Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League Previews

People have been casting a cynical eye over Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League for a while now, ever since it was revealed to be a live service title. Rocksteady, the near legendary developer behind the Batman: Arkham games, has been working on this thing for what feels like way too long, and based on a number of fresh previews from various gaming websites, there's now a real worry that Suicide Squad is destined to miss the mark.

The overall picture that these previews paint isn't especially pretty. Most of them praise Suicide Squad's story and character performances, but end up being rather critical of the core gameplay loop. Just about every publication takes issue with cookie-cutter open world objectives and missions, the kind which see the titular squad defend an object against waves of enemies. There are also pacing concerns here, as these objectives apparently pad out key story missions to an unnecessary degree.

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GameSpot in particular isn't at all sold on the aforementioned live service elements, saying that the game feels conflicted in what it's trying to do. In trying to balance both cinematic storytelling and dynamic open world mission design, the game supposedly struggles to perform on either front.

IGN, meanwhile, isn't keen on the Suicide Squad itself, finding them difficult to root for when they do terrible things to achieve their goals — the worry being that at some point the plot will simply reset itself instead of dealing with the consequences. What's more, the publication notes that there isn't much to differentiate the playable characters outside of special abilities. Basically, gameplay boils down to aiming and shooting, and apparently, the actual gunplay isn't anything to write home about.

As alluded in the opening paragraph of this article, there's long been a concern that Kill the Justice League is merely chasing trends — and Eurogamer also thinks that's the case, with Rocksteady having drifted from the gameplay template that made its previous titles so beloved. Indeed, VGC says that if you didn't already know, you probably wouldn't guess that Suicide Squad is from the same studio.

The optics aren't great then, but as always, it's impossible to pass complete judgment on a project based on just a few hours of play. Here's hoping that the full release of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League is more warmly received.

How do you feel about this one? Lock and load in the comments section below.

[source gamespot.com, via ign.com, eurogamer.net, videogameschronicle.com]