Rocksteady Studios is back and teaming up with Warner Bros. Games to give us that well-needed fix, and this time, it’s different to the usual superheroes we get to play. We are adventuring into Task Force X, more commonly known as Suicide Squad. There has been some controversy over the title, but I think Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League pulled me into the game even quicker.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League is based in Metropolis, the home of Superman, and set in the same well-established universe as the Batman Arkham Series, taking place five years after the events of Batman: Arkham Knight. As I mentioned before, the game is based around Task Force X, or Suicide Squad, comprised of some awesome Arkham Asylum inmates including Harley Quinn, Deadshot, Captain Boomerang, and King Shark, who have all been hired by A.R.G.U.S., run by our favourite person to hate, Amanda Waller.

First jumping into the game, a giant floating mechanical skull surrounded by arms will grab your attention as they cause pure destruction to Metropolis. The famous floating skull is owned by none other than Brainiac, who has also taken the Justice League and brainwashed them, so as the title suggests, it’s your job to hunt the Justice League and defeat them.

You have the option to play the game as a solo, or you could run with up to four-player co-op, which was seamless and loads of fun, although there was the occasional disconnection, as well as some difficulty in getting the party to come together. There were so many small things that made this game great, like when a friend joined in, the AI would do something, making the transition seamless and look like it was meant to be.

The only real negative to mention is that if you are heading out on a mission and have friends who want to explore, like mine, when you want to hunt down more missions, they will be teleported back to you. My friends hated it, but I couldn’t see the issue. It was my progress after all. If you are playing the game solo, the other four slots will be filled by AI. I’m still yet to find a game where AI is more helpful and less of a hindrance, but this title came pretty close, with the exception being when you were trying to harvest shields. They would come in and drop the person you’re about to melee hit.

Each playable character has different weapons, traversal options, and attributes, and the first character we’ll dive into is Dr. Harleen Quinzel, or as she’s more commonly known, Harley Quinn. We all know how bat-shit crazy Harley is, and we wouldn’t change her all the money in the world. She rolls around with the iconic baseball bat to start with, but as you progress, you can change this out. At the start of the game, I was able to steal a Bat Drone and Grapple Gun from the Hall of Justice, which she can use to traverse around the city and make full use of her acrobatic skills. It was really weird seeing Harley using a Heavy Weapon, but it was quite amusing chewing through enemies with such a short character.

Floyd Lawton, or Deadshot, is next on the list, well known in the DC Universe for his sniper rifles and wrist-mounted guns, both of which can be used in the game, and a whole lot of fun. When we were in the Hall of Justice, we managed to find a jetpack, making the Riddler’s Traverse Challenges much simpler – great for all the achievement hunters out there.

Digger Harness, or Captain Boomerang, is our favourite Australian-based member of Task Force X, even though he seems to be the dumbest member. Even King Shark outsmarted him a couple of times. Infiltrating the Hall of Justice, he went straight for the Speed Force Gauntlets, giving him the ability to dash as quick as the Flash, but only for a short amount of time. His iconic weapon, the boomerang was good fun and was also a secondary traversal method. You can throw it before speeding off to where the boomerang is, but otherwise, he is locked to using shotguns, SMG’s and sniper rifles.

Last, but certainly not least was my favourite character, Nanaue, or we all know him as King Shark. He is a demi-god humanoid shark who has some sick abilities, such as a charge leap, where he leaps into the air before dashing in a direction to get to places quickly. He picks up the Riddler’s Hat of Invincibility while the group is in the Hall of Justice, but he never puts it on. I played the game from start to finish with King Shark. I loved playing the character, and his dialogue was great, but we’ll touch more on that later.

I found all the characters to be well polished, with everything working super well, but once you got used to using one character and switched to another, it felt like you needed to relearn the game and rediscover the sweet spots for their traversal moves and the specials you can unlock, like hitting RB + LB would perform a heavy strike, damaging most of the people around you, and Y + B would slow down enemies, letting you draw your weapon and unleash hell.

Like all good open-world campaign games, there is always side content that you can choose to do during the campaign, or after, depending on your playing style. The side quests can give you access to Legendary equipment, making the fight against Branianc that little bit easier. I won’t spoil too much on the side quests, as they will continue to grow with the new characters you meet along the way, but all the side missions are different styles, offering lots of fun, and sometimes, induce rage.

I’ll recommend you skip this next paragraph if you don’t want spoilers. Elseworlds is brought to light as you journey to defeat the Justice League, and you’ll discover that there are thirteen Brainiacs out there, but they’re all on different worlds. Elseworlds brings the endgame content, and with this comes new missions that reward you with Promethium to unlock the next Branianc boss battle. With the game being played across live servers, this offers plenty of existing and future content, and I’m hyped for it. I love titles that offer additional content after completing the main story, and with how big the DC Universe is, there’s plenty to cover.

Another cool addition to the endgame content is that once you’ve finished the main storyline, you can start earning Finite Crisis Ranks. These determine what looks are available to you. There are also extra missions locked behind specific Finite Crisis Rank requirements. At this stage, we don’t know how high a level you will need before Season One drops, but we’ll be sure to update when the Season drops. Incursion Missions offer even more endgame content and are locked behind a Promethium requirement. Once you unlock Promethium and start earning it, you can use it to unlock the Incursions missions, but this will set you back 1000 Promethium per mission.

