While there was a little bit of unexpected hype for Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League thanks to some successful playtests, the final game did end up disappointing many. While the campaign has good storytelling moments and fantastic visuals, it is ultimately bogged down by the ‘live service' elements, which impact everything from gear and upgrades to repeatable missions and progression. Now, WB has confirmed that Suicide Squad failed to meet sales expectations.
In recent months, WB Games has made it quite clear that it wants to go all-in on live service in an effort to capture more recurring revenue in games based on its biggest franchises. Rocksteady's Suicide Squad wasn't planned to be the first big swing at this, but it has ended up being the publisher's first major attempt and so far, the results are underwhelming. On Steam, the game's playerbase has dropped by over 90 percent, with more people playing the older Batman: Arkham Games than Rocksteady's latest release.
We don't have hard sales numbers for the game yet, but WB Games' CFO, Gunnar Wiedenfels, provided an update during the company's recent quarterly earnings call, stating that Suicide Squad “has fallen short of our expectations”, adding that this will set up the games publisher for “a tough year” compared to 2023.
WB Games had the number one best selling game of 2023 in many countries with Hogwarts Legacy in 2023. The big difference here is that this was a single-player Harry Potter RPG, a game that fans had actually been asking for. Compared to Suicide Squad, a game that has primarily been met with raised eyebrows and scepticism since its announcement, it seems quite clear where things went wrong.
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KitGuru Says: Suicide Squad's player count may rise again once the first season kicks off in March, but I have my doubts. If things don't turn around in the months ahead, then we have to wonder if Rocksteady will keep at it, or if the plug will be pulled ahead of schedule so the studio can move on to its next project.