“Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League” Review – Are the Negative Comments Justified?

We’re sorry for the delay in the review. One of the writers onboard with the review came down with an illness the day before the game was released and therefore took longer to play through the game to give it a fair review.

Rocksteady Games. The studio behind the hugely successful Batman: Arkham games. When you discuss the best superhero games of all time – the Batman games are always at the top of the conversation or at least in there somewhere.

People longed for a new Batman game and when the announcement came that Rocksteady had shifted their plans to a live service Suicide Squad – the internet erupted (not in a good way).

Whenever a game is announced and known to be a live service game, it’s immediately hit with negative attention, and for good reason too. Many games have tried this method and failed, more recently, comparable and notable was Marvel’s Avengers. Crystal Dynamics and Square Enix lost money on the game due to how poor it was.

The issue with live service games is they need a LOT to keep up to the standards of replayability. There aren’t many games that can do that. Maybe Call of Duty, Fortnite, EA FC, Destiny, and a few others but it’s difficult to keep players playing for a lengthy period. The fact Rocksteady is willing to trial this with Suicide Squad is a huge risk in itself and it’s still too early to tell if the game will be another Marvel’s Avengers or the next Destiny.

Let’s take a look at the Metacritic reviews from the point of writing (February 4th, 2024)

Metacritic reviews were an odd one. No critics were given codes before the game was released which raised red flags. Metacritic didn’t allow anybody to review the game until February 3rd, 24 hours after the standard edition of the game dropped. This red flag became further red considering early access to the game had been given to those purchasing the higher editions of the game and getting it days earlier. So far, the Metacritic reviews do suggest this game may not make it as far as Rocksteady hopes to do.

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Information and products Daniel used to play the game;

• Platform: PlayStation 5
• Edition: Standard
• Screen: 4k Samsung TV 27″
• Audio: SteelSeries Arctis 7P+ Wireless
• Release: February 2nd, 2024

Information and products Daniel used to play the game;

• Platform: PlayStation 5
• Edition: Standard
• Screen: 4K Samsung TV 46″
• Audio: HyperX Cloud II
• Release: February 2nd, 2024

Initial thoughts

Honestly, the initial thoughts were this isn’t as bad as people are making out. The game throws you into a tutorial for all 4 members of the Suicide Squad. Deadshot, Harley Quinn, King Shark, and Captain Boomerang. You get an idea of how each character works and their traversal methods of getting around a broken Metropolis. You then get brought back 7 days in the past where the game truly begins.

I chose Deadshot as my character, I had planned to do so even before the game came out. Phil chose Captain Boomerang. One of the things I liked about the game was the fact the characters weren’t really plug-and-play. You had to play with a character and understand them, their abilities, their traversal, weapons, and so on to get an idea of how they play. It was a learning curve but an enjoyable one where you can learn new things about them.

The combat is obviously chaotic and at times all over the place but it’s designed to be like that. Marvel’s Avengers was the same but Suicide Squad has a more satisfying feeling to the combat. It is smooth and the way you can move around or change your style of attack is generally pretty good. With my build of Deadshot, I use a sniper rifle and an assault rifle which works well for the type of shooter player I am generally. I love being able to jet pack into the sky, hold the high ground for a little bit, and snipe enemies. It’s satisfying.

Phil was excited for this game generally due to the story above all else. He’s a huge Suicide Squad fan and I was excited for the story as well being a DC fan. People didn’t like the idea that you’re killing the Justice League but I think this is what switches this game up from others out there. You’re playing as the villains trying to save the world from a Braniac-controlled Justice League. The thing is, you generally feel how powerful they are as well. One of the first missions when you encounter Batman for the first time is actually frightening. He beats the sh** out of the entire team until you escape.

Now, don’t get me wrong. This game isn’t perfect. It definitely has its flaws. I initially just hated the idea of this game because I am completely against live service games now after so many failures. I instead opted to go in with an open mind which helped a great deal. I’m not going to sit here and tell you it’s the best game released because it’s not. It’s far from it. But it’s certainly not a 1/10 or a 1-star game that people keep throwing out.

I thought the same with Gotham Knights but maybe my experience has been enhanced with both of these games because I’m playing completely with Phil. I haven’t played solo and I think these types of games are designed to be more fun with friends. It feels that way. This isn’t a game I think I’d enjoy as much without anybody to play it with.

I’m not going to sit here and tell you it’s the best game released because it’s not. It’s far from it. But it’s certainly not a 1/10 or a 1-star game that people keep throwing out.

Am I wrong though?

Dislikes

As always, I do like to point out the flaws of a video game early in the review. I do this, particularly because I prefer to get the bad points out the way so when you’re reading it, you can save the best until last.

1. This may be a bug but who knows? I didn’t receive any pre-order bonuses despite pre-ordering the digital version of the game directly from the PlayStation store. This annoyed the hell out of me right from the beginning and now I immediately don’t trust buying anything in the store.

2. The enemy types begin to get boring quickly. Avengers had the same issue with the robots where it’s just the same layers of enemies over and over again except in the boss battles. The enemy types are different normal, heavy, snipers, etc. However, I feel like this will get even more boring in the end game part of the game.

3. I have to mention this, the live service aspects of the game. Despite the fact I’m somewhat enjoying the experience, I still hate the fact this game chose to go down this route. We haven’t had a battle pass yet but we do know it’s coming. There’s already microtransactions in the store to buy currency for skins. The skins in the store at the moment are awful as well. I feel like this game may become a bit too predatory so we need to tread carefully for that.

