Rocksteady Lifts Suicide Squad Alpha NDA in Apparent Bid to Counter Damning Previews

This game is looking like it's going to be another Gotham Knights in terms of fan reception, though I personally have even less interest in this one with all the shooting.

As someone who signed that NDA, what portion of the NDA is eased and what is still enforced!?

The game is DOA no matter what at this point.

Sad thing is, assuming this doesn’t tank Rocksteady, we won’t be getting another game from them for at least 5 years at the earliest.

I held out some hope this game would turn around...but...it...looks...really rough. I can't stand the GIGANTIC RNG numbers for every hit like it's Borderlands or something. The traversal is weird and vertical with not one hero who can fly. Now all of a sudden it's zoomy time. It looks doa as hell to me. They can't even buy off IGN for a cheap 8/10 this time.

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They were forced into making this game, no doubt about it. Warner really are hopeless but you can be certain that the micro transactions will be perfect on day 1

Alpha was awful, so.. there ya go

WB just killed a great studio with a forced live service product.

They should have cancelled this last year and repurposed it into a single player game.
This game is completely out of touch with what super hero fans want.

I also don't know what the fixation with the suicide squad is. It's never really been that popular. Both movies failed at the box office.
Can we establish people don't care about the suicide squad already? Do the base heroes right before you go into alternative stuff.

If this was a single player justice league game in the vein of the batman arkham games it would've sold like hot cakes.
People will lose their jobs over this and i am sorry to see it, but whoever made this call kind of deserves it.

I mean, it certainly can't get any worse so why not? (I guess) 🤷‍♀️

It’s unfathomable that Warner Brothers, with their current absurd debt and negative image, is looking at the single player Hogwarts Legacy selling 22 million copies during Feb last year vs this inevitable train wreck coming out at the same launch time and going “yeah, we should double down on live service player engagement games”. I didn’t like Hogwarts Legacy but I thought it could actually have a good impact by Warner Brothers increasing their single player output.

I just can't see this turning out okay at this point.

All I can say is good luck Rocksteady. I think you will need it in the weeks to come.

The game was not for me in the first place, so don't change much.

it's crazy how quickly this game went from highly anticipated to doomed and dead on arrival. i think it has passed the point of no return — good or bad, it will fail due to the negative perception that the game has generated (mostly warranted). i'm just waiting for the inevitable announcement of rocksteady being shuttered at this point. the writing is on the wall.

Like many here I'm expecting the announcement that Rocksteady is closing by the end of the year, WB set them up to fail and that's exactly what's going to happen unless by some miracle the game catches on by regular folk.

As a huge Arkham and Batman fan I found the Alpha to be really disappointing. The gameplay was so repetitive - you were basically doing the same thing over and over again. Shooting purple things.
The story looked interesting. The cutscenes were fantastic, but the gameplay that surrounds it is so dull and monotonous. Huge disappointment for me personally.
Really hoping it surprises us and is great though!

I bought Gotham knights despite it getting a savaging and I really liked it and I thought the bad press was a bit unnecessarily harsh. I don't think I'll bother with this until its in a sale as I'm not a huge suicide squad fan but I hope it turns out to be a great game for those who are.

I was in the alpha test, and I was not impressed.

The graphics were good, and the game ran smoothly; I’ll give them credit for that.

But the control scheme was way too complicated for the fast-action type of game it was trying to be. There were three different buttons for traversal, when it could have been one. The right trigger was used for shooting and melee, when they needed to be different inputs.

They also had too many different systems in place for combat. The aforementioned confusion about when you were going to melee or shoot, with a move that required you to melee, then shoot. All while trying to maneuver around the area with the three types of traversal, which if you didn’t hit the right inputs in time would leave you missing the ledge you were trying to reach or miss a grapple point, sending you to the ground or into the abyss. While also having an active reload. And a convoluted way of gaining shield, having to shoot the enemy’s legs and then get close enough to melee them.

And then there’s my questions about why this game even uses the Suicide Squad as protagonists. The first thing the game does is give each character tech that mimics the powers of other heroes/villains. And then just uses guns as the main combat mechanic, leaving the powers for movement and special attacks. All while fighting brainwashed heroes that would wipe the floor with those particular characters, new powers or not.

I gave up playing not long after playing two (two!) tutorial stages. The stage after that was mostly a wild goose chase, going to a marker on the map where a hero was supposed to be, only to find just another wave of generic aliens to shoot. They did this four or five times, only to trigger a lengthy cutscene where the heroes fought each other for a bit, leaving us to chase after them again. That coupled with the fact that — for all of the powers and combat mechanics they introduce — you could just shoot at things with yours guns and ignore all the other stuff. Thus rendering the use of the distinctive characters moot.

At this point, I think they should just cut their losses, and use the assets they have made for this game to make an entirely different game altogether, even though that would probably take another ten years to build.

