Retailer reveals Arkham City alt costumes for Batman… AND BEYOND!

He is the terror that flaps in the night! Okay, wait… Now I’m getting all of my favorite 90s cartoons confused now. That’s not entirely my fault, since aNew Zealand retailerrecently posted a picture of three exclusive pre-order costumes for Batman - and GOOD GOD ALMIGHTY - one of them just so happens to be the caped crusader Arkham City star Kevin Conroy first made famous: BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES!!!

Above: Batman Beyond

Let’s start from the left. That strange alteration is a highly sculpted take on The Caped, or rather, Winged Crusader from Batman Beyond, a WB animated series that began broadcasting in 1999. The story takes place in the future where an elderly Bruce Wayne has decided to hang up his cape, and teenaged Terry McGinnis takes up the Bat mantle in a sharpened, more minimalist costume.

Above: Batman: Earth One

In the middle is the outfit you might not recognize, and that’s because it stems from the Batman: Earth One series which DCannounced years ago, but has yet to see the light of day. According to GR’s comic poobah Henry Gilbert, this limited series is not unlike Marvel’s Ultimates label, in that it’s setting out to tell a different, more modern day origin story behind the Darkest ofKnights.

Above: Batman: The Animated Series

AH HA! And here’s my personal fav, here’s the hyper-hand drawn Batman: The Animated Series Batman. Up until Christopher Nolan came along, this was how Batman was best remembered off the page, as DC showed a remarkable amount of balls with its mid-nineties TV series, which was considerably darker and moodier than what was then passing as kiddie fare. Not only did Batman: TAS essentially set the bar for the tone and style of DC’s animated division to this day, our hero was brought to life by none other than Kevin Conroy, the current voice of Batman in Arkham City. For many of us, Conroy will always be the perfect Batman!

Above: Early access to Frank Miller's "Dark Knight" skinwas confirmed as partArkham City's beatass Collector's Edition

So how can you whip your Batarang around these exclusive pre-order alt costumes? Well, unless you wanna buy the game from Australia, there’s not a whole lot you can do. There’s tone of confusing pre-order incentives floating around Batman: Arkham City, but don’t let it get you dizzy, friends! For one, it's almost a certainty that US/UK retailers will recieve these at some point. Add to that, these are Day One DLC bonuses, and you can probably rest assured they’ll be made available to everyone, probably for purchase, immediately following the game’s release.

Aug 2, 2011