Marvel's Avengers vs Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League

On paper, both of these concepts should be instant wins. But as always seems to be the case, it’s in the execution that separates the good from the dreadful. After a day of celebration turns into one of tragedy, the Avengers go their separate ways, only to be reunited by budding hero Kamala Khan when the world once again comes under threat. Getting the ol’ superhero gang back together, dealing with everyone’s emotional baggage while learning to be a team again – yeah, it’s a little cliché, but if anyone can sell it, it’s the Avengers. While Kamala was undoubtedly a highlight, the campaign for Marvel’s Avengers ranged from fun to meh at a moment’s notice, offering no real surprises other than standard superhero fare – which some players were more than happy to indulge in. Kill the Justice League on the other hand was on track to reach the highest of highs as only the Arkham-verse could deliver, what with a solid intro that had the Suicide Squad tasked with taking down brainwashed versions of the world’s finest heroes. Alas, this just meant they had further to fall, with a final act that decimated any hope of the game reaching the same levels shown in Rocksteady’s previous work. Had this been an elseworlds story with no link to the older Arkham games, maybe it wouldn’t have stung so much, but the untimely manner in which the Justice League characters are done in, while the Squad plot armor their way to the most depressingly open-ended conclusion to make way for more live-service content squashed whatever hope was left. The Avenger’s narrative is no Infinity War, but it is it’s biggest strength by far, whereas the story that the Suicide Squad chose to tell, and how they told it, proved to be one of its biggest failures. Loser: Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League

Marvel’s Avengers is bloated, stuffed, and downright saturated with various virtual currency. Some are for unlocks, some are for upgrades, and a few are needed to unlock your upgrades. Seriously, between the credits, units, fragments, upgrade modules, nanites, nanotubes, catalysts, plasma, uru’s, DNA keys, and more, it’s way too easy to get confused as to what you even need at any given time. Doesn’t help that whatever you’re grinding for will likely only afford you cosmetics and new equipment that are barely worth it in the long run. Which makes the fact that most of these can be purchased with real world money seem all the more predatory. For as much as fans may scream about Suicide Squad getting wrong…at the various least it doesn’t have the most egregious monetisation practises. There are no loot boxes to speak of and its future cosmetic-only battle passes are going to be free…for now. We’ll have to see how they handle those premium tiers going forward, though we will admit how the in-built store handles its cosmetics by forcing players to purchase bundles instead of individual pieces is a little scummy. Greed truly did ruin whatever potential both these games had, though we’d be remiss if we didn’t drag Avengers across the pavement for how abhorrent it was when it came to trying to turn players into piggy banks. Loser: Marvel’s Avengers

Oh boy. Now here is where things get nasty. While no one can deny that repetition, grind, and a sense of dullness permeates the mission structure and overall tone of Marvel’s Avengers, there is at least…variety? Whether you’re playing as Ms Marvel, Thor, Iron Man or any other member of the team, they each feel like their own character. Hulk smashing certainly feels different to unleashing a Unibeam, that’s for sure. While we’re not exactly thrilled that the final fight is against MODOK of all villains, between the HARM Rooms, War and Drop Zones, there was enough here to at least give the illusion of diversity. As for Suicide Squad…yikes. Who thought that escort missions, indistinguishable gunplay and shooting the Justice League would make for a good gameplay loop? We’re not saying that the Squad don’t have it in them to make an amazing game, nor are we totally against battling evil versions of our favorite heroes. But when you break up the repetitive drudgery of taking down your billionth Brainiac-controlled tank but shooting down Superman out of the sky with a minigun with zero fanfare or challenge…you know you messed up. Speaking of Brainiac; don’t get us started on his flimsy excuse of a final boss fight. He turns into the Flash and makes you act out the first boss fight all over again. Rinse, repeat, reload. No one considers the gameplay of Marvel’s Avengers great, but it’s a damn sight better than the looter shooter shenanigans Suicide Squad dumped into our laps. Would it really have been that hard to just leave the guns to Deadshot and let the other members shine with their own weapons? Too little too late now. Loser: Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League.

What’s a superhero game without its superheroes? Given the culture-defining impact the MCU has had, it was interesting to see how Marvel’s Avengers was going to take things in its own direction. And the result was…meh? Thor being down and out and having to slowly regain his godliness, Kamala Khan being the fangirl who reignites the passion in the heroes she’s idolized all her life – these feel like story beats that you’d expect to come out of a typical Avengers comic saga, and thanks to the talents of some of the biggest voice actors in the industry, the cast retain some sense of heroic familiarity. But these moments are few and far between, and with the game’s numerous other issues, the shine wears off rather quickly. If we’re talking about performances, if we’re talking about character models, then Kill the Justice League knocks it out of the park. The Squad all feel like themselves, act in a way that teeters between the anti-heroes you want to root for, and the villains that make you wince. Besides, you can’t go wrong with the likes of Tara Strong. Alas, what lets them and everything else down…is the writing, especially when it comes to the side characters. Batman turning into a murderer whose final words in the Arkham-verse are nothing more than cheap, throwaway banter with Harley before she executes him? It’s downright depressing, especially when a few tweaks here and there would have made all the difference from a character standpoint. Also, why the hell is Poison Ivy now a child? Way to undo her tragic death in Arkham Knight! We certainly have more than a few problems with Suicide Squad’s treatment of the Justice League, but they get more things right than wrong with its central cast. The Avengers on the other hand are mostly shadows of themselves that fail to define themselves against that of their more popular counterparts. Loser: Marvel’s Avengers

For every step forward Square Enix seems to be taking these days, they also have a habit of taking two steps back. Marvel’s Avengers was them taking two steps back, tripping over their own feet, somersaulting and planting down face first. It was a catastrophe. Not even Spider-Man or Black Panther could save it. It’s a stain on Square Enix’s reputation just as much as their obsession with the blockchain, and by extension, it crippled the chances of another Avengers game finding popularity and recognition moving forward. If anything, they’ve dumped all the pressure on Insomniac’s shoulders. We can’t help but feel for Crystal Dynamics here, even if they made the rotten thing, it’s clear weren’t allowed to play to their strengths. Kill the Justice League may be new on the scene but the negative impact it’s had is likely going to be felt all throughout 2024. Sure, it’s not as vacuous a project as half the titles we got last year, but coming from Rocksteady of all developers, who had established one of the seminal video game trilogies of our time, to come out with something as ill-conceived and ill-fated as this – it cuts deep. Does it still have a chance to make the most of its endgame and better itself? Absolutely, but there’s no escaping its dismal first impression – one that, again, had you snipe down the Man of Steel with a minigun. Still can’t get over that. Suicide Squad may still be public enemy number one, and the tarnishing of Rocksteady’s Arkham-verse may be a hard pill for many to swallow, but when it comes to Square Enix’s antics that took something as popular as the Avengers and led it straight into financial ruin – it’s an industry failure that is still being discussed and analysed to this day. Loser: Marvel’s Avengers With a total of three to two, Marvel’s Avengers loses this bout, and once again cements itself as one of the worst superhero games in modern memory.