Rocksteady's Suicide: Kill Reputation

RATING:
😡 - 41% - C-

REVIEW:
Is this as bad as some people have been saying? No, it's not a complete dumpster fire even though some may lead you to believe that. The first review I saw was a 1/10.... It's truly not that bad, and there is some to appreciate here. The thing I want to highlight the most is the incredible voice acting. I haven't seen nearly enough praise for it, and every single actor/actress completely embodies their character. I gotta give credit to pretty much everyone in here so let's just run through the names. Tara Strong - witty with perfect line delivery. She feels 100% like Harley Quinn. Daniel Lapaine - perfect Australian accent with so much charisma. Bumper Robinson - able to be a more human side of the Suicide Squad, and he makes the very minimal depth his character has substantial. And Joe Seanoa is 100% King Shark in disguise. Everyone else does a great job in their villainous roles, although with little time I can't say too much about them besides the fact they really do feel like the characters the play. Every bit of Kevin Conroy we get is amazing though. He's a truly perfect voice actor. Rest in peace to an unforgettable legend that transformed not just this genre, not just this industry, but the world. Moving over to the story side of things, this is actually a very good premise for a game. Rally together the Suicide Squad to do what no one else can - kill the Justice League. It's a compelling idea with so much potential and opportunity. I liked seeing the dark sides of these famous superheroes known for being these symbols of good. The story sadly gets best in the cutscenes. Wonder Woman v.s. Superman was one of the best parts of the entire game, and it's just a cutscene. It's so cool when the story gets going, but it can't keep that in the gameplay. It's also fun to see these characters interact. The voice acting, the line delivery, the jokes - I mean this game has a lot of genuinely funny moments.

This is also what a AAA game should look like. The graphics are incredibly good, and seeing these vast, bright, colorful landscapes brought to life for the first time was really cool. There's a very high production value, and the visuals did entertain me at first. It starts off in a really cool location to kinda tease you, but it ends up doing nothing with that and the locations start to feel VERRYYY repetitive. Another cool location was the dark bank for the Batman mission where he takes the team out one by one. That was an awesome mission where the dread and tension actually kicked in. If only the rest of the missions were like that.... The dark atmosphere, the haunting figure of Batman, it was cool. The combat system also starts fun. I can't say that I didn't have a big smile on my face when I started playing. It starts off fun. I also like the idea of rallying together a squad to go through story mode. However, it should be separated from a regular solo run. I say that because I don't like that you have to be connected to Internet to play the game. If you gave solo players an area to go through the story without Internet, and you had an area for online story mode, then it would have been a lot better. Having to connect to the Internet to play anything is just dumb. I have a couple other great parts of the story I want to shoutout as well, one of them being the whole Alternate Luthor storyline. It's a very creative premise, and I enjoyed being in this Earth-2 a lot. I also like the dynamic between Waller, the Suicide Squad, and Hack. Hack is a cool character, and there were a couple unique things they set up (but end up not exploring...). I liked the tension between the SS and Waller, and how their relationship developed throughout the game. Oh and I gotta say, that main song slapped.

The gameplay has some novelty, but the second it wears off it just becomes so incredibly repetitive and boring. The location of the fights pretty much never change, and you're fighting the same few enemies over and over. The regulars, the snipers, the shielded, and the Flash enemies. Oh yeah, and occasionally one will morph into this beast thing with higher HP. It just becomes super boring, and you have to endure the incredibly basic and stale combat system. However, the thing that really makes the combat bad is the fact that all four of our main protagonists have guns. They didn't do anything unique with their character skillsets. It's just guns and a side melee weapon that has a skin based on which character you're playing with. Deadshot and Harley should be the only ones with guns. It's also hilarious just how much this pales in comparison to the Suicide Squad (2021) movie. There's pretty much zero character development here, besides the fact we see a more human side of these iconic villains. It's ultra basic, and Deadshot is really the only one with a motivation beyond the surface level "I want freedom." They don't give depth to any of these ideas. There was a really compelling concept in the idea of redemption in the irredeemable and how everyone has a dark side which would mirror really well with the basic premise of "evil Justice League." But, they do nothing with it.

Somehow, we haven't even got to my biggest problem yet. It's not the dull characters, it's not the repetitive gameplay cycle, it's not the massive amounts of wasted potential, it's the missions. There is SO. MUCH. PADDING here that it's insane. A lot of the missions have no relevance to the main story, and they often make you go run off and "collect weapons to defeat the next boss" in order to pad out the length of the story. I couldn't tell you a think that happened in Chapter 2 because it was just meaningless. There's three types of basic missions - escort (THE FREAKING ESCORT MISSIONS OH MY WORD, WHY SO MANY???), destroy the incubators, and put these ungrateful A.R.G.U.S soldiers in a truck to rescue them. That's it. The gameplay isn't just padded out by these missions, the gameplay IS these missions. Finally, as much as I've praised the story, I do have some issues with it. The first one is how much they choose to retcon the story decisions of the Arkham games. That master marksman Deadshot who you battled intensely within the past games - yeah, he was a fake. Instead of carving their own path and coming up with not lazy, genuine reasons to why these things happened, they just go back and change the games we loved. It's the definition of lazy. My other issue with the story is just how incomplete it is. We don't know if the Justice League will be brought back to life, we don't know how we stop the invasion alltogether, the story just comes to a cliffhanger and says "mOrE cOmInG sOoN!!1!!1" You're crazy if you think I'm playing more of this game. Wikipedia will do. Like, I get it's a live service game, but did we have to get TWELVE OTHER BRANIACS involved?!? There wasn't anything more interesting or fun we could've done? We're just supposed to go around shooting variants of Braniac in different skins? Whoopee.

