One-hundred and twenty-seven days.
Batman: Arkham Knight is returning to Steam on October 28, which will mark one-hundred and twenty-seven days since the original (busted) launch date. The re-release will be day-and-date with a patch that “brings the PC version fully up-to-date with content that has been released for console,” according to a post by WB Games.
In case you’ve missed this whole sorry debacle: WB and Rocksteady put out Batman: Arkham Knight in June. The PC port was a mess—not just locked to 30 frames per second but poorly optimized too. And buggy. And with a bunch of textures/effects missing (like rain).
So Batman crawled back into his hole for four more months of winter or whatever while WB worked on a fix. There have been a few interim patches, but this is The Big One—the one that makes Arkham Knight (hopefully) the game it should’ve been from the start.
That’s not really saying much. I thought Arkham Knight was mediocre even if you put aside the technical issues, but at least people will finally get the game they paid for.
The only surprise in this whole fiasco is that WB isn’t offering PC players anything to win back their good graces. I expected a nominal gesture—a free piece of DLC or whatever to those who held out this long—but all WB’s giving away is gratitude. “We want to give particular thanks to the members of the PC community who took the time to give us clear, detailed feedback and bug reporting,” says WB. Judging by the number of ASCII middle fingers in the comments, people seem to feel this is small consolation.
Ah well, at least this saga is coming to a close. Let this be a lesson: Don’t preorder games. Or if you won’t heed that advice, at least take advantage of Steam’s refund policy when necessary.