Next year the Batman movie franchise hopes to be revamped by director Chris Nolan's and Warner Bros. with "Batman Begins". With any Batman film there is always a game that accompanies it. Unfortunately, there have been very few Batman games to truly succeed and not suck. Part of the fault would be attributed to developers not making a Batman that lives up to the source material. Well next year EA and Eurocom plan to give gamers the real Batman experience that we've all been waiting for.

Batman Begins will allow players to become The Batman. When I say "become The Batman" that refers to the Batman that criminals in the comic books fear. Yes, I said "fear". EA's Batman game will allow players to do those things that we've seen the Caped Crusader do for decades in comics. Afterall, Batman isn't just some guy dressed as a giant bat who runs around brightened streets beating up baddies with his brightly dressed sidekick. No, the Batman we know stalks criminals, messes with their minds, scares them, and then beats the hell out of them. Fear will be his ultimate weapon, not some batarang. And that is just what is being promised in the upcoming Batman Begins game.

Batman Begins will use fear as it's driving force according to sources. What is said to set Batman Begins apart from other Stealth/Action games is the EKG monitor displayed onscreen. With this Batman is able to look at a enemy and see their heartrate, thus indicating their level of fear. For example, say Batman is hiding in the shadows watching two thugs guarding courtyard. The two thugs heartrates are calm and they patrol apart from each other. Batman tosses a batarang at an object (trashcan, etc) causing a noise near one of the thugs. The thugs checks out the noise and in that short time Batman takes out his partner in crime. Turning around the thugs sees his crony laying unconscious, looks up, and sees the dark, foreboding silhoulette of The Batman. The EKG monitor goes wild. A picture-in-picture window appears on the corner of the screen showing the thugs fear-ridden face. As a result of this sequence of events the thug will be too afraid to call for backup or fight effectively. But that's just one dynamic of the fear factor.

Another dynamic of the fear factor is interrogation and reputation. Say Batman is hanging upside down by a pipe on the ceiling. Two guards walk by. Batman drops his upper body down, grabs the last guard, covers his mouth, and draws him up to the ceiling in one movement. The first guard turns and notices his partner gone and gets afraid but moves onward. Batman can interrogate the guard freely now. Of course Batman could've also beat the guards senseless and interrogated them too, but that isn't very Batman-like when stealthy options are available. In interrogation mode Batman can ask questions and even beat on his prey to force out more information. Once he gets his info the criminal can be knocked out. In true Batman comic style, the criminals will talk about their experiences to their cohorts and increase Batman's reputation. That will make Batman's appearance even more threatening next time around. Coolness!

It is easy to see that EA wants to make sure that Batman Begins is authentic to the Batman universe. Gotham City is beautifully rendered with real-time lighting, shadows, moving skyline, towering buildings, dark alleys, etc. Some environments will be interactive to aid Batman in his fight against crime. Treversing Gotham City will be a mixture of stealth, cape gliding, zipline sliding, rooptop jumping, and gadgetry in classic Dark Knight style. Batman himself looks great with the new suit and the various criminal scum are rendered nicely too.

Batman Begins seems to be an ambitious endevour which I'm sure many would love to see succeed. With a script written by J.T. Petty, who wrote the scripts for the Splinter Cell games, we can expect some seriously good dialogue. And the fact that the game will follow the film, but with expanded story elements is good news too. But most importantly, gamers will finally get to be the ones making Batman's enemies afraid instead of it being the other way around. Next summer might just be a great summer for Batman fans all around.