4. The customization is weak. Gotham Knights had better customization than this as did Avengers. It’s poor from what I’m looking at so far. The suits aren’t great and don’t appear to get better anytime soon. At least with Avengers, you could customize your build more to make it work for you, it doesn’t appear to be the case with this at the stage we’re both at in the game.

5. Servers are an absolute issue. When attempting to play the game after killing The Flash, I couldn’t get on the servers as they were down. The main problem here is that the game is online only, meaning if the servers are down you physically cannot play the game. £70 games should not be this reliant on online only and need a backup plan in case this type of issue happens.

Story

The story is very interesting in my opinion. Having the story be about Brainiac infecting the world as well as taking over the greatest heroes in the DC Universe and having the Suicide Squad be the heroes is good.

The concept of the world’s heroes and villains coming together to ultimately save the world is fascinating. Seeing the multiverse come into play as well makes the story that much better. I’m interested in seeing where the story goes post-story.

You know, they could have easily gone with “You play as the Suicide Squad but Batman will be there to help you along the way to give you gadgets and equipment”. They didn’t which I’m thankful for. Having the story be the Squad basically on their own with Wonder Woman refusing to help them just makes the story a tad more interesting.

Understandably, we have seen a lot of people complaining mainly about the Batman aspect of things. We get it. I do believe this should’ve been a 4th Batman game. I think Suicide Squad should’ve been its own thing. The main issue I have is we have no idea if this is linked or not. It appears as though it is but then we’re not so sure.

The story has been good up until the stage we’re at which is shortly after killing The Flash so we’re not too far into it to give it a proper end rating but so far, we have enjoyed it.

Gameplay

The gameplay is fun. I’ve been enjoying it thus far. It takes a bit of learning to master the traversal of the characters but once you do, it’s honestly so fun to ping around the city with Boomerang using the speed force and seeing Deadshot flying about with his jetpack.

Throughout the gameplay, in the open-world sections, if you look around you can usually spot Batman just watching over you, learning everything you do. It’s quite a scary experience and I finally know how the criminals of Gotham feel when Batman is watching them.

For now, the gameplay is alright, I expect the gameplay to become more and more exciting once downloadable content comes shortly.

The weapon system, the mod system, and the affliction system are all very simple and easy to get the hang of. It’s not an over-complication of the system where you need to mod everything together or use certain things. You can find a gun and use it, you can mod them for more stats and that is it.

Honestly, the combat is fun. It may seem like a straight-up shooter combat system but it isn’t. You have to do different things depending on the enemy. Sometimes you would need to go in with a melee but other times you may need to use your weapon to freeze an enemy and then shoot them. Other enemies can go into a stance where you would need to counter them and then kill them to regain shield and ammo.

Characters and customization

The characters that we can control are good. Each character is different and has different personalities that bounce off each other and you can tell that this is somewhat of a working friend group. You have the serious and straight-forward one in King Shark, the obvious crazy one in Harley, the “I’m doing this for my daughter” type in Deadshot and you also have Boomerang who, well, he’s the one who speaks before he thinks and it tends to backfire on him usually resulting in him getting punched.

The customization so far is minuscule, to say the least. I began the game with 3 different suits which all come with different colors and have 3 different sections you can change, the body, hat, and color. You can also buy two different suits in the store for each character which the store will be added to throughout the game’s lifespan. Another way of getting more customization is simply buying the deluxe upgrade which gives you Justice League-inspired gear.

The customization for the weapons and load-outs is decent as well. You can get different rarities for weapons and armor mods which make the game different for each player. It’s fairly easy to get these new weapons etc which is a huge plus.

Content

So far the content is also on the weak side. While I do believe more content will come over the next few months, the base game is simply just a story for now. That’s not to say it is a bad thing. There are plenty of things to do within the base game.

Along with the story, you have side quests within the open-world aspect of the game. You have stuff that the Riddler gives you like riddles and time trial stuff that you can complete which is different for each character – one notable thing I like is the person who did the best in the previous mission becomes the Team Leader. It’s a small but nice touch when you’re in a squad.

I will say though, that the missions are seemingly a bit repetitive except for the boss battles which are done very well. I’ve already mentioned that the enemy types aren’t unique and just seemingly similar to Marvel’s Avengers which does hurt the game slightly. I want to see more human enemies as well and I hope this is something we get in the future.

In regards to added content – right now, it’s trash. Battle passes and more microtransactions are on the way but we’ll see how predatory they become. The Avengers game was somewhat generous giving us all of the challenge cards for the heroes in the game already, only making players buy the cards for future heroes. I can’t see Suicide Squad doing the same here but I hope they give something back to the players.

So content is a bit weak at the moment. Granted, there is some good stuff to upgrade and change with your weapons and mods but in terms of missions, etc, there needs to be more variety to it. I hope they do add some interesting content in the future and do not take the same avenue the Avengers did.

Bugs

1. At the beginning of the tutorial mission, I invited Phil to join my session. It then completely messed the game up. It teleported me into an elevator with no way out or anywhere to go. I had to restart the entire game so not a game-breaking bug or anything – but wait until you’re outside the Hall of Justice before inviting a friend.

2. By far not a game-breaking bug or anything like that, this is more so along the lines of a hilarious bug. In the game while playing with Dan, I was using Boomerang, Dan was Deadshot. The bots were both Harley and King Shark, well in this bug, except the actual cutscenes, we had two King Sharks running around with us.

Buy, rent, wait for a sale, or avoid?

This isn’t a game we’d recommend going out and spending £70 on right now. I don’t agree any live service game should be £70 because of the amount of content in the game you need to pay for including battle passes. This is a wait for a sale. Maybe at £40, this wouldn’t be that bad of a purchase. I just think battle passes should not exist in full-price AAA games.

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Rating: 8.1/10

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