One of the more exciting reveals during Gamescom’s Opening Night Live ceremony last week was Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight. Not only is TT Games returning to the Caped Crusader – its first time since 2014’s Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham – but it’s doing so with a brand-new take on the superhero… kinda. I say that because a lot of Legacy of the Dark Knight will feel familiar to those who watch and read about Bruce Wayne’s bat-shaped half, and that’s by design.
Instead of continuing its original storytelling from the first three Lego Batman games, TT Games is fusing various Batman media, namely films like the Dark Knight trilogy and 2022’s The Batman, to tell a definitive story. I played roughly 50 minutes of the game and caught references to Batman (1989), Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy, and even the 2010 animated feature, Batman: Under the Red Hood. TT Games promises even more, including 1966’s Batman, Batman Returns, and various comics and graphic novels.
Immediately after hearing and seeing all these references, I was curious how TT Games approached utilizing all these various (and unique) properties to tell a single, cohesive story. Assistant design director Jimmy Sedota tells me it’s about mashing together the highlights.
“It’s been a fun challenge,” he says. “We’re pulling from so much. There’s so much inspiration and reference out there, so as we started developing the story, we looked at some of the most iconic moments that we know, that even casual fans would recognize […] and so we started with that, the highlight moments, and we started to see how we could lay out a single story that’s our retelling that also references that stuff.
“Then from there, we started pulling more and more of that deep lore in, so looking at comics, TV, and all that stuff, and really starting to find moments like, ‘Oh, we can get this nice lore cut in here, and we can reference this thing here.’ Even in the ACE Chemicals mission you played, there are definitely references to the 1989 film, but also Under the Red Hood, and some stuff from the comics. And we feel that we’ve married that all in a way that tells a unique story, but is something that players and fans will recognize as familiar at the same time, with, of course, our humor and Lego TT Games twist on it.”
That ACE Chemicals mission Sedota mentions was the primary focus of my hands-on preview at this year’s Gamescom in Cologne, Germany last week, and it was a blast. It also showed me that Legacy of the Dark Knight doesn’t feature inspiration from just movies, TV, and comics – it takes massive inspiration from Rocksteady Studios’ Batman Arkham series. And wow, am I so glad it does.
I’ve enjoyed previous TT Games Lego versions of beloved characters and stories, including Batman, but combat has always been the weakest point of the experiences for me. It felt too simple, with not enough challenge to keep me engaged. TT Games is tackling this in two ways: using Arkham-inspired combat and including, for the first time in its Lego games’ history, difficulty options.
There are three combat difficulty options: Classic, which “offers a traditional Lego experience” with unlimited lives, fewer enemies, and less frequency of advanced enemy types; Caped Crusader, which “offers a balanced focus on combat and story” with unlimited lives, more enemies, and advanced enemy types that appear more frequently; and finally, Dark Knight, which “offers harder combat for heroes seeking a challenge” with limited lives, even more enemies/frequent appearances by advanced enemy types. Dark Knight also includes a level reset upon losing all your lives. While you can gain lives by collecting hearts in missions, if you lose all of them, you’ll need to restart the entire level.
I chose Dark Knight for my ACE Chemicals mission, and I’m so glad I did. It’s a perfect challenge for the game’s Arkham-inspired combat, and I quickly fell back into my habits of sneaking around, taking enemies out, and grappling to high-up gargoyles and perches to plan my next attack. I performed stealth takedowns from the ground, even sneaking around in underground grates and through air ventilation shafts (where, like the Arkham games, your view transitions into first-person). Unfortunately, I was unable to perform stealth takedowns from gargoyles and perches, and I’m not sure if that will be an aspect of the game’s combat.
Still, stealth feels incredible, especially when coupled with distractions like throwing Batarangs or blowing up explosive barrels. Outside of stealth, my Arkham memories continued to push to the forefront of my brain as I pummeled enemies with the Square button, countering them with Triangle, and flipping over shielded enemies for attacks from behind with Circle. I even dodged bullets shot my way to glorious effect. It really feels like playing an Akrham game, but smartly, combat features the unique TT Games twist you expect. Sometimes takedowns were straightforward – other times, like while playing as Jim Gordon (who resembled the Gary Oldman version from Christopher Nolan’s Batman films, though appearance varies based on costumes), I bashed an enemy over the head with a bug-catching net to comedic effect.
“We’re huge fans of what Rocksteady was able to achieve […] and this was built from the ground up at TT for what we think is the best Lego Batman combat system for our fans and for our games,” Sedota says. “We have co-op, multiple playable characters over the course of the story campaign, gadgets, and more, and we feel we’ve created something uniquely our own.” I do see how Legacy of the Dark Knight features unique flourishes in combat, courtesy of TT Games, but also… this combat is basically just Arkham combat, and that’s great! That combat rule,s and it feels fantastic here!