I played the closed Alpha and enjoy the game play.
I have the deluxe version preordered and will be playing at the end of the month.
I don't listen to previews or reviews for games because it's another person take on the game, I like it so I am playing it .......... Deal with it lol

ppl in the comments dismissing those giving negative feedback about the game but theres always people that like bad games also, so you should take what they say with a grain of salt too.

its a game by rocksteady so i think it has potential. gotham knights was made by Wb games, a dev that got lucky with origins and had a chance to make their own game and it sucked. waste of my $70 that im still salty about.

They're definitely trying to control the bleeding, but it's like a massive hemorrhage now.

There is nothing gamers hate more than a live service game trying to also be a single player game. Just go all in on offline single player or online multiplayer.

Or if you are smart like R* have 2 clearly defined modes so you get 100% of something rather than 50% of nothing.

I really hope WB take that approach for the next Hogwarts Legacy game. They have R* kind of money and budget to do that now.

This is getting a bit painful. It seems at best it’ll be a bit of a laugh with mates, when bought on sale. It’s already out-competed with fun co-op games to play with friends, it doesn’t look to have enough meat for single player. I just hope it doesn’t rank Rocksteady, an otherwise excellent studio.

Nothing about the direction they took with the game has left me happy....but the Arkham games are probably my fav of the 360/PS3 gen....so I am going to give this a go...seen as it looks like it's going to bomb.... hopefully it will be on sale rather quick

This will be on Game Pass and Playstation Plus by November.

Tried the closed alpha test and it was decent better than expected but defo not a day one buy it'll probably be on ps plus quick just like Gotham Knights.

Was the tweet deleted, because I can't seem to find on their page and the link in the text leads nowhere?

I watched all the previews and I just think it looks boring. More mindless bang bang and utter chaos on screen in fights, with characters that I personally find very unappealing. (Or, rather, I should say that I find the way these characters are portrayed in the cutscenes released so far is very unappealing.) Shoot the glowing purple weak point... how inspired.
I'm sure the game will be alright and find its audience that appreciate it for what it is, rather than dislike it for what it isn't, but it definitely isn't one for me.

I worry this could result in rocksteady getting shut down.

It’s a weird one. After seeing the PlayStation State of play where this was featured, I couldn’t have been more uninterested with the game. However, I signed up to play the Alpha and gave codes to 3 of my friends. We had a blast in the end, but half the fun was playing with people I knew and have gamed with for years. If it had been randoms who don’t speak, it would not have been nearly half as fun. I want to support a product that sees the final act for Kevin Conroy, but I would imagine that if I do play it, it will be a platinum trophy and nothing more. When WB see how big this game will fail, they won’t support it for very long and likely they will throw Rocksteady under the bus. I can see this being their last game but let’s be honest, with the departures of the 2 heads of the company and the main man behind the Arkham Games, Rocksteady aren’t the same company that made the Batman Games.

This is gonna be a rough year for Rocksteady if they survive it at all. As well as yet another example of a high profile studio being forced into the live service model and it failing hard.

It's not surprising from WB, although hogwarts should have shown success can lay in other quality designed sp endeavors. However, Sony should really have read the writing on the wall in terms of the sentiment this trend has garnered in recent years. live service is not a predatory scheme that can be slapped onto any ip, nor will you convert enough new addicts into these traps using the once revered Fandom of talented studios. The willingness to risk damage done to the studio and/or IP is such a shame and example of the blind trajectory greed compels.

I feel bad for Rocksteady, but I genuinely want all games that adopt these additional predatory greed driven revenue siphoning schemes in their games to fail.

Really enjoyed and was surprised by the alpha. Characters played completely different and different controls. They nailed that. Combat was fun and varied due to it. Looked good and played smooth. Was disappointed when it ended.

It’s fashionable to say “DOA” on games now and have a pile on so I think it’ll be true on this game. Look at the comments here. So many that didn’t play the game so vocal about how bad it is.

Personally I enjoyed the Alpha but I don’t think I’d pay full price for the game, I just don’t get why they thought this story was a good idea. That’s my main gripe. Why…..

I enjoyed the alpha, especially the story bits. I'm not fully sold on the open world yet but overall getting to play it made me much more interested than I was before.

I played the alpa - the story was interesting, but the gameplay was the worst kind of floaty, generic looter-shooter nonsense. If I wanted a gear system that complicated I'd open an Excel spreadsheet. I might have a go when it gets onto a subscription service, but giving WB Games money for this only encourages them.

I got access to the Alpha test. Got bored and got back to Spider-Man 2, which I was playing at the time. Agree with the comment above, it was quite a generic looter shooter.

Put this sad live service trash out of its misery.

Please, at least, don't give it to PS Plus monthly free... There was enough of garbage...

@Kidfried Not necessarily. Warframe is both a co-op persistent shooter, but it’s largely a single player game with co-op elements.

@AndroidBango This will be on Game Pass and Playstation Plus by November.

July.

