Injustice: Gods Among Us - Review

It’s hard to be unbiased when dealing with a game that includes characters from theDC Universe, most of them very deep to my heart. But, I put personal bias aside for The Avengers, so I think I can manage. Now, before we begin. I will wholeheartedly admit that I am no fighting game fanatic, unlike some people I know. When it came to my childhood, I was very partial to SoulCalibur and occasionally Mortal Kombat if it was available to me. Thanks to SoulCalibur IV and Mortal Kombat: Deception and Armageddon though, I had pretty much lost touch with both properties, and Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe and SoulCalibur V didn’t do a single thing to sway me otherwise. But, prior to SoulCalibur V, was Mortal Kombat (2011), or MK9. Mortal Kombat brought the franchise back to its roots, and nicely rebooted the franchise with a re-telling of the original three games. So, when NetherRealm announced that they would be making a new title solely focused on the DC Universe by itself, I was somewhere between curious and wary.

The mediocrity of MK vs. DC attributed to both feelings. I was curious to see if they could take what they had established with it and greatly improve and fine-tune it, and on the other hand I was worried it might be an MK9 clone or just MK vs. DC without the MK, which wouldn’t be an improvement. Thankfully, the Injustice Battle Arena matches hosted by WB Games had impressed me, and after talking about it with friends, I was convinced to buy it. Well, not just buy it... pre-order the Collector’s Edition.

The backstory is more touched upon in the comic.

Now, I want to be fair and judge the title on its own merit but comparing it to MK9 is somewhat inevitable, so I’ll touch on that at some point. Injustice: Gods Among Us from a narrative standpoint chronicles the events of an alternative universe where The Joker has infected Superman with Scarecrow’s fear toxin, which made him harbor the delusion that he was in battle with Doomsday, before the effects wear off and he realizes he had been battling Lois, killing her and her unborn child. Upon this moment of grief and hysteria, Superman murders The Joker and institutes martial law of the entire planet under his rule to eliminate any potential crime. Batman, upon accidentally stumbling into this alternate dimension along with the Joker, joins the Insurgency, a group of rebels on a crusade to end the Regime; Superman’s dictatorship.

Given that the game is not scripted by any experienced DC Comics writer, it’s impressive how well-crafted and balanced the story is, albeit a brief one. But, considering most titles in this genre never bother with any semblance of a storyline, it’s appreciated here. NetherRealm also made the right decision in bringing in DC’s Chief Creative Officer, Geoff Johns for referral and advice for accuracy to the established lore these characters hail from.

Now, getting to comparisons, the Injustice fighting structure is as you’d expect, fairly similar to that of MK9, but with some major contrasts. For one, battles are not split into rounds, fights instead having two health bars given to both combatants, and there is a short break once the initial bar is diminished, with no damage allowed to bleed over into the latter. This allows players to better prepare and strategize when and when not to utilize their character powers, specials, or a stage transition. Another contrast is the environmental interaction, such as knocking your opponent into the Batcomputer sitting in the background if you happen to bring your opponent near context sensitive area, or slamming a car onto your opponent if your character has that kind of strength.

New 52 Batman is my fave. Collector's Edition exclusive.

There are enough elements in Injustice for it to speak for itself and not be overshadowed by NetherRealm’s previous game. Characters are varied and I don’t feel starved for a good roster, especially when no character seems to branch outside of what their styles and limitations and power or lack of have been in the comics. However, even while I may have just said that Injustice holds up as its own game, I’d be cheating myself I wasn’t honest... Injustice could honestly afford to be a little more like Mortal Kombat, and not necessarily from a general gameplay perspective. 

MK9 seemed to be bursting with content, especially in the wake of Marvel vs. Capcom 3, which offers barebones. Not that Injustice is comparable to it, it’s just... where’s the Tag-Team mode? Where are the non-DLC unlockable characters and other content? S.T.A.R. Labs missions are a nice distraction and are better than typical fighting game mission modes with some interesting criteria, but an Elseworld’s Finest Flash skin doesn’t seem worth all that effort and time. Also, characters need to be balanced, but that’s kind of a given with any new fighting game on the market.

240 Missions, not including DLC like Red Son.

Regime Superman is thankfully no Shao Kahn, but I’m not surprised that he still remains a somewhat obnoxious end fight for Classic Battle mode, the equivalent to Arcade Mode. As far as properties go, I think NetherRealm could make this into a franchise, I wouldn’t mind a sequel to this a few years down the road. Overall, the game may leave a little something to be desired to a non-fan, but it’ll be pretty minute, but there’s quite a lot of fanservice for myself and friends. So there’s not THAT much to complain about, but there’s definitely room for improvement. For what we got though, I’m happy about it. 8.5 out of 10.