We’ve Played Batman: Arkham Knight On Switch - Here’s 17 Minutes Of Gameplay

So is the review embargoed, or did you get no review code in advance? Either way, pretty disappointing from WB Games / Nintendo with the game now in the wild.

Looks better than it did on PS4/360 though, so you also have to compare with how this game has always looked and ran in the past... dropped frames might be the engine too

I've watched the first seven minutes and this is nowhere near as bad as I expected. If his is the worst of the trilogy then it's good enough for. I've never played these games before, I can't wait!!

I kinda wish they changed the art style to more cartoony to improve performance while keeping great graphics. I don’t mind worse graphics, but it sucks having lame black blob shadows, no smoke, reflections and bad explosions! Wish they put more effort into Knight!

Personally it doesn’t look playable enough for me to ever bother with it. I’ve played the PS4 version of it though, could just be spoiled.

Bummer. Combined with the inadequate physical edition and with so much other stuff to play I think I might be passing on this one. We’ll see what the reviews say.

Honestly outside the Batmobile it doesn’t look terrible. Heavily downgraded from other versions, but still fine enough if the switch is all you have. Hopefully a patch is released to stabilize the frame rate for both Knight and Asylum.

Oeh yes i want.
Already have it on pc, but want to play in handheld.

This looks unplayable on Switch.

I will say that both Asylum and City look truly amazing on my big-screen and am loving both of them. Knight...is, I hate to say it, both better than I expected and also so frustrating to see in action.

I haven't checked out Knight, but so far on City I think it's pretty solid. Noticed some mild choppiness in some cutscenes but the gameplay seems smooth.

Up to us? If the game has issues regarding framerate and overall performance, just say it loud. You bashed games with fewer problems in the past.

If I didn’t have this already on other systems, I’d give it a shot. But there’s no reason to have this if you have other options.

@rushiosan I mean some people are more willing to put up with frame rate issues and the like. It is kind of subjective on your personal tolerance for that kinda thing.

I'd only pick this up after many patches and a steep discount. A few stutters here and there are one thing, but the way it runs when you're in the Batmobile is unacceptable.

@dartmonkey thanks for the reply. No reviews on metacritic, so I'm guessing you weren't alone in that regard

That looks pretty rough. 😬

@nessisonett Knight was the one I was both the most worried about, and also the least excited to replay. Might just dust off that PS4 copy for a replay if the other two spark my desire to do so.

@rushiosan
They have a review coming out in a few days, this article wasn’t really meant to give the authors opinion on the game.

If I HAD to choose, I would had preferred if Arkham City was on cart. Alas, no full release is complete. SEA regions confirmed theirs is roughly the same calibur of lazy.

The big issue seems to be in the batmobile sections, a lot of things going on screen. Still seems playable overall to me.

No interest in owning the other consoles and my laptop is no where near capable of running this game, so I'm content sticking with the Switch version.

Perhaps I’m in the minority, but this looks like it plays quite well for the switch. I never got around to any of the Batman games when they were released, so this feels like a treat. I’ve already completed Witcher & Assassin Creed in portable mode, and this seems to be right on par with them.

I’ll still wait for the NL review, but at first glance, this feels like a solid 7 or 8 in a genre of game I enjoy.

Eh it performs badly on all platforms and looks playable on switch. I will still get it but waiting on a sale.

RIP Kevin Conroy.

I'm glad they showed B:AK. It would be the one I'd be most worried about. Honestly, this doesn't look nearly as bad as I thought it might. Not going to compare with other systems, but that's not the point here. Other than the more intense fights, this should be fine. Come to think of it, I'm rather surprised how well some developers have done porting large open world games to Switch. The system was certainly not designed with those kinds of games in mind. I have wondered if Nintendo is taking this more into consideration taking queues from PS5 and Xbox on how they approach hardware design to support open world games.

Dang it. Now I gotta go fire up AA and start the whole series over just to pay tribute to Conroy. RIP

I'm soooo getting this when I can!!

Wow, this looks fun. I mean I've heard of these games but I've never seen them played. You're legit Batman. Same about those frame rates though. I don't care too much about frame rates but those driving sequences were a bit much even for me. What does it run best on? PC, I guess. PS5?

Guarantee this game will get more patches considering the delayed release. Which excites me because it already looks pretty damn good. If they can fix the stuttering I'll be happy. Hopefully things will be in a better state by the time I'm finished with the first two games

@The-Chosen-one

I never played but handheld would be nice.

I have a Steamdeck OLED for it.

@Daggot I'm so excited to play Asylum again. That's almost a perfect game in my eyes. RIP to Kevin Conroy, it'll be nice to hear him again.

Same ole Switch.

@sword_9mm
Nice!

Thanks for posting the video.

"disclaimer: we won't actually be shining the NL logo into the sky when our review is up, sorry"

I wouldn't have thought of that, but now that you mention it I'm disappointed.

@TCKuma I waited years to play Knight and really enjoyed it when I finally got round to it last year. I’m not sure it was in great shape when it launched, so sometimes I wait for games like that until I can judge them on their merits.

As long as Asylum and City work well, I’m fine. I never liked Knight anyway.

Looks serviceable to me. /shrug

But I'm pretty old school, I remember the days of fighting with PCs to make games work at all so I probably have a high tolerance for sub-par performance.

They should have ported Origins instead. This'll likely be a skip for me, despite how much I love the first two.

I remember people saying that GTA Trilogy was “unplayable” even after patches, but then I played it myself and found it not perfect, but absolutely playable and enjoyable.

So, I don’t know what to think. Reserved judgement.

This was always going to be the roughest of the trilogy, but honestly, it doesn't look quite as bad as I was fearing. I'm hopeful for the patches.

