Amid confusion over the future of Warner Bros. Games, footage of a long cancelled Batman game has been recovered and shared online.
To say the gaming division of Warner Bros. has had a tumultuous few years would be an understatement. Of all its big releases over the past few years, Hogwarts Legacy has been the only bona fide hit, with the rest massively underperforming.
It’s what led to multiple studio shutdowns last year and now the company is selling off the entire gaming division to Netflix, as part of a wider deal.
There’s no telling how things will pan out in 2026 but, in the meantime, a shadow of the publisher’s past has popped up, with early development footage of a cancelled Batman game that looks impressively good.
The game in question is only known as Project Apollo and was in development during the early 2010s at Monolith Productions, the studio responsible for the Middle-Earth: Shadow Of Mordor games. The developer was shut down last year, when its long-delayed Wonder Woman project was scrapped.
This Batman game would have been unrelated to Rocksteady’s Batman: Arkham games, which were still being released at the time, and instead it would’ve been set in the same universe as the live action movies from director Christopher Nolan. (There was actually a game based on Batman Begins from EA, in 2005, but it wasn’t very good.)
Self-proclaimed ‘retro and obscure video game enthusiast and archivist’ MrTalida on Bluesky has managed to recover a number of pre-production documents and videos about Project Apollo and shared them via the Internet Archive for anyone to peruse.
They also posted a small selection of videos detailing some very early gameplay footage, which shows off glimpses of how mechanics like combat, stealth, and throwing smoke bombs would have worked.
Even at this early stage, the influences of Nolan’s movies can be clearly felt. This version of Batman wears a similar suit and Monolith intended to let you drive the armoured tumbler version of the Batmobile.
Rocksteady was unlikely to be happy about any of this, especially if they were asked to share resources, it wouldn’t be surprising to find out they were egging on Warner to cancel the game. Especially given their consistent attempts to pretend Arkham Origins, which they didn’t make, doesn’t exist.
According to a Did You Know Gaming report, though, some concepts from Project Apollo would carry over into 2017’s Middle-Earth: Shadow Of War.
This is far from the only Batman game to have been abandoned over the years. Before it did Gotham Knights, Warner Bros. Montréal reportedly worked on a Batman game that would have starred Batman’s son Damian in the lead role.
For now, fans of the caped crusader have a new Lego Batman to look forward to, which incorporates elements from all the movies, and various other media, including the Nolan films.
Expert, exclusive gaming analysis
Sign up to the GameCentral newsletter for a unique take on the week in gaming, alongside the latest reviews and more. Delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning.
Rocksteady is also reportedly working on a new Batman game, following its disastrous Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League. That’s never been officially announced though and no one knows if the project will survive the Warne Bros. acquisition.
Email gamecentral@metro.co.uk, leave a comment below, follow us on Twitter.
To submit Inbox letters and Reader’s Features more easily, without the need to send an email, just use our Submit Stuff page here.
For more stories like this, check our Gaming page.
