In the gaming space, gamers make many “presumptions” about what a studio should do next based on the success of a previous gaming entry or IP. The developer or publisher often won’t go down that path for one reason or another. Sometimes, that can be a good thing; other times, it might not. In the case of Suicide Squad Kill The Justice League, the jury is still out on whether the title will be good. After all, early previews paint curious pictures of what it will be like gameplay-wise. But the biggest question that fans had is that of, “Why didn’t they just do a game about the Justice League?”
Or, stripping it down a bit, why not just go from doing a Batman trilogy to doing games about Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, etc? Well, in a chat with ComicBook.com, Suicide Squad Kill The Justice League Production Manager Jack Hackett and Advanced Combat Designer Noel Chamberlain discussed the rather basic reason they went with this path:
“At the core of Rocksteady’s values is we want something really narrative driven, and we’re really story orientated,” noted Chamberlain. “So, we look at what’s going to be the most interesting and then add on things like that like having four very unique protagonists. And again, I think fans expect Rocksteady to do something slightly different, and having you have to fight the Justice League and overcome this insurmountable challenge as a player and as a character in the story is really interesting, I think it’s really exciting for players to experience. I think once players play it, they’ll know why this is our choice for the game.”
In other words, they tried to go for the “unexpected approach” to surprise players, and they succeeded. Plus, that “unexpected route” led to them having fun trying to make it all work:
“I think the Justice League are the perfect antagonists because they’re everything that the Squad is not,” added Hackett. “I think that contrast, and then flipping the good and evil, both sides are begrudgingly on the wrong side. The Squad are evil, and they’re being forced to be good, and the League end up being forced to be bad. That’s just a fun, compelling narrative.”
Many aren’t questioning whether the game will have a good narrative, but the gameplay still leaves much to be desired, and the live service element isn’t helping things. We’ll find out more on February 2nd, when the game debuts.
