Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League’s uphill battle to success

Rocksteady’s Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League is the acclaimed developer’s next game but it has an uphill battle to face once it releases.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League has quite the uphill battle in front of it. Modern development for big budget releases can take anywhere from 3-5 years (or more) and it can make or break any studio.

In 2015 Arkham Knight released to record sales and critical acclaim and it would become the last big Rocksteady game for a long time.

After many delays Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League will finally see the light of day in February 2024. It will have been 9 years since Arkham Knight. Development on this game will essentially outlast most of the DCEU’s existence.

Seeing Rocksteady spend almost a decade working on a multiplayer focused team loot shooter with microtransactions is quite baffling. Fans just witnessed the drastic fall of Marvel’s Avengers, which is essentially the same type of game Suicide Squad is going to be.

By the time this releases, Warner Bros and Rocksteady will have most likely spent over hundreds of millions of dollars developing and advertising this game.

Yes players will be initially interested in this game because it has DC characters. But to keep fans on board and to satisfy WB’s bottom line, the game essentially has to stand out and be good enough to take them away from the countless games out there.

With big online games like this, there’s likely going to be problems at launch. Rocksteady has to listen to fan feedback to fix issues and keep their base engaged. There has to be a future roadmap of content like new playable characters, cosmetics, quests, maps, that Rocksteady has to be transparent about.

In order for this game to be considered successful they would not only have to sell a lot of copies, but also have players invested into their microtransactions. Let’s not forget the servers they have to keep up as well.

Suicide Squad’s multiplayer elements will directly compete with heavyweights like Call Of Duty, Fortnite, Overwatch, Apex Legends, Destiny and PUBG. The studios behind those games essentially spend most of their time and resources on them so they could become what they are today.

The reality is that a modern successful multiplayer game can make a lot more money for them than something single player due to the constant income from DLC and microtransactions.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League will launch with a $70 price tag as well and its competitors like Fortnite, PUBG,  and Call of Duty: Warzone are all free to play. So if Suicide Squad isn’t hitting on all cylinders in its launch, players will be quick to abandon it and its longevity could go the way of Avengers.

Hogwarts Legacy recently just launched to great acclaim and is a billion dollar earner. It’s an expansive single player RPG that pays loving homage to the Wizarding World. Imagine if Rocksteady did something like that for DC?

They’re already aren’t enough DC games and with the underwhelming performance of Gotham Knights, all eyes are on this game to succeed for fans.

The game could be a resounding success, but there are definitely obstacles ahead for WB and Rocksteady. If it succeeds, then Rocksteady definitely deserves their flowers, but it probably would’ve been less of headache for everyone had they just made another single player game.