(1) What is the Batman Telltale series?
Telltale Games is releasing an episodic story driven game set in the Batman universe. The game is currently untitled.
(2) How will a Batman Telltale Series work? Will the gameplay revolve around action or story telling?
Telltale has only just established its new trademark game style with The Walking Dead in 2012. We don't expect that style to change completely for Batman. Telltale focuses on new storylines and aims to tell new, intricate stories in well-known settings. The game progresses through the player's dialog and plot choices, interspersed with carefully orchestrated QTE action sequences.
(3) Aren’t Telltale games all about dialogue? How can they handle an action series?
Telltale games do indeed focus a lot on character development, but Telltale is certainly capable of making action scenes too. In titles such as Wolf Among Us, Tales from the Borderlands, or Game of Thrones, Telltale does a good job at incorporating lots of action scenes into player choices and character development.
(4) When will the episodes be released?
The series was confirmed to premiere in Summer 2016. Release dates for specific episodes have not yet been announced.
(5) For which platforms will Batman be available?
The episodic game series will premiere digitally on home consoles, PC/Mac, and mobile devices. Specific platform details are yet to be announced.
(6) How much does Batman cost?
This is unknown as well, but it's likely to be the current usual cost for Telltale's games of $5 for an episode or a bundle comprising of all episodes that itself averages out to $5 an episode.
(7) I'm new to all that episodic game stuff. How are they doing this?
You can expect to receive a new episode roughly every month. Each episode contains an individual part of a story that is held together through a narrative that connects all of the episodes together into what Telltale calls a season. Think along the lines of a serialized television series such as Lost. An episode usually lasts about as long as a good movie would.
(8) How many episodes will there be?
Batman will have five episodes.
(9) Will the different platforms release simultaneously?
Almost. Telltale has come a long way since 2009, when the PC and console releases of their episodes were months apart. Nowadays, most platforms released within days of each other, and even these small lags were only due to the different release schedules of XBLA and PSN NA. However, PSN Europe always lagged a bit more.
(10) Are there concrete release dates for all these episodes?
Ok, here's the really really important part. There absolutely are not!! While Telltale doesn't start each new episode 'from scratch', large parts of the development cycle still take place during these release months. From writing to animation to voice acting to possible gamer input from the forums, it all comes together to form a new episode only weeks and days before release; and eventually, another time frame insecurity is added when console manufacturers receive the final build of the episodes for their quality assurance process.
As a consequence, since Telltale has to sync up release dates with all of their distribution partners, fixed dates will only be announced mere days before an episode releases (in Telltale's blog, on their Twitter, Facebook page, etc.). Don't ever believe dates given by various unofficial sites! These are nothing but estimates, placeholder dates and possibly wishful thinking.
(11) Telltale has so many games in development. Will this affect the quality or development time of this game?
No. Since the success of Walking Dead: Season 1, Telltale has sized up from 70 people to near 350 people, and now have five times the amount of staff members they had during Season 1, so multiple projects at once should not be a concern. They now have a big enough staff to work on four projects at once as well as extra staff members to work on side projects. (Even before Walking Dead: Season 1, Telltale had several points in time where they worked on multiple projects with a much smaller staff size of less than 70 people.)
Even though Telltale announces their projects ahead of time, this doesn't mean that each game is in full production. All games by Telltale Games are first started with a small team of just a few people, who do things common in very early development, such as sorting out the season wide story and working on concept art. As the deadline nears, more people are brought in to work on other things, but it is still a small team. Full production doesn't start until the current seasons wrap up, and seasons that are announced years in advance won't begin full production until long after that. The currently ongoing series also don't affect each other, as different teams are working on each project. Even in the case of shared staff, the work load is light enough for these staff members, that their working between projects doesn't have any affect on the quality or development time of either project.
In an
interview with Hollywood Reporter, Kevin Bruner stated that "Telltale's approach to game development is much more like television than most other game developers. Across all of our series — The Walking Dead, Minecraft: Story Mode and more — the development process at Telltale spends a significant amount of time upfront in the writer's rooms not just with writers, but designers, directors and creative input from all across the studio.
It's not unusual for our games to exist longer on whiteboards and sticky notes and in scripts than they do in traditional game production. It's incredibly similar to how TV often spends so much time in preproduction and planning before moving into actually shooting."
To see what current and future projects Telltale are working on, follow our "Future of Telltale FAQ" thread for frequent updates!
(12) Which languages will be available?
Only English is certain at first (as that is the original language as written by the Telltale writing staff). Information on other languages usually comes later.
(13) Will there be a bonus/free collector's DVD version for Batman available from the Telltale store?
This has yet to be revealed, but it's possible.
(14) Who is voicing Bruce Wayne/Batman? Is it Kevin Conroy?
This has not be revealed currently, but it's possible. However since this is in a different continuum than the Arkham games, that is unlikely, as Job J. Stauffer
stated when asked if the AMC show actor will voice Michonne in The Walking Dead: Michonne that she will not because "This is a different continuum." and this may apply here.
(15) What universe is this game set in? Comic? Man of Steel? Dark Knight? Arkham series?
Telltale will be working in their own interpretation of the Universe.