You might want to skip this paragraph as well. The endgame content just keeps coming, and you’ll be presented with a screen full of awesome-looking weapons, and for the DC Universe fans reading, you’ll notice some familiar names, with the likes of Two-Face or Bane standing out in the list. These are designed for the people who like collecting all that sick-looking loot and grinding their way through games.

These are called Infamy Gear Sets, and they can only be earned by completing Incursion missions, though you’ll also need to level your Finite Crisis Rank in order to get the really cool stuff, so prepare to chain missions. Fans of Diablo will also find some familiarities in the Villian Synergies. This lets you equip infamous and notorious gear, and because these can link together, you can use it to create a powerful build, letting you have two powers from two different villains in one build.

During Incursions, some of Braniac’s minions will be mutated, giving them the powers of our favourite heroes. Some will have Flash’s speed, while others can manifest the power of the Green Lantern. I’m lucky that I haven’t come across any that would require the use of Kryptonite, the Man of Steel was hard enough as it was, but the more Incursion missions you finish, and the more Finite Rank you gain, you’ll come across increasingly more difficult hordes of enemies. Once you hit level 10 in the Finte Crisis the fun really begins, and you can start taking part in the freshly unlocked Killing-Time game mode. Enemies will come in harder and faster, steadily getting even more intense as time goes on.

Each character can reach a maximum level of 30, but you can then progress into Mastery. This lets you continue to earn and use Skill Points and upgrade the Skill Tree, unlocking extra perks that offer things like more damage, increased XP, and special move sets that can help you do some pretty damaging special moves to the hordes of enemies around you. Once you’ve unlocked enough, you can even earn alternate moves, and after completing a character’s skill tree and reaching level 30, you unlock a Squad Skill Tree, and you can use these points to finish that as well, with each character having their Skill Tree to progress through.

As you complete the main story, and even some of the side content, you can unlock more items for your loadout, including anything from firearms, sidearms, and grenades, to adjusting what the bomb implanted in your head can do. Much like the looks system, this was super basic and user-friendly to play around with. You can also upgrade weapons by using various charms to decorate them, and the in-game currency to upgrade the stats, though this seemed kind of pointless at this point in the game.

There’s also the choice of using one of your Support Squad’s abilities, giving you the option to re-roll the weapon, but the results are random and could make the stats better or worse. You’ll have to decide if it’s worth the gamble. If you’re lucky enough to get your hands on the Deluxe Edition, the included weapons seemed to have higher stats, so I used these more than any of the others.

Regardless of which character you choose, you can alter their appearance in the menu, such as changing the colours of their clothes or applying special skins, such as the Justice League pre-order bonus, giving you some interesting things like King Shark dressing up as Superman, but you’ll also be able to unlock and purchase items. They’ll let you make your favourite character your own, and the beautiful thing is that everyone in your squad will see your character as you do. I loved pulling out the King Shark’s mankini, an iconic skin from the comics, and rolling around with that. The UI for this was super simple, with all of your options readily laid out and on display – you won’t waste time scrolling to find things.

Edward Nigma more commonly known as the Riddler has been to Metropolis, leaving Riddler Trophies, Riddles, and Time Trials around the city. You’ll need to find and solve these, though some of the riddles are harder than they seem, and the time trials can be really competitive. I found myself wanting to hit Three Stars on all of them. If you can get them all in one, you’d be doing better than me.

It has been confirmed that Season One of Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League will add a new playable character – our favourite clown prince, The Joker. There are also going to be some new episodes, including additional missions and side quests for you to complete, so I’m looking forward to driving head first into Season One, and you’d better keep an eye on MKAU Gaming’s website for the Season One review.

I loved how simple the controls were, and this really helped to drive home the fast-paced feel. Even though each character had their own methods of traversing the world and bashing heads, they all felt similar enough that it was easy to swap between them. The comments I made earlier, the ones about feeling like I had to relearn a character, were more about learning their strengths and weaknesses The controls are also customisable, so if you wanted to change them, you can, but I feel like the preset was where it needed to be.

While the character models and the cutscenes were all done, the city was a little bit of a letdown at times, in that some textures felt like they weren’t quite finished. There were times while I was traversing around the city that I saw something and thought, “Damn. That could have been textured that little bit more,” but at the end of the day, how a game looks does not make the game. It’s more about the story and gameplay. The cutscenes, on the other hand, were done so well that I felt like I was sitting in a cinema watching them, and they paired well with the amazing voice acting and fantastic dialogue, and this combined with the character’s facial expressions, as we as how they moved really brought them all to life, making for a very immersive experience.

My favourite part of this title has to be the audio. The dialogue, provided by some big-name actors, kept me laughing the whole time, and this was mirrored by anyone I was playing with. These, combined with incredible sounds of combat and the general ambience of Metropolis make for an incredible soundscape, and it’s something you would expect from a Triple-A title.

If you were a fan of the Batman Arkham Series, you will love Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League. It offers hours of fun, and with the ending bringing a new beginning, I’m keen to see what the developers can bring to the table in terms of future content. There are plenty of laughs, quite a bit of frustration, and an all-out good time on offer.

Written by: Hayden Nelson