Despite two Batman games giving fans of the caped crusader a chance to smash thug skulls into pavements with gauntletted fists time and time again, Warner Bros doesn't think players have hit that level of Dark Knight skill that would let them really feel like Batman. To help that, in the next iteration of the series, there will be a training area in the Batcave where players can practice their skills.
This makes sense thematically too, since Origins is an origin story (surprise!) where Batman is going from billionaire to crime fighter throughout the game, therefore having an area to practice his combat mechanics and abilities, will let players improve their own skills along with Wayne's, levelling him up and unlocking new abilities.
The inclusion of said area, was announced by Warner Bros' Montreal senior producer Ben Mattes at an Nvidia conference, where he said he wanted players to feel even more bad ass than they have done in the past. “We want players to be awesome at this game before they’ve finished it, so that they can have that very empowering experience of being Batman right at the heart of these central, meaningful events that are happening in our game’s story.”
The only downside to this might be that players are better with Batman at this point in his career than they were in City, which took place years later. Hmm.
To watch some footage of the game in action at the Nvidia show, head here and skip forward to about the two hour mark.
KitGuru Says: Mattes does have a point. While I didn't finish Arkham City, throughout my playthrough of that and Asylum, I pretty much just punch jumped between enemies and rarely used any of the gadgets mid-swing. But then again, Batman himself would have spent thousands of hours honing his skills. There isn't a game that's ever been made which could hold my attention for that long. [Thanks PCGamesN]