[Disclaimer: As always take any rumor with a grain of salt.]

Players around the world have enjoyed the Batman: Arkham Universe for over a decade now. A more grounded universe based around psychology, it has generated nine games, two novels, four comics, and the first good Suicide Squad movie… which was animated, by the way. Through all that success and despite the boon its ground universe gave it, the series would inevitably struggle to incorporate more mythical elements of both Batman and the wider DC universe.

With Warner Brothers desiring to create a unified video game universe having a Batman universe without magic, without souls and all the ramifications that come with them, it would be a difficult process. One that would require retconning a significant portion of the underlying lore that the Arkham universe is based around. After all, if souls exist how can you say the criminals are a result of their mental condition?

If a report from Geeks WorldWide is accurate, Warner Brothers’ solution to the problem is to soft reboot the Batman Universe to fit inside an expanded Video Game DC Universe. According to their sources, the upcoming Court of Owls game being teased and developed by WB Montreal will be the flagship of this reboot and launch of the wider Video Game Universe.

Shortly after the launch of the Court of Owls Batman, Rocksteady will release their long in development title that their source specified was no a Superman game. A superman game is in development at another studio, but there is no ETA as to when it will be released or if it will survive the development hell that has plagued the DC Video Game Universe for the last couple years.

Though the source said “soft reboot”, the problematic nature of incorporating a materialistic philosophy Batman into an expanded universe would be rather problematic from a lore standpoint alone. Adding to it would be the issue of having lore and characters either dead or already established within the confines unaffected by a wider universe.

After all, you can’t use the joker while he’s dying or long after he’s dead. It would make a pragmatic sense to keep the outfits, the vehicles, the character personalities, all that is Batman Arkham Universe from a personality standpoint, and restart the lore. This opens WB’s studios up to the freedom of being able to shape characters in an expanded universe without being confined to a decade-old series.