LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight

Overview

Rise as the Dark Knight and experience the essential Batman story in a bold, action-packed adventure with hard-hitting combat, an open-world Gotham City, and the signature LEGO charm that fans know and love.

Made by TT Games and published by Warner Bros. Games. It follows Bruce Wayne from his training with the League of Shadows to becoming the hero of Gotham City. He builds a new family of allies with Jim Gordon, Catwoman, Robin, Nightwing and Batgirl, and faces the Joker, the Penguin, Mr. Freeze, Poison Ivy, Bane and more.

Combat mixes combos, stealth and detective skills. Gotham is open, so you can grapple, glide or drive the Tumbler and other Batmobiles and Batcycles between crimes, challenges, secrets and landmarks such as Arkham Asylum, Ace Chemicals and Wayne Tower.

Key contributions

I built the animated-object system the whole game uses, the Batclaw, projectile system, helped develop Gordon's Rebound Launcher and other gadgets, and a range of the abilities players and NPCs share.

• Helped create and maintain the core gameplay and player mechanics as part of the gameplay team.
• Designed and wrote the animated-object system used across the whole game.
• Built gadget behaviour and mechanics such as Batman's second main gadget, the Batclaw, architected the projectile system and helped develop other mechanics such as Gordon's Rebound Launcher.
• Worked with technical designers to design and build the mechanics for player interactions.
• Made data-driven projectiles and systems that designers can set up themselves.
• Wrote reusable abilities that players and NPCs share, and drop-in, drop-out co-op.
• Wrote AI behaviour and reactions to the player's mechanics.
• Made generic debugging tools to save the whole team time.
• Optimised for memory, CPU and GPU budgets, with tests proving each change.
• Ran tests on every build and added one for every recurring bug.
• Helped ship patches, DLC and the Switch 2 launch without breaking the live game.
• Turned existing tests into reliable reproductions and debugged unfamiliar systems with detailed logging.

Technical details

• Unreal Engine 5 and C++, with Blueprints where designers need to build on top.
• Gameplay Ability System: reusable abilities and effects shared by players and NPCs.
• A state-driven animated-object system written in C++ and used across the whole game.
• Data-driven projectiles and systems that designers configure without engineering time.
• Co-op with drop-in, drop-out players acting on shared world state.
• Profiling and optimising to memory, CPU and GPU budgets, including reconfigurable object pools.
• Automated tests on every build, with a regression test for each recurring bug.
• Shipped on PC, PS5, Xbox Series X|S and Switch 2.