Vaporware Chronicles: The Dark Knight

<p>In my humble opinion&comma; <em>The Dark Knight<&sol;em> is Christopher Nolan&&num;8217&semi;s best Batman film&period; Heath Ledger nailed The Joker&period; And it was a joy to see Two-Face on the screen as he should be&period; This is also my second favorite Batman film ever&comma; coming in at a close second to Tim Burton&&num;8217&semi;s <em>Batman<&sol;em>&period; I&&num;8217&semi;ve been fascinated with Batman since I was eight years old&period; And while I&&num;8217&semi;m ashamed of the current DC Movies out there&comma; it is nice to take a look at what was almost perfection&period; Little did I know in 2007 Pandemic was brewing a tie-in video game that could have blown our socks off&period; Unfortunately&comma; it joined the ranks of many deceased games&period; Here is its sad tale&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;137932" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-137932" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-137932" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2018&sol;05&sol;07140556&sol;Batman-The-Dark-Knight-Video-Game&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"359" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-137932" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>The Dark Knight<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; EA&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<h4>The Glory of What Was Pandemic<&sol;h4>&NewLine;<p>We all know how amazing Pandemic&&num;8217&semi;s games use to be&period; This was the studio that brought us <em>Destroy all Humans<&sol;em>&comma; <em>Mercenaries<&sol;em>&comma; <em>Full Spectrum Warrior<&sol;em> and of course our beloved <em>Star Wars&colon; Battlefront<&sol;em> games&period; Their last title&comma; <em>The Saboteur<&sol;em>&comma; was met with critical acclaim but not financial acclaim&period; It is sad that the failed development of <em>The Dark Knight<&sol;em> put the final nail in their coffin&period; In the video below you get to see some of the development that had taken place by the team&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<h4>The Cost of Not Meeting Deadlines<&sol;h4>&NewLine;<p>Rumors were floating around in 2008 that Pandemic&&num;8217&semi;s <em>The Dark Knight<&sol;em> would be releasing alongside the movie of the same name&period; The rumors also stated that the game took place after the events of the movie and would follow Batman along an open-world Gotham City&period; Commissioner Gordon himself&comma; Gary Oldman&comma; said in an interview with G4 that the game developers had finally smoothed out Batman&&num;8217&semi;s gliding ability&period; Unfortunately&comma; the game did not meet the June 2008 deadline and was pushed back to December of 2008&period; This cost both EA and Pandemic a huge sum of tie-in money&period; According to <em>Newsweek<&sol;em> magazine that missed date cost the studio and publisher an estimated &dollar;101 million dollars&period; That is a huge chunk of change&comma; especially when the development studio is missing deadlines left and right&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;137937" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-137937" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-137937" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2018&sol;05&sol;07142137&sol;thedarkkngiht-1&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"480" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-137937" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>The Dark Knight<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; EA&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>December was fast approaching and EA knew that Pandemic was not going to have the title finished&period; In October EA officially canceled the title and instead of getting an amazing open world Batman game EA was given a bill for 100 million dollars&period; EA was none too pleased with this outcome and laid off Pandemic&&num;8217&semi;s Brisbane Australia office on the Christmas of 2008&period; They didn&&num;8217&semi;t stop there&comma; they closed that studio completely in February and then in November of 2009 they completely shut down Pandemic&&num;8217&semi;s LA office&period; A sad end for a once great studio and an interesting game&comma; we all know what happens next though&period; In August 2009 Rocksteady&&num;8217&semi;s near perfect <em>Batman&colon; Arkham Asylum<&sol;em> was released to both critical and financial success&period; To quote Jack Nicholson&&num;8217&semi;s Joker&comma; &&num;8220&semi;You can&&num;8217&semi;t make an omelet without breaking some eggs&&num;8221&semi;&period; The omelet was<em> Arkham Asylum<&sol;em>&comma; the eggs&comma; sadly&comma; were Pandemic Studios&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;