Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League had a rocky development cycle and a straight one rockier start, but players were hoping that the first season of the action-adventure shooter would help right the ship. Unfortunately, the season that introduces the famous DC villain Joker is being completely sidelined on social media, with players pointing out all the hallmarks of evil Live service game design that it offers functions.
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League Season 1 launched on March 28, almost two months after the game’s initial release. Almost immediately, however, the officer began Suicide Squad Discord and other corners of the internet have been flooded with a flood of questions, comments and concerns.
“ABSOLUTE DISASTER… Who would have thought that locking Joker behind Master 35 would be a smart idea. The only reason they did this is because you PAY for him.” wrote one Redditor on r/SuicideSquadGaming. “Essentially locking Joker behind a paywall or a tedious affair… What happened? That’s just… sad,” complains u/Splunkmastah in the same subreddit.
Read more: Suicide Squad “Game fell short of expectations,” says WB
The 76-stage battle pass puts Joker right in the middle, and accordingly ForbesPaul TassiTo reach Master 35, you must achieve “a separate, third rank.” [not the battle pass or mastery ranks] This forces you to complete between 10 and 20 missions depending on the mission to reach this level.”
And playing through these missions isn’t exactly an immersive gaming experience. “There are no new mission types here at launch. Zero,” writes Tassi. “There should be something like Stronghold, but it won’t start until maybe halfway through the season, and it’s not there now. Instead, the “new” Incursions are either straight up killing enemies (grunts in one case, brutes in one case, infused enemies in one case) and then the anti-aircraft gun mini-mission from the first game.”
“To catch up [Joker] “You have to complete the same missions until you reach level 35, and once you do that you get a redesigned Lantern boss fight and a cutscene, and that’s it for the content.” The author Lady Emily wrote on X (formerly Twitter). The Brainiac boss fight in question is a complete retread of a campaign mission near the end of the core game, in which the villain copies lightning and summons enemies, helicopters, weapons, and more. “It’s identical,” emphasizes Tassi.
“I know a lot of us are upset, especially those who were hoping things could get better, but some of you are still making excuses for WB and saying, ‘Well, it’s a live service, what have you.’ expected?’, says one r/SuicideSquadGaming Post titled “No Excuses.” The same post compares Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice LeagueAccept live service Helldivers 2s approach, which has regularly added new enemies, mission types, planets, hazards and abilities since its release on February 8th. “This is how you do live service,” reads u/Gumgy413’s post.
Suicide Squad represents a uniquely irritating trend in the gaming industry right now: the aggressive shift to live services with the aim of steadily extracting money from consumers. This pivot point is also responsible for this Blizzard’s convoluted mess Overwatch 2which has just finally stopped locking new heroes behind its Battle Passesand a whole host of other games (new, old and/or in development) that are adopting this business model in the face of unprecedented layoffs.
