With a drivable Batmobile, a brand new (and non-lethal) disruptor gun, and a whole menagerie of playable characters, Rocksteady and Warner Bros. Interactive's upcoming superhero simulator Batman: Arkham Knight is bringing a lot of new material to the table - but it doesn't have everything. For one, it doesn't have multiplayer.

That's not an oversight or a budget-mandated omission, either. Rocksteady didn't want Batman: Arkham Knight to have multiplayer, at least not according to director Stefon Hill. "We knew we didn't want to go down the route of creating a multiplayer experience," Hill said. "We thought the player being in control of both characters was really interesting, rather than splitting it up into a co-op experience."

Hill's referring to Batman: Arkham Knight's Dual Play mode, in which players can switch between Batman and and one of his allies in the middle of a fight. With Arkham Knight just few weeks before the game's release, Hill's finally talking a little bit more about how Dual Play works, mostly in a discussion documented by Games Radar and the Official PlayStation Magazine.

Notably, while Arkham Knight is an open-world title (complete with seamless, screen-free loading), players won't be able to between members of the Bat-family whenever they want. Dual Play only kicks in during specific areas of the game. As Hill explains:

When you get into those areas [characters like] Nightwing will join you and you'll be able to switch between both characters whenever you want. You have one button press to switch between [them] and as you fight you can maintain a combo across both characters.

Players won't be able to choose which one of Batman's allies they're using, either, as supporting characters only appear when it's appropriate for the story. Every Dual Play character is linked to a particular villain - Nightwing helps take down the Penguin, for example, while an older trailer showsBatman taking down goons with Robin, and glowing green robots with Catwoman. Sadly, this makes it sound like players will only get to team up with one character at a time; think less Justice League, and more The Brave and the Bold.

The Dual Play characters aren't the only members of Batman's supporting cast that players can get their hands on. Pre-order DLC includes playable prologues featuring both the Joker's ex Harley Quinn and the former Robin Jason Todd (alias The Red Hood), while future DLC will add Batgirl, aka Barbara Gordon and Oracle, as a playable character.

Batman: Arkham Knight is out June 23 for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC.

Source: Games Radar