BOSS BREAKDOWN:
Time to get into my favorite part of a review - the Boss Breakdown. Bosses can truly make or break a game depending on how impactful and fun they area. I played through the entire game on Sweating Bullets mode (besides the Braniac fight, they force you to play on the easiest difficulty on the first try), the hardest difficulty you can start off with. Let's get in.

THE FLASH
Difficulty: 4/10
Attempts: 1
Rating: 7/10

This was one of the two actually good boss fights in the game. I liked figuring out how the Anti-Speed Force thing worked, and Flash threw out a variety of fun and unique attacks. The best part had to be Scott Porter completely delivering as The Flash. He was quippy, and added a lot of charm. I was laughing a lot during the fight, and I liked the interactions in the beginning between Boomerang and The Flash. However, by the third boss bar the fight does get a bit repetitive and boring. The attacks are the same thing over and over, and there's a lack of mechanics or weakness exploitation in the fight. His weakness is literally enough bullets, and he dies a completely dishonorable death. Wonder Woman truly is the only one who dies an honorable death in this game. This was a solid fight, but it just lacked some more flair and mechanics.

GREEN LANTERN
Difficulty: 6.7/10
Attempts: 3
Rating: 4.5/10

On concept alone, this should be a good fight. I like the idea of Green Lantern creating constructs that you had to destroy in order to weaken him. However, they pretty much waste it. It gets super repetitive, and there's nothing to the fight beyond that idea. By the last third, when things are supposed to be ramping up, they just put more constructs around the map to fire more laser attacks at you and make it "harder." It's not earned, it's just stupid. Good job, you put a bomb in every place you can land. I felt like I was fighting a bad traversal as well. Because you can only go like three mid-air leaps, you have to land. And when you do, it's pretty much lights out. Everything is firing at you. It's a cool concept, and fun for the first half, but it eventually just becomes stale.

BATMAN
Difficulty: 2/10
Attempts: 2 (game crash)
Rating: 0.4/10

If this isn't one of the worst fights I've ever played, then I don't know what is. The boss fights in modern Super Mario games have more mechanics and skill required to beat. Firstly, it makes zero sense how the unstoppable Arkham Batman, who one-shotted Harley Quinn, who killed the Joker himself, who fought out of an entire Asylum run over by goons, who... should I go on? Anyways, it makes no sense how this Batman, in his most powerful form would die this easily to the literal Suicide Squad. He throws all of three variants of this stupid laser attack, and will ocasionally throw an easily shot down purple bomb thing from the sides. He's an absolute bullet sponge, and all you do is counter and then shoot. Counter, shoot, dodge, counter, shoot, dodge. How boring can you get?????? His weakness is literally enough bullets, and it's truly embarassing and dishonorable with how they kill him off. He died on a park bench, shot by Harley Quinn. How was Batman not able to resist Braniac's mind control? Why did he never snap out of it? All questions that will go completely unanswered! The fight also starts with one of the most repetitive sequences I've truly ever played, and it's a snoozer from top to bottom. They even wasted Knightmare Batman and the fear toxins. Truly atrocious.

SUPERMAN

Difficulty: 7.5/10
Attempts: 5
Rating: 7.3/10

My pick for the best boss fight in the game would be Superman. The difficulty alone is what makes this really fun, but he actually has some cool attacks (gasp, gasp). The frozen Kryptonite was a smart way to be able to get shields, and I liked how you'd have to be careful when you'd counter depending on the attack Superman was doing. He actually had more then like three attacks, and the gameplay cycle was genuinely fun and challenging. My only problem is once again how they kill him off. He's a bullet sponge. Again. And he dies because of enough bullets. Again. The gameplay cycle was fun, but I wish we did do more offensively then just counter and shoot.

BRANIAC
Difficulty: 4/10
Attempts: 1
Rating: 4.1/10

The visuals were the thing that held this fight up from being a complete dumpster fire. I liked the designs, and just being in this alien world was super cool and refreshing after being in pretty much the same location the whole game. The waves of enemies were fun to fight off, however gameplay wise the fight was literally a redo of The Flash fight. They completely gave up on it, and it just added to the insane repetition the game had. Braniac has his own set of powers, why don't we use those? His weakness is AGAIN enough bullets, and we don't do anything to make it more fun.

BOSS RANKING:
1 - Superman - challenging with cool attacks from Superman
2 - The Flash - good charisma, Scott Porter is amazing, but gets stale
3 - Green Lantern - unearned difficulty that wastes a cool concept
4 - Braniac - a complete throw in of the towel that's super repetitive
5 - Batman - ultra-boring/repetitive, made my game crash, and dishonorable

HOW GOOD WERE THE BOSSES?
Average Score: 4.6/10
My Score: 4.9/10
Overall Review: The gameplay got very repetitive in pretty much every fight, and the horrible Batman fight made the overall package a lot worse. The dishonorable treating of these iconic characters didn't help as well. There were a couple good fights, but it ended up being just mostly mid.

While it may start fun, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice Leaguequickly becomes stale and repetitive. The treating of Batman is offensive, and the incredible voice acting/charisma can't save this. The visuals also start off cool, but they end up like the combat - boring and regular. The missions were awful, and the story was only good in the cutscenes. This was a huge disappointment.