QCF: Injustice: Gods among us

onathan and Martha Kent knew they had their hands full. The moment they discovered a baby aboard an alien spaced pod that crashed into their cornfield on that fateful day years ago, their parenting and the legacy of Jor-El’s omnipresent recordings have instilled the morals and virtue that helped mold Clark Kent into the strongest keeper of justice the galaxy has ever known—but what if that wasn’t enough?

Superman may arguably be the most powerful being in the universe, but ironically he’s also the most human, and with those distinctions comes its limits. NetherRealm Studios aims to explore what happens when the last son of Krypton is pushed beyond his last limit in Injustice: God among Us.

DC vets Palmiotti, Gray, and the rest of the label work in collaboration with Mortal Kombat creators to continue the streak of good luck that the comic book license has seen in games by producing the ultimate comic book fantasy from the DC universe, and deliver it in a solid game at the same time. After some time to indulge the title, both the DC fanboy and the video game player inside of me left their room, got together, and happily shook hands with one another as they spent the afternoon having a solid romp with an experience that created the all too coveted common ground they have been searching for.

NetherRealm had a tall order when they took on this project. We can all agree that while the concept of Wonder Woman pummeling Sinestro through 40 stories of skyscraper to the top of the Daily Planet building sounds amazing on paper, memories of Justice League: Task Force and MK vs. DC Universe may have left a bad taste in too many mouths to generate some solid faith. The studio learned from these past outings and applied this focus to take Injustice in the right direction, putting those fears to rest. The modern superhero fighter does this by never losing sight of what it aspires to be. The attention to detail involving the emulation of the DC Universe, from settings to characters, is the most authentic to appear in a game yet.

The presentation is both palpably and narratively strong, so let’s touch on the narrative. I mean, how good of a job does the title do when it comes to selling the probability of Aquaman being able to actually stand toe-to-toe with Black Adam, and even win for that matter? Well, to keep it frank, NetherRealm Studios done good, folks.

The Joker is many things, but he isn’t a pushover -- no matter who he’s up against, and the Man of Steel came to learn this harder than any superhero did before him. The clown prince of crime uses illusion and deception to dupe the Kryptonian into murdering his wife and unborn child, which proceeds to initiate that a catalyst effect that trigger the death of the entire population of Metropolis.

Superman has snapped. The aftermath pushes the heroic icon into merciless tyrant who rules humanity with an iron fist, and recruits those who will join him while eliminating those who don’t. To clarify, the charm of the narrative doesn’t simply rest on the fact that the story makes strides to check off all the necessary tropes to set the conflict and the elements in place that make it believable. What makes the story engaging is not that Injustice excels, but that it respectfully does so