that were also equipment used by Batman. Also, Deathstroke and Firefly, who were only seen in Arkham Origins, appear in Arkham Knight and they refer to specific moments from Arkham Origins, including their defeats by Batman.
- #062
- #063
Contains a major spoiler — show
In the Shadow Wars mission on the Season of Infamy DLC, when you go through the morgue at the hospital, there is an empty chamber with Talia Al Ghul's name on it. It is hinted that her body was taken by the League of Assassins and brought to a Lazarus pit to be revived.
- #064
Contains a major spoiler — show
During Batman's first face-to-face encounter with the Arkham Knight, the other soldiers are told not to shoot the bat symbol on his armour because that's where the armour is thickest. When Batman uses the remote control on the Batmobile to surprise the mercenaries, the Knight immediately grapples out, much like Batman himself would. Or someone he trained. Much later, Gordon shoots Batman there intentionally, "killing" him and knocking him off the building, as part of Scarecrow's manipulation.
- #065
- #066
Contains a major spoiler — show
When Batman heads to surrender to Scarecrow near the end of the story, check the wall outside and you'll see a spray-painted red Batsymbol. It's also the Red Hood's symbol, letting the player know he's following Batman before Hood rescues him from Scarecrow.
- #067
Contains a major spoiler — show
In the Red Hood DLC mission, Red Hood goes after the Mob boss "Roman Sionis/Black Mask." In terms of continuity, Batman: Arkham Origins (2013) comes before Batman: Arkham City (2011). But in Batman: Arkham Knight's Red Hood DLC mission, Black Mask looks exactly the same as in Batman: Arkham Origins.
- #068
- #069
- #070
- #071
- #072
Contains a major spoiler — show
Near the end of the first segment of the weapons cache side-quest (which is completed as part of the main story), as Batman is closing the vault door to protect himself from the explosion, the hallucination of Joker pretends that Batman is locking him up inside the vault, jokingly begging and pleading not to be locked in. This ends up hinting at his fate in the game when Batman purges the Joker from his mind by locking him up in a cell to be trapped in the darkest corner of his mind for eternity, with the Joker hallucination similarly pleading not to be trapped inside, only this time he's no longer kidding around.
- #073
- #074
Contains a major spoiler — show
The very first thing we see in the game is the label on Joker's cremation chamber - "ROBINSON". Or "ROBIN SON", if you read it with a space in there. A major theme of the game is that Batman sees his sidekicks as family. The game's main villain is ex-Robin Jason Todd lashing out at his old mentor and adopted father for replacing him. It could also be a reference to Jerry Robinson, who co-created the character of The Joker.
Deeper Meaning (10)
- #075
After Batman tells Jim that Barbara was captured, they head to the clock tower, only to get attacked by the Knight's militia jeeps. The Arkham Knight demands Jim to be brought to him alive. This is because they were planning to blackmail him to join their side; Batman is led to believe Barbara died, while Jim is still captured and likely knows the truth.
- #076
- #077
Contains a major spoiler — show
After Scarecrow gasses Batman on Stagg's airship, he asks Batman what he can see: "the city engulfed in fear? Betrayed by those you trust the most? Your darkest secrets revealed?" It sounds like typical villainous bluster, but he manages to make it all happen by the end of the game: the Cloudburst briefly drowns Gotham in fear gas, Gordon shoots Batman on Scarecrow's orders, and the world learns Batman is Bruce Wayne.
- #078
Contains a major spoiler — show
When the Arkham Knight shows up in his chopper, he targets Batman and says "Time to die, old man." Another meaning of the term 'old man' is 'Father'. Appropriate for Jason, who feels betrayed by his father figure. He could also be calling Batman "old man" because AK knows he's significantly older than him.
- #079
Contains a major spoiler — show
The four "infected" each represent a part of Joker: Albert King represents Joker's strength, Johnny Charisma represents Joker's charisma and showmanship, Christina Bell represents Joker's obsession with Batman, and Henry Adams represents Joker's deception and intelligence.
- #080
Contains a major spoiler — show
The ending of the game references Frank Miller's "The Dark Knight Returns." Specifically, the destruction of Wayne Manor and Batman/Bruce Wayne's supposed death. Unfortunately, the audience is left without any sort of closure for Batman/Bruce Wayne by the end of the game.
- #081
- #082
Contains a major spoiler — show
The smoker at Pauli's Diner in the beginning cutscene is wearing a red hood hinting him to be Red Hood. However, there's an Anarchy symbol carved on his table, which could hint to him being Anarky. Later on in the game, you can hear some of Arkham Knight's goons remark on Anarky's disappearance, which further hints to the smoker being Anarky.
- #083
Contains a major spoiler — show
The smoker in Pauli's Diner is wearing a hood, so the player can't see them before Scarecrow's fear toxin kicks in and everyone in the diner suddenly looks like a zombie. The smoker was wearing a red hood, hinting that he was the Batman character Red Hood, who we later learn is working with Scarecrow as the Arkham Knight.
- #084
Contains a major spoiler — show
Relating to the disappearance of Henry Adams: * There's a flyer on the refrigerator at Pauli's Diner stating that a local man named Henry Adams has gone missing. Sure enough, it's revealed later that he's been abducted -by Batman himself; as the only transfusion recipient with natural immunity to Joker's blood, he was instrumental in Batman and Robin's attempts to synthesize a cure. * Out of all the Jokerized citizens, Henry is the one whose physical appearance most closely resembles the real Joker, to the point that it looks like he could almost be an older relative, only without the skin or hair coloration. Turns out to be a hint that he's the most Joker-like of all of them, and not immune after all. * A hint that Henry isn't quite as immune as originally believed (and the one who hacked the security system) shows up when Batman asks him to help with hacking a security camera. He makes sure to tell Batman that he doesn't really know anything about computers to throw him off, before proceeding to do as Batman asked much faster than anyone who's genuinely computer-illiterate could be expected to. He does state that the interface is much simpler than a normal computer layout, though in hindsight, this appears to be a taunt of sorts. Similarly, billboards for the cocktail singer Johnny Charisma's live Halloween show appear throughout the city. While some fans' initial interpretations of a hidden message note seemed outlandish, it's later revealed to be somewhat true; Johnny, another infected blood recipient, is slowly becoming more Joker-like in his appearance, complete with a similar hairstyle and an equally ostentatious lounge-lizard suit. Batman even later hallucinates variations of the billboard where Joker's the one hosting the show.
Related pages
- Bryan Cranston — Batman: Arkham Knight comes up in the facts on that page
- Batman: Arkham Asylum — Batman: Arkham Knight comes up in the facts on that page
- Batman: Arkham City — Batman: Arkham Knight comes up in the facts on that page