Walkthrough

Arkham Knight does not hand you its side content all at once. Most Wanted targets surface as story chapters clear, some of them need a Batmobile upgrade you do not have yet, and a couple only exist after a specific cutscene has played, which means no list of missions can be worked through top to bottom. The useful question is not which missions exist but which ones you can actually finish right now.

So this guide is ordered by when things open and what you need to be carrying. It covers the Ace Chemicals story mission and six Most Wanted missions, including the Robin episode, and hands off to our collectibles guide for anything you pick up along the way and our mechanics guide for what the endings need.

When each mission opens

Two of these are sweeps that stay open for most of the game, three are one sitting each once triggered, and one is not Batman at all. The Most Wanted count matters for the finale: our endings guide puts the threshold at seven of the fourteen to reach the Knightfall Protocol and all fourteen for the true ending.

Start here: Ace Chemicals

Ace Chemicals is the long early story mission, and it is the one that teaches you the Batmobile is a tool rather than a car. Scarecrow has the plant and five workers who know where the fear toxin bombs are, and Gordon cannot get past the gates because the Arkham Knight has just dropped the bridge into the water.

The beats run in a fixed order. Grapple up, then take the second floor terminal off five militia goons using the floor grates rather than a brawl. Climb to the highest point of the building and sweep with the Batscanner to mark all five workers. The first is in the small office opposite the entrance on the eastern side, which you reach by gliding through the window. From then on the mission alternates between fighting on foot and solving the environment with the Batmobile: winch the broken road up into a ramp so the car can jump the gap, blow the tanks with the 60mm Cannon, winch open the circular tank holding the second worker, use the Riot Suppressor when a room fills up, and later winch the elevator counterweight to move a lift that is blocking the last stretch.

Two of the workers are already dead when you reach them, and one more is beyond saving. That is not a mistake you made. Our page says it plainly: there is no way to save all five, because the deaths are written into the story.

It ends with the Arkham Knight in an attack helicopter, which wants the 60mm Cannon while it moves and the Vulcan Cannon the moment it holds still, then a fear toxin bomb carry where the gauges tell you when you are walking too fast. Anything over three lit and you slow down. Our Ace Chemicals walkthrough has the full route including the Panessa Studios flashback that closes it.

Island sweeps: clear these as the chapters unlock

Two Most Wanted missions are not missions so much as standing jobs. Both spread targets across Bleake, Miagani and Founders' Island, both pay Upgrade Points per target, and both refuse to be finished early because the story keeps the later targets locked.

For the mines, get close enough and the target starts showing on the minimap. Clear the guards first, then attach the virus with the Power Winch and hold the marked ground while it uploads, which is what the Batmobile's Battle Mode is for. Winch again when the upload finishes to fire the mine off safely. Our page gives threat ratings for ten of the fourteen, running from Very Low up to Extreme, and the Extreme pair are the two that need Chapter 9.

The APCs work differently: nine of them, three per island, in random spots, and they get harder as you go rather than being tiered by location. Each one adds speed, rocket fire rate and escorts, and from the fifth onward they carry double rocket pods. Watch the top right of the screen for the APC's health and its remaining escorts, and watch the bar above the radar, because that is the signal and if it empties the APC is gone and has to be found again. The Ram charge upgrade turns the afterburner into your best weapon against them. Full detail is on our Armored and Dangerous guide.

Disarmament has a boss on the end of it that the APC hunt does not. Clear all fourteen mines, then finish Own the Roads and Occupy Gotham as well, and Deathstroke's tank is waiting on Grand Avenue on Miagani Island. Deal with the Cobra drones using Missile Barrage, chase them onto their tails and hit the exhausts with the Heavy Cannons, shoot his guided missiles down with the Vulcan Gun, and move laterally and vertically to dodge everything else. Our Campaign for Disarmament guide lists all fourteen mine locations island by island.

Set pieces: play them once, get them right

Heir to the Cowl

This one starts in Chapter 3 while you are looking for Oracle, when Alfred points out someone standing beside a burning bat symbol. Four rooftops, four combat trials, and every one of them has to be cleared as Azrael without taking a single hit. Trial one is on the Kingston building west of the Gotham bank on Miagani at 3039, 2668, against six thugs, two of them carrying bats. Trial two is the Otisburg rooftop south of the Fire Station on Founders' at 2728, 1472, where seven thugs come with an elite brawler who throws things at you, so Cape Stun into a beatdown. Trial three is the small rooftop opposite the Osamu Tower in Central Chinatown at 1896, 2343, and the medic among those nine thugs is the whole fight, so remove them first with a Remote Electrical Charge or a counter throw. Trial four is on the Lady of Gotham statue against six sword specialists, and their sword swing only answers to a Blade Dodge.