Seems desperate

@Nem tbf though the second film in 2021 is really really good. One of the best super hero films and then peace maker out of that is amazing. I think suicide squad came out when more covid stuff was going on as well

Played the alpha, thought I'd hate it but genuinely enjoyed myself. Didn't click with Captain Boomerang but enjoyed my time with the others. Liked it enough to pick it up at launch.

Played the alpha and it was enjoyable and had some funny lines from the characters although mostly from Harley. The main thing that I felt let it down was the controls. Every action was done by combining two buttons together and at times felt all over the place not entirely sure why they did it this way when a single button would have been fine. The combat and traversal was clumsy because of it and trying to counter attack was a nightmare as it'd lock on to the nearest enemy rather than the one you were facing. If they overhaul the controls and simplify some of the combat I think it would be an okay game, nothing special but there is some fun to be had there.

@Northern_munkey I enjoyed Gotham Knights too, don't know why it got such negative press. I mean performance was shaky and there were a few bugs admittedly, it was no Batman. But it was fun playing with a friend, had decent visuals not groundbreaking but still good and had a good story to it.

Zero interest in this game and Rocksteady being indignant about it makes them look ridiculous.

It's a live service always online game that doesn't need to be. It's more of the same ***** hocking MTX and cosmetics. Everything i dislike about these kinds of games.

It's DOA for me. It's a shame to see a once great studio stoop to this level of *****.

Any game that's a live service, games as a service and any of that cosmic purchases rubbish deserves failure.

A wise move. People seem to have chosen their opinions about this game before playing it. Which is unprofessional for reporters but the game industry is full of reporter hacks.

An we'll sadly seem to be standard for some gamers to hate games before they have even played them sadly.

@ATaco Agreed. Think the waning enthusiasm got shipped from GK to this, then, when people saw it was an always online shooter, it seemed GK was the closest thing we'd get to an Arkham game, after all. By that time, no-one was excited for either, any more. Haha

They should have combined the Arkham Trilogy into one big game with improved visuals. Like a director's cut with added scenes and side stories.Would have been huge but awesome.

It will be a PS Plus Extra game within a year.

Previews were damning and you know its bad when even mainstream outlets say so.

I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed a Rock Steady game.

@Nem the first movie made 749,200,054 USD worldwide
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1386697/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0_tt_8_nm_0_q_suici

It was a huge success. The problem was that it got bad reviews.

No trickery no bs. You know what you're getting into.

@Netret0120

For sure in a year and a half.

@naruball I think it got bad reviews cause it wasn't very good. But, if anything it shows that audiences gave it a chance and were disappointed given how the sequel barely broke even.
I still think people don't care for it very much. This game will likely show the same.

@Nem was it a sequel or a reboot? Either way the argument was that Suicide Squad wasn't particularly popular, which isn't the case. That's why I brought up the first movies' box office success. Why would it do so well when it was bad if the IP weren't strong?

If the game doesn't do well, it won't mean that people don't care about SC in general. It it will mean that people didn't like what they saw. Keep in mind that Spider-man is the most popular superhero yet Spider-man games weren't selling well until Insomniac took over.

@naruball but it's not. The second movie or reboot if you want to call it that had a budget of 180m and made 164m at the box office. It was a flop. It proves audiences lost interest. The first movie doesn't matter much and was critically panned meaning people didn't really enjoy it.
The suicide squad is not that popular and not only did it crash and burn at the box office and had bad reception for both movies but this game also shows the disconnect.
This would be a good idea once you have an established universe. But, both the movies and the games have failed to build such a universe. So, dropping suicide squad like it's the thing that will kick-start DC is ridiculous.

Spiderman is hugely popular and the insomniac games weren't the first time they sold well. They were mismanaged for sure though. But, so were the movies. But, they never sunk as low as failing to make a profit.
Sorry, but Suicide squad is nowhere near as popular as spiderman, which is the most popular marvel character. There isn't a comparison here. It's unfair to even do that.

It's time to bring out the heroes before bringing out the anti-heroes. People won't get invested on the suicide squad without being invested in the dc universe first.

@Nem how can the first movie not matter much? The first one matters the most in determining the popularity of the franchise. Whether it's good or not, if it's popular, it will pull strong numbers first week (and it did). If it's terrible, then the sequel won't do well. That's exactly what happened.

This was also the case with the Spiderman movies. Spiderman has always been popular, but the movies with Andrew Garfield showed that quality matters. The first one did ok, but the sequel didn't perform well at all. Following your logic, it would mean that Spiderman the franchise was not popular, which couldn't be further from the truth.

And of course suicide squad is nowhere near as spiderman. Who even said that it is? The argument was specifically that Suicide squad on its own is a popular franchise and the performance of this upcoming game is no indication of its popularity since people have rejected the game specifically for its many problems.

"Spiderman is hugely popular and the insomniac games weren't the first time they sold well. They were mismanaged for sure though. But, so were the movies. But, they never sunk as low as failing to make a profit."

When Activision made Spider-man games, which were decent but not great, they sold lifetime what Insomniac Spiderman games made in a single day. The difference is massive.