I especially love all the humorous touches TT Games has added to its otherwise classic take on Gotham, complete with rainy nights, lots of neon signage, dangerous streets, and enemies galore. Similar to TT Games’ more recent Lego games, not everything in this game is made of blocks. Instead, TT Games uses Lego as signposts to players.
“It’s a really good mix of art direction, design direction, and usability and UX design,” Sedota says when I ask how the team balances Lego vs real-world elements in-game. “When you see Lego, you expect to be able to smash it. [Legacy of the Dark Knight] still feels like a really beautiful modern game, but it still has plenty of Lego touches, and when you see those, you know most are interactable. That’s for players to recognize, ‘Oh, I can interact with that.’ That’s the marriage of our design and visuals.”
In the ACE Chemicals mission I complete, Batman and Gordon are tasked with infiltrating the compound, and I mostly stick to the shadows to do so, though I find myself in a couple of brawls, too. Switching back and forth between these two characters is good fun, as Batman plays, like, well, Batman, while Gordon uses a non-lethal gun to shoot giant sticky globs onto enemies, making them easy to beat up. Outside of combat, the mission requires these two characters to work together. As I’m playing solo, switching is as easy as tapping on the d-pad, but TT Games envisions me playing couch co-op with someone else taking control of the opposite character. There are light, easy puzzles to complete that require switching from Batman to Gordon, then back to Batman, and vice versa, every so often in this mission, and it feels reminiscent of TT Games’ typical puzzle design.
This mission ends how you might expect, as a figure under a Red Hood falls into a vat of acid and may or may not become a certain villain in Batman’s extensive rogue gallery: Joker.
Speaking of Joker, if you saw the reveal trailer, you likely recognized that Legacy of the Dark Knight features a Joker inspired by Heath Ledger’s legendary performance, at least in appearance. I don’t encounter the Joker in my preview, but Sedota tells me the characters in this game aren’t based on a single iteration of the character. The team is drawing inspiration from various Batman media, and while costumes will allow different characters to resemble specific iterations, those costumes don’t alter the character. Batman and other characters in Legacy of the Dark Knight will remain consistent in their personalities – you only choose to have your Batman look like Robert Pattinson’s, Christian Bale’s, or maybe even Adam West’s iconic take.
“We’re not just doing all the movies,” Sedota tells me. “There’s a single [English] voice actor [for Batman] that’s constant throughout. Even as Batman progresses, the story features that single character, but we’re bringing out some humor, keeping it light, and building this all through story and gameplay mechanics.”
However, Sedota tells me the consistency is primarily for Batman and the extended Bat-family, teasing that we might see more character evolution in the game’s villains.
Beyond the ACE Chemicals mission, I also got to play around and explore the open-world Gotham, and it’s a visual treat. Immediately, I look for the nearest grapple point and am thrilled to learn that you can tap the jump button for a powerful boost mid-grapple when you reach the end point, similar to the Arkham games. This sends Batman flying high into the sky, and I glide down a bit before dive-bombing into a group of unsuspecting enemies below. After this, I solve a quick Riddler Puzzle Box and find a Wayne Tech Cache with a Lego piece inside. By clicking the right stick, Batman utilizes Detect, which shows you where to go and locates nearby things to interact with – it’s basically detective vision.
I eventually make my way down to the streets below and call up the Batmobile via the d-pad. The one that appears is the muscle car variant seen in The Batman, complete with its roaring turbo. TT Games has already shown off the Tumbler from the Dark Knight trilogy and the 1966 Batmobile, and I look forward to other iterations that might appear. Driving around feels great, as rain pours from the moody sky, causing the neon signs above to glisten in reflections on the streets. I complete a quick time-trial race and can already tell I’m going to be spending a decent chunk of time behind the wheel in Legacy of the Dark Knight. As for which Gotham this is, it’s an original version from TT Games, but, like the rest of the game, it draws from a wide range of Batman media.
“We looked at lots of maps, games, and comics, in particular, and looked at the basic structure of certain things you need to have in Gotham,” Sedota says. “There are always multiple islands, and we found something for the right size of our game, and there are different islands that unlock as you go through the main story, and new content opens up.” He adds that you’ll have all four islands of Gotham unlocked about halfway through the main story, but lots of “new activities” will appear over the entire course of the campaign.
This open-world Gotham, like the ACE Chemicals mission, is impressive. I’m more impressed with a TT Games Lego game than I’ve ever been with Legacy of the Dark Knight, and I’ve only played for 50 minutes. As a massive Batman fan desperate for another video game adventure with the Caped Crusader, TT Games seems set to deliver everything I want and more. Truly, I cannot wait, and I’m legitimately annoyed I have to until 2026 (but please take your time, TT Games, and don’t crunch).
Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight is set to launch on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, and PC (via Steam and the Epic Games Store) sometime in 2026.