Afterwards you go to the Clock Tower in Chinatown to reconstruct Azrael's memories, and this is where people fail the mission without realising: five markers have to be scanned in the right order, at 00:00:00, 00:05:55, 00:16:44, 00:28:92 and 00:41:31, and missing one fails Heir to the Cowl outright. The mission then offers you three endings, which our Heir to the Cowl guide walks through: kill Batman, break the sword, or simply take the elevator and leave, which resolves the same way breaking the sword does. All three finish the mission, none of them touch the main story, and the Angel in the Dark achievement plus eight Upgrade Points arrive either way.

Two-Faced Bandit

Three banks, unlocked one at a time, each of them a fight in two halves. While the alarm is going you can be as loud as you like, because the clock is the money leaving the vault; the moment the alarm stops the remaining thugs know you are in the building and it turns into a predator room. The counter in the top centre of the screen is tracking both things at once, the thugs left and the cash left.

Chinatown on Bleake is the tutorial version, with three thugs in the caged vault you can take in one combo and the best floor grating network of the three banks, which lets you cross the whole building underground. Drescher on Founders' is three floors joined by elevators, ten thugs and two million dollars on the clock, so open with a Fear Multi-Takedown on a group of three. Kingston on Miagani is the largest bank in the city, wants fifteen enemies down before Two-Face arrives, and is the only one with chandeliers you can drop on people with the Remote Hacking Device. When Two-Face walks in with medics, a Detective Mode jammer and a scanner, take the jammer first, then the scanner. Two-Face himself goes down in one takedown. Each bank has its own achievement, and our Two-Faced Bandit guide has the enemy counts for all three.

Lamb to the Slaughter

The last Most Wanted mission to open, and it starts with an empty chair. Jack Ryder normally sits in the GCPD interrogation room, and when Oracle calls after you save her servers, you go there to find an audio tape instead of a journalist. He has gone to the Lady of Gotham, which sits out on the water, so you gain height and glide to it.

Before you drop into the cage, spend a moment on the two weapon crates with the Disruptor, because that keeps most of the knives and guns out of the fight. Then it is twenty five cultists in three minutes inside an electrified ring, with Ryder's life on the timer. Some of them will still have knives and others will pick up what gets dropped. The fence is a weapon too, so push people into it. When the crowd is down, shut off the four generators under the stage with the Remote Electrical Charge, grapple up and take the side entrance on the right to reach Deacon Blackfire. Our Lamb to the Slaughter guide has the setup in full.

Playing as Robin: A Flip of a Coin

The one entry here you cannot reach as Batman. A Flip of a Coin is a DLC episode set after the Knightfall protocol, with Robin following Two-Face's laundered money out of a garbage disposal facility and into a mansion. It plays like a compressed Arkham game: quiet takedowns through the floor grates downstairs, then an incinerator with three floors that has to be cleared by grappling up and down, then the Foreman in the control room who tells you where the mansion is.

The mansion is where it gets good. Do not drop into the main hall, because two sentry guns and a brute are waiting. Take the vent from the railing instead, gel the breakable wall in the secret room behind the brute, get back on the rope above the hall and detonate it, which removes the brute before the fight starts. Disable the turrets with the Remote Hacking Device before you land, and if they come back online mid fight, our page recommends switching to fear takedowns to end things quickly.

The security door puzzle is the bit people search for, so here it is: six mechanical statue heads sit above the door and each one flips between an angel and a demon. Set the three on the left to angels and the three on the right to demons and it opens. After that a sniper laser lands on Robin's chest, which is your cue for the ballistic shield, and then Two-Face is in his chair with a room full of goons and a coin. Dodge the stun stick swings, pick up dropped guns to swing at people, and use the shield to stun. Apprehending him unlocks Succession Plans, and the whole episode is on our A Flip of a Coin walkthrough.

A sensible order to work through

Take Ace Chemicals as the story gives it to you. Start Armored and Dangerous the moment the Batmobile gets its first upgrade, because nine APCs at one Upgrade Point each is the cheapest experience in the game and they spawn near you when the mission is selected. Pick up mines whenever a chapter boundary passes rather than trying to sweep them, and accept that the last of them wait for Chapter 9. Do Heir to the Cowl while the trials are still level appropriate. Leave Lamb to the Slaughter alone until it appears, since it cannot be started early. And treat A Flip of a Coin as a separate evening, because it is a separate character with a separate gadget set.