‘Batman: Arkham VR’ Leaps From PlayStation VR To HTC Vive, Oculus Rift (Update: Now Available)

Update, 4/25/17, 11:10am PT: Batman: Arkham VR is available now on Steam and the Oculus Home store.  Original article: 4/3/17, 10:10am PT:

Batman: Arkham VR debuted in October 2016 as an exclusive launch title for Sony’s PlayStation VR HMD. Soon the rest of the premium VR market will get to feel what it's like to be Batman as the game heads to the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift.

Batman: Arkham VR will make its PC VR debut on April 25, 2017. Rocksteady Studios didn’t say whether the new release includes additional content, but it seems like we might be in for a graphics enhancement, because the graphics in the PC announcement trailer seem crisper than they did in the PSVR trailer. Apart from the apparent graphics boost, we assume that the PC version of the game is the same as the PSVR version released last year.

Unlike its console and PC-based predecessors, which involved a mix of beating up hordes of enemies and solving puzzles, Batman: Arkham VR focuses more on investigating its story than on fighting bad guys. The game gives the impression that Warner Bros. Games and Rocksteady Studios were more interested in letting you see through Batman's eyes (cowl?) than on bringing the Arkham series' gameplay to VR.

What gameplay there is does rely on hand interactions, so you will need Touch controllers with your Rift headset. Rocksteady didn’t say how much the game would cost, but we don't expect it be too expensive, as the PSVR edition currently sells for $20. We're curious how the game will perform on HTC Vive and Oculus Rift--as the troubled Batman: Arkham Knight showed in 2015, Batman hasn't always successfully gone from console to PC.

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 Kevin Carbotte is a contributing writer for Tom's Hardware who primarily covers VR and AR hardware. He has been writing for us for more than four years. 

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  • Jeff Fx
    Nice. I haven't gotten PSVR for the exclusives since everyone who has used a Vive seems to find PSVR lacking, and I've already been disappointed by the Move controller tracking on regular games.
    Reply
  • jaber2
    I imagine it would be the next step for PSVR is to add tracking
    Reply