I wasmildlyexcited forSuicide Squad: Kill the Justice Leaguein the run-up to its release. WhenRocksteadyshowed off the first in-depth look at gameplay in early 2023, itprompted instant, severe backlashfrom fans who were annoyed that the game didn’t look more like the studio’s trilogy ofArkham games. This time around you weren’t a solitary force stalking the shadows and punching henchmen’s lights out in rhythmic combat. You were one part of a co-op team shooting bullet-sponge enemies. Though we had known that Suicide Squad was co-op for years, Rocksteady fans still weren’t ready for what they saw.
I wasn’t part of that backlash. I evenwrote a piece defending Suicide Squad, comparing its gameplay to my beloved (and similarly maligned) Crackdown 3. Given that that game went through development hell and was greeted with shrugs when its final version (which was significantly pared down from itsinitial pitch) actually released, that likely wasn’t the comparison Rocksteady was going for. But rambunctious open-world shooting with an emphasis on superhero platforming was what the studio seemed to be serving up and, if it could deliver on that, I was committed to giving it a shot.
Reviews Killed My Enthusiasm
Then thereviews came out and seemed to universally conclude that the game was meh, with a repetitive structure and boring, simplistic missions. Suicide Squad arriving at the $70 price point that has become standard in this generation meant those reviews killed my mild interest, at least until the price got significantly reduced.
The $10 upcharge console players have seen this generation makes sense as a way to offset longer, more costly development cycles. But it also means that many players are less willing to take risks on games that don’t get raves at launch.
Less than a year after launch,Rocksteady is set to give Suicide Squad away for free on PlayStation Plus. Given that some interest has reignited around the game in the past few months as the price has been slashed significantly, it feels like the perfect opportunity to finally see if my initial instincts were correct, or if I was right to stay away.
Don’t Call It A Comeback (Because It Probably Won’t Be)
One of the beautiful things about gaming is the possibility of new life for games that fumbled out of the gate. The glut of games in the live-service market has made this kind of redemption arc increasingly rare, as games likeXDefiantandConcordget smaller and smaller windows to make a dent. But some of the defining games of the last decade have faltered upon release.Final Fantasy 14was a disaster before it became the best-loved MMO in the world.No Man’s Skywas a massive disappointment before it became synonymous with redemption. Smaller games likeEscape from TarkovandAmong Usfound success randomly years after release thanks to the whims of the internet (and trend-setting streamers).
Coming to PS Plus is probably just a last-ditch effort to get Suicide Squad in players' hands, given that a year tends to be the absolute longest that games like this are allowed to struggle anymore. But that isn’t a bad thing. Getting people to play a game that took this much time and money and effort to make is a better outcome than deleting it from existence. I’ll finally be picking Suicide Squad up now that it’s on PS Plus, and I hope other people do, too.
The live-service bubble has definitively burst at this point, and I hope that Rocksteady, like Naughty Dog and BioWare before it, is pivoting back to what it does best. I don’t want the result of a decade of work to simply stop existing without anyone taking notice.
