andy.chalk@pcgamer.com (Andy Chalk)
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Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League flopped badly when it launched earlier this year, and it hasn’t shown any signs of turning things around. At the moment, SteamDB indicates that 161 people are currently playing the game on Steam, and while that isn’t the whole picture—Suicide Squad is also available on Xbox and PlayStation—it’s sure not a sign of good things happening.
The persistently near-subterranean player counts has led to worries that WB Games might do a Redfall and pull the plug on planned future updates—although hopefully without pulling the plug on the entire development studio in the process. From a business perspective, it’s not an unreasonable suggestion: Why put however much money a full year of content takes to create (presumably a lot) for the benefit of a few hundred (or even a few thousand) diehards?
But that is apparently the plan: A WB Games representative has confirmed with Kotaku that “Suicide Squad will complete its currently announced roadmap.”
That roadmap includes three more post-launch seasons (the first season, featuring The Joker, is already live) with three new playable characters, three new environments, and various weapons, gear sets, activities, and other content between them.
That’s good news for the people playing Suicide Squad, but it doesn’t exactly ooze enthusiasm for the future, or even suggest that one is possible. It’s more akin to a begrudging acknowledgement that promises made will be promises kept. Which I suppose is more than we get in some cases.
It’s been reported that WB Games took a $200 million loss on Suicide Squad, so you can understand why there’d be a reluctance to throw good money after bad. But it’s also (another) spotlight shone on the inherent Achilles heel of live service games: If they aren’t a hit, all those big promises for the future are just ink on paper, and the fact that you spent $60 or more in anticipation of a long, fruitful future really doesn’t mean anything.
As a business executive, you might argue that shutting it all down is the smart move, but as a fan of a game in the firing line, it really sucks: When Sharkmob announced the end of development on Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodhunt—finally, a battle royale I liked!—I was genuinely let down. And, I hate to say, I stopped playing—it’s still a great game, but knowing that the promised story isn’t going to evolve further completely took the wind out of my sails.
So take heart, Suicide Squadders: For the next nine months or so, your game will live on. Beyond that, though, I probably wouldn’t get my hopes too high.