Gotham Knights Diaries Part Ten

This is my exploration of Gotham Knights where I will chronicle my playthrough like a text-based Let’s Play. I’ll point out all of the Easter Eggs that I can spot in the footnotes at the end of each part. Now let’s continue Gotham Knights…

Having uncovered a strange liquid called dionesium in a Court of Owls mine, I had returned to Belfry after a brief run-in with Talia al Ghul…

Alfred Pennyworth reported that the city records held no mention of mining in Gotham City for a long time. Then, Dick Grayson handed him and Tim Drake earbuds to hear the repaired recordings from Batgirl’s first encounter with the Court of Owls. Meanwhile, Barbara Gordon and Jason Todd were discussing how the dionesium was exactly what Talia had described; weak lazarus pit water that could create controllable zombies.

Suddenly, Alfred exclaimed that he recognised one of the voices: Constance Cobblepot. While she was likely related to Penguin, it was in name only due to Oswald’s proclivities having resulted in him being ousted by the family, according to information I’d come across at the Iceberg Lounge. While the Batcomputer’s software couldn’t match the recordings to file records, due to damage from the death pit, it would be a different matter matching the recordings to live voices. And Dick knew of an upcoming event at the Orchard Hotel, the Masquerade Ball, where the upper class would be toasting the life and legacy of Bruce Wayne.

Alfred warned that security would be tight, but with luck and the right vantage points, we’d be able to put faces to voices. Though, I was a little dubious since everyone would be wearing masks… In any case, Alfred knew the head of security, a Mr. Hendricks, and had set up a meeting that I would have to attend before the Masquerade Ball.

Barbara had several emails, including some sent to herself as well as the team? Judge Elena Moreno’s last case before the death of her brother and her subsequent disappearance related to shutting down construction in the Chelsea Tunnel, so we needed to investigate. There was a “joke” from Dick, Barbara asking Tim for help arranging system redundancies, her telling Dick that she’s reset his password again, and her telling the team that she’s set up some races. I would not be attempting the races.

Since I had some new blueprints, I crafted Batgirl’s Team-Up Incendiary Tonfa and equipped the Detective Basic Batarang, then checked on the samples of Clayface that I had collected. Tim confirmed that the supervillain had been “torn to shreds” by a turbine during his last clash with Batman at the reservoir — something that one of Batman’s audio logs had told me previously. He went on to say that Clayface’s DNA had changed since he had analysed it before, and moments after Barbara jumped in to hypothesise what was going on, Dick went all “great detective” on them. By which I mean, he hadn’t followed a word and required it to be dumbed down.

The two heroes explained that Clayface was currently in too many places at once, but as those parts recombined he would become stronger and smarter, and more dangerous. At least in his current state — diced into microscopic pieces throughout Gotham’s water supply — he wasn’t hurting anyone (that we could prove). So, we ran a scan for his unique clay signature (apparently a thing we could do) and located it at Dixon Docks.

Arriving at the dock, I checked out a warehouse to find some filming equipment — cameras, tripods, microphones, etc — stolen from Elliot Television Studios. Scanning some residual clay, I followed the trail to another warehouse where I found some mobsters and a Clay Mimic, all of whom I made short work of. The Mimic escaped into the sewers but made it super easy to follow on the Batcycle by damaging the road surface and frequently popping out through manholes. As I gave chase it started to knock over trucks, cause cars to collide, and be a general nuisance, before finally dropping down into the sewers again.

Following the trail, I could hear Clayface talking to himself about making a movie showing what kind of monster Batman really is. Then, some Clay Mimics ran away, leaving others to guard the area, but I took them all out quickly and quietly before following the ones who ran. Again, I could hear Clayface talking to himself about Batman. I spotted a movie script on a table, which was titled Batman: The Terror, and written by Clayface, an excerpt of which seemed to be near the climax with Batman kicking “awesome hero Clayface” into a turbine.

Sliding down a pipe, I interrupted filming where Clayface was being confronted by a second Clayface (but with pointed Batman ears), the whole thing crewed by three clay golems holding clay equipment. All of them seemed nonplussed that I was there, though annoyed that I tried to argue that Batman hadn’t attempted homicide. However, upon learning why Batman wouldn’t be coming down into the sewers, Clayface grew angry. After all, Batman had just tried to kill him a few days ago! Except, it had been a year and the turbine had clearly done some damage to his memories.

Clayface attacked, along with Clayface and Clayface — the objective listed them as Clay Homunculi, and a tooltip said Clay Amalgamates but they all acted identically — and after defeating them some golems entered to help beat me up. However, I soon won the day and Clayface escaped by squishing himself through a locked gate, taunting that he would invite me to the premiere of his next project…

Returning to Belfry, my patrol summary said that I had defeated 23 enemies, three of which were silent takedowns. Not sure how that worked, since I had taken out five Clay Mimics without being spotted, and no other enemies silently…

Since I had some points to spend, I upgraded with HP +, Unflinching Heavy Strike, and Piercing Beatdown. I noticed that I was slightly over-levelled for the mission Gotham City on Ice, so I decided to take on Mister Freeze. A cutscene began with the police scanner exclaiming that there were 12 people frozen solid, and a shootout at Elliot Center. Dick Grayson, the master detective, saw his breath misting, then noticed Belfry’s big window ice up, so asked Tim Drake if the weather had reported an ice age. Alfred Pennyworth chipped in that the temperature had dropped 60 degrees Fahrenheit (it’s impossible to know the Celsius conversion) in minutes, and asked if there was an extreme cold front.

Both of these adults knew that Mister Freeze was currently active in Gotham City, so that interaction really annoyed me. Freeze wasn’t even a brand new supervillain, Batman had promised to help cure him some time ago, and their first thoughts were “it’s just a bit chilly”?

Jason Todd was the first to suggest that it was Freeze, and Barbara Gordon confirmed that the origin point of the storm was Elliot Center, and upon arriving as Batgirl I knocked out a couple of goons to help the police. Of course, I was spotted so had to beat up the rest of them. The police helicopter in the area helped me out by blowing a hold in the ice, allowing me to grapple up and very, very slowly squeeze through a gap. As I travelled upwards, I beat up Regulators and avoided falling ice, finally falling inside the building through a window.

There were frozen civilians around the atrium I found myself in, as well as more Regulators. I took most of them down silently, but the last couple spotted me and I had to bash their heads in. Grappling up an elevator shaft, I squeezed through a gap in the wall to get outside again, then grappled to the roof. The weather machine was there, so I attached the disruptor only for Mister Freeze to enter the fray.

Taking out most of his health, I was defeated for the first time (by an enemy and not a death trap). However, I won on the second attempt! Freeze tried to grab the disruptor, for some reason not thinking to do that minutes prior, and it overloaded his suit. As he lay there dying, Batgirl casually pressed the external reset button to save his life. Freeze wasn’t thankful, instead saying that letting him die would have been so much easier for us…

Returning to Belfry, my patrol summary said that I had defeated 30 enemies, eight of which were silent takedowns. Speaking to Alfred, he told me that I’d need to interrogate some Regulators to find out where their supply of cryo weapons were. But for now, there were a load of premeditated crimes to put a stop to, a Historia Strigidae to find, a member of The Watch to speak to, and a ball to attend…

FOOTNOTES

Dixon Docks is more than likely named for writer Chuck Dixon, who wrote a ton of Batman comics in the 90s, launched ongoing comics for Robin and Nightwing, and co-created Bane.
Batman: The Terror could be a nod to the 2001 storyline Terror by Doug Moench & Paul Gulacy, published in Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight, but that didn’t feature Clayface.