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Batman: Arkham City is 5 times bigger than Asylum

Batman: Arkham City developer Rocksteady has revealed that the game - due for release next year - is "four or five times" bigger than its much-loved predecessor.

Speaking to OPM’s roving reporters for CVG, Rocksteady boss Sefton Hill also revealed that the caped crusader has double the number of goon-smacking moves at his disposal than he did in Arkham Asylum.

"Without a doubt, the hardest part of moving the game setting from the confines of the asylum into the urban sprawl of Arkham City was simply building the environment," he said.

"Our objective in this game is not to make the biggest game we can, but to make the best game possible. Gamers who played Batman: Arkham Asylum will know how dedicated we are as a studio to injecting an incredible amount of detail into every environment we build.

"It is this attention to detail that gives our games the deep and intense atmosphere that so many players have found so compelling, and so we have had to seriously scale up our art team in order to bring the same level of detail to Arkham City, which is about 4-5 times bigger than Arkham Asylum."

If you’ve got a spare few bob, you should really check out OPM’s stunning 14-page (yes, 14 page) Arkham City cover feature in this month’s mag - which is in stores now. Our sister title took a peek at Arkham City - in a world exclusive trip to Rocksteady’s London HQ. Alternatively, Order it here and have it delivered to your door.

Rocksteady’s really jacked up the goodies for the second outing, it seems.

"In terms of gameplay, we knew very early on that just scaling up Batman’s abilities and gadgets wasn’t going to work as he is fundamentally facing a new game world and totally different range of enemies in this game, so we took his move set from Batman: Arkham Asylum and built from there," added Hill.

"Looking at the raw amount of animations in this sequel, Batman’s moves have doubled in number and we also wanted to create an authentic sense of continuity from the end of Batman: Arkham Asylum, so the player will begin Batman: Arkham City with many of the same core gadgets that they unlocked in the first game.

"Batman’s cutting-edge technology is a significant part of the game, so gamers can expect to see a range of totally new gadgets, as well as evolved new features built into those tools that they already enjoyed in Batman: Arkham Asylum."