What I really wanna see is how Asylum and City play. Those two were my favorites in the series.

Funny enough Arkham Knight was the first game I tested when I got a Steam Deck. Man it runs and looks sooo great on the Deck 😎 Glad more people can enjoy this game. 😁

Standard quality in 2020s

@MasterGraveheart You should be very happy!

Having a blast playing City, looks and plays great handheld!
Arkham Knight is rough around the edges, still playable though..
Hopefully there will be some patching on the way.

Running fantastic for me!! Very playable and fun

@BoFiS No, it doesn't look better than the PS4. Dropped frames and low quality textures are very noticeable on the Switch.

Knight was the worst running of the series. And it seems they still haven't fixed the issues.

So, either I have terrible luck or there is NOTHING on the Arkham Trilogy cart.

I got the physical edition and popped it into my Switch...Asylum does NOT load. I returned it for a 2nd copy and again, the ONE game that is supposed to be on the cart does not load. Either I have bad luck or WB games shipped a blank cart or a cart that requires an unlock that does not yet exist.

Wtf.

Should have put Arkham Origins in the bundle instead. Knight had a slim chance to becoming a good Switch port.

@Jimgamer8 went through the credits sequence on Arkham Asylum - looks decent, but some frame skips and graphical glitches. Will persevere. Love many of the ports on Switch, so hope this one works out. Sadly Arkham just stopped working with my new SteamDeck so good timing I suppose.

An odd glitch I have now encountered in City is that the locked gates in the museum seem to be invisible. No clue how that happened, and maybe closing the game would fix it, but it's definitely caused some confusion.

@Jimmy_G_Buckets Honestly Origins would probably also be a giant crapshoot. Every version of that game is held together with prayer, it's probably why it's not been ported anywhere.

@Bizzyb Same thing happened to me. Just restart your Switch completely. Thats what fixed it for me.

City on Switch makes you feel like Batman. Knight makes you feel like Batman's parents.

For the steep asking price of old games, I expect no less than a steady 30 fps fully functioning games.
No excuse for the framerate drops 8n knight and asylum.

@mr_somewhere Yeah. Arkham Origins was released on Nintendo Wii U and they could have just ported that.

Bought it for asylum and city and they run okay. Minor hiccups during combat and detective mode. Maybe we're lucky and that'll be patched out but since it's the unreal engine I assume not.

They wanted the trilogy on Switch. But everyone knew that Knight could be too demanding for the system. They've done the best that they could with the system. However it will be enhanced for switch 2 hence the download only.

I tend to have a high tolerance for graphical downgrades and even performance issues, but the Batmobile sections look unplayable even to me. Yikes.

Seriously, what happened here? There weren't any previous indications that it would turn out this anti-miraculously.
Now I wouldn't think too much about this, even if it all gets righteously fixed one day. If this was 2018 it would be a huge deal and would start countless debates about Switch's capabilities, but right now it's simply about fixing it because we all know it's possible, and considering the success of the platform and its future successor coming any time soon, it definitely deserves it.

@JohnnyMind Holy run-on sentence Batman!

Does anyone know if the devs are going to plan any patches for the three games? Would be nice if anyone had any info on that front.

Got tired of just watching videos and jumped into AK tonight. Gotta say, it is not as bad as OUTER WORLDS was when first released. I have been driving the Batmobile in first person (my prefered method on PS4 as well) and have not had any issues. I do wish they would have scaled back the rain and the ambient lighting a bit to pick up performance (also because I just simply hate the constant rain in this game). I also wish they would have added some graphical options like The Witcher 3. I was able to fine tune that game to my personal graphical tastes to balance gameplay and visual fidelity. That should be an option here.

Asylum and city are both great so far, any frame drops is just nitpicking imo, pretty sure they were in the originals which I have on pc and wii u from back in the day. Waiting on knight to download but from the videos I imagine wb games pushed to get this released for Christmas and the sales before the developer could tinker with it a bit more. It was never going to match ps4 preformed wise but hopefully with patches they can iron the issues out by scaling back some of the fancier effects. Same situation with gta trilogy which is completely fine now. All patched up on switchup best source to see what games have been corrected and improved.

@NarutosBiggestFan There's a 17 minute video above showing that it is, in fact, playable.

@PJOReilly Thanks for the reply - it's a bummer that publishers put you and other outlets in this situation - it doesn't inspire confidence in them - and of course, it is no reflection on the work you and your great team do.
I picked up my pre-order. Asylum and City seem fine, perhaps the former more downgraded than I expected (SteamDeck spoiled me). I put an hour into Knight - and it's oddly not too troubling. For sure it isn't the best way to play it - but it's playable and reminds me of trying to discern detail playing Doom on the GBA - a handheld experience you didn't expect to be possible.

@rainbowtick I know they need to respect the original look of Knight, but if the system can’t handle it, they should have opted for more Zelda style graphics or just wait for new system to release!!! This starts to get annoying! Also the cartridge sizes! Switch is the only console where a fraction of the releases is on the cartridge- look at Doom, Metal Gear Collection, now Batman!!!!! Wake up people and let Nintendo know this is not ok! Next is Resident evil games- all in cloud because Switch can’t run them, then Kingdom Hearts Games- cloud only, Hitman-cloud, and many more,….How can nobody complain that Switch is getting these half cooked physical releases and no longer gets proper releases for big third party titles!!!! They have scraped off the bottom of the barrel to an extreme! We need a serious horsepower for the next system and I won’t be forgiving any more crappy releases by Nintendo! I used to side with N over PS, but Nintendo has been abusing its loyal fan base for too long, just because a lot of the users are kids, who don’t even know how to voice their opinions.

@MarioBrickLayer My feelings exactly.