Video of abandoned Batman game surfaces

Gamers could have had a chance to see the world's greatest detective go head-to-head with history's most notorious serial killer. While Day 1 Studios' adaptation of the Batman vs. Jack the Ripper comic Gotham by Gaslight never saw the light of day, an early video of the project on Siliconera gives a glimpse of the game that could have been.

Clocking in at just over 2 minutes, the animation prototype clip shows Batman traipsing around a Victorian-era Gotham shrouded in mist. The video appears to place specific emphasis on the motion of Batman's trenchcoat/cape and the way shadows play off of the environment. The city streets are mostly desolate, save for a handful of placeholder models, including a gun-toting civilian and a second copy of the caped crusader.

Originally published in 1989, Gotham by Gaslight is an alternate reality tale that wonders what would have happened if Jack the Ripper had followed up his London killing spree with a series of murders in a Gotham City under the protection of the dark knight. It was written by Bryan Augustyn and drawn by Mike Mignola, best known as the creator of Hellboy. According to Siliconera, the game adaptation was developed as a pitch for THQ in 2009 and 2010, but it was never picked up.