Summary
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice Leagueis certainly not the first Arkhamverse game to obfuscate paramount narrative details, but it dizzyingly reinforces that disappointing tradition. Not only is Harley Quinn inexplicably a changed woman as her own independent mad clown now, but the Floyd Lawton players confronted multiple times in theArkhamgames apparently wasn’tthe ‘real’ Deadshotthis whole time, either.
These details can be excused if players don’t mind how these characters came to be and can simply accompany them for the ride. That said, every subplot and dangling narrative thread would’ve been strengthened by having more context, and the beginning ofSuicide Squad: Kill the Justice Leaguecould’ve had a much stronger opening if it led with a cinematic of Brainiac versus the Justice League.
IfSuicide Squad: Kill the Justice Leagueopened with a cinematic where Green Lantern, Superman, and Batman had been overwhelmed and mind-controlled by Brainiac it would’ve gone a long way in clarifying how Brainiac caught the League by surprise. Instead, the game neglects any exposition and immediatelytosses Task Force X into a Metropolis already swarming with purple aliensafter the League is already largely compromised.
It would have been terrific to see how they were captured to begin with and how Brainiac was able to arrive on Earth without the League spotting him from the Hall of Justice’s Inner Sanctum or the Watchtower, where monitoring invasive entities is one of the satellite’s primary functions. Plus, it’s unknownhow long Earth-2 Lex Luthor was in communication with Earth-1 Lex Luthor, but nobody seemed to know about Brainiac or be prepared for his arrival until it was too late anyhow, at least in terms of how that information was delivered in the campaign.
Brainiac’s arrival on Earth-1 and how Metropolis and the Justice League responded to the invasion is not entirely omitted from the story, but such details are only privy to players who take the time tocollect Residual Echoes and listen to Invasion audio logsto learn about the event. Such lore being remanded to audio logs deep within the game’s menus is not engaging, though, and anything not directly told within the story’s immediate dialogue and cutscenes is usually deemed nonessential or supplementary rather than crucial to the plot.
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice Leaguemakes it obvious that its priority was looking ahead to future content rather than looking back, and unfortunately a lot of its richest storytelling moments are disregarded this way as a result.
Gotham Knightsmight not have received stellar praise, either, but how it contextualized the beginning of the narrative was at least illuminating.Gotham Knightsopening with Batman’s death in a lengthy cinematicwas the perfect introduction to the story because it gave players all the context they needed before having the Bat Family descend upon Gotham City.
InSuicide Squad: Kill the Justice League’s case, it’s as ifGotham Knightsopened with Bruce Wayne’s public funeral and neglected to go into the context of how he died fighting Ra’s al Ghul.Suicide Squad: Kill the Justiceneeded that context on-screen and without it players aren’t supposed to question little details, ultimately to the narrative’s detriment.
Because Brainiac isn’t revealed until after each Justice League member is dead it’s clear Rocksteady wouldn’t have wanted to display him in the game’s opening moments and spoil that. But seeing more of the Justice League as their traditionally heroic selves would’ve also given their subsequent brainwashing and deaths a greater impact, so the payoff might’ve been worthwhile if this information was given to players right as the game started.
Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League
WHERE TO PLAY
Play as the Suicide Squad to take down the World’s Greatest DC Super Heroes, The Justice League. Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, is a genre-defying, action-adventure third-person shooter from Rocksteady Studios, creators of the critically acclaimed Batman: Arkham series.
