Back in February earlier this year, what the world saw was a generic, Destiny 2-style gameplay but with superheroes. Loot boxes, upgrades, crafting, battle passes. Gelatinous purple weak points stuck on everything. The presentation posed too many questions with seemingly little answer as to how these elements – and, let’s be honest, aspects which don’t belong whatsoever in a superhero’s world – marry up to create an engaging experience.
For starters… loot boxes?! What superhero – or, in this case, antihero, this being the Suicide Squad after all – needs to feverishly collect incremental improvements to weapons and gear in order to be powerful? Superheroes should be suitably kitted out from the get-go. This is the superhero fantasy. When we assume command for the first time in-game they’re already imbued with superpower, with intrigue coming from getting to wield those powers for ourselves in unique and exciting ways. The reason Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League missed the mark by so much is that it doesn’t understand what it means to be a superhero. If we wanted a game with guns and aliens, well, we’d play a game with guns and aliens. There’s plenty to choose from.
See, Kill the Justice League is created by the boardroom. You can envision the origin of the idea: let’s take something universally popular – like superheroes – and toss them in a blender with the most lucrative method of video game delivery we can think of – like live service. The most original thing here is the game’s focus on the Suicide Squad themselves, flip-reversing the usual role of good guys chasing bad guys and instead asking us to play through the eyes of an ordinarily nefarious character. But a seismic change must happen as there is a fundamental flaw with Warner’s plans to monetise a PvE game.
Surely, somewhere along the line someone in the boardroom has wondered how they plan to keep players engaged and paying once they’ve completed the story. Will there be be players still knocking about after the credits roll who care enough about skins to routinely complete weekly challenges (assuming there will be weekly challenges)? Furthermore, with Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League already being a full price AAA game the need for tacking on monetisation seems unnecessarily immoral. It’s a cancer on video games at large; we’re encouraged to spend more despite forking out a small fortune already. And yes, whilst you can complete the story campaign either solo or in squads of four, there’s a prevailing worry that we – the gamers – are being taken for the proverbial ride.
Delays followed last February’s lacklustre State of Play presentation, with it appearing from the outside Warner Bros. have held back release, instead opting to take into consideration the negative feedback it received from fans. However, upon the game’s return to the zeitgeist via an Insider 01 presentation and a new trailer unveiled at The Game Awards the live-service pitfalls and the cosmetics-focused battle pass were evidently still in tow. (Update: this was followed by another Insider episode). The real reason for the delay was likely down to QA and the need for more polish. Also, maybe it was to take it out of an already crowded release schedule; last May and June saw the release of many games which Warner might have seen as potentially overshadowing their own.
Now we have more details, and an official release date of February 2nd, 2024, at least we’ve learned that one major bugbear will be removed, although not in time for launch. That issue – amongst the most derided – was Kill the Justice League’s always online requirement, whether playing solo or in online co-op. Suicide Squad is clearly designed with multi-player in mind, but it’s a neat feature for single players to see the campaign through via choosing and switching between each of the four characters on a whim, with AI taking command of the remaining party members not in player control. Why there is a requirement for players to have a constant internet connection to begin with is baffling, but at least this is something the developers and publishers have acknowledged based on fan feedback, albeit only implementing sometime after the game’s release.
Another positive really is the most up to date glimpses of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League paint a clearer picture of the gameplay. It’s easier to imagine how distinct each of these characters will feel to play. It was always known that each of the four Suicide Squad members – Harley Quinn, King Shark, Deadshot, and Captain Boomerang – would come equipped with their own unique move set, but we never really got as clear a look at how this works in gameplay traversal and how their personalities really shine through until now. King Shark, for example, is all-out pummelling enemies. Captain Boomerang’s traversal is swift, and magic, with players able to combine air-dashes and boomerang tosses to stylishly take out unruly mobs from a distance. The interesting point here is these traversal skills are stolen at the story’s outset from the Hall of Justice. Whilst ostensibly providing the same outcome – a flashy way to hurl from point A to point B – each traversal power stolen by the Suicide Squad fits their personality remarkably well and goes some way to distinguishing the feel of each character even further.
Guns and weaponry are still important mind. Deadshot is equipped with laser precise sniper rifles, granting him prowess at head-shotting goons whilst zooming through the air on his jetpack, whilst Harley Quinn’s playful backflips precede powerful, skull-crushing melee attacks.
The game takes place in Metropolis, and it’s a playable area twice the size of Rocksteady’s most previous game Batman: Arkham Knight. Rocksteady have proven themselves capable of designing spellbinding game worlds given the excellently detailed Gotham City of the Arkham series. And, to give them credit, the Metropolis of Suicide Squad looks to be superbly designed vertical playground; it’s vibrant, colourful, and – most importantly – looks fun to traverse through. If the gunplay was a little bit derivative, at least Rocksteady’s part in creating the world looks top notch.
And this is the thing, and whilst this feature isn’t the first to say it: Rocksteady moving beyond single-player action-adventures to games as a service is, well, kind of weird. If Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League doesn’t deliver the goods, it’s unlikely responsibility will rest at Rocksteady’s doors. Warner Bros. seem hell bent on releasing umpteen looter shooters, shoehorning DC’s intellectual property into the model whether the shoe fits or not. Indeed, CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery David Zaslav is on record stating the company is going all-in on games with ‘always-on gameplay through live services, multiplatform, and free-to-play extensions.’ The only goal they have, evidently, is to get as many players playing their games as possible (which isn’t a problem) and keep them playing for as long as possible (which can be a problem, if the game itself isn’t fully designed around free-to-play, or games as a service.)
As it happens Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League isn’t going all in on live service. What’ll likely happen is plenty will play, and enjoy, the story campaign. They’ll get a lot of fun out of completing the game’s missions with their friends. After all, some of the gameplay in the latest trailers looks fantastic, the boss battle with Green Lantern an especially exhilarating highlight. But once the credits roll on story mode, there’ll be little to keep players interested. That is, until the huge amount of post-launch content begins drip-feeding to players – Rocksteady and Warner Bros. have promised there will be DLC, and thankfully it’ll be free. Let’s hope it won’t become a derivative content treadmill, as DC’s IP deserves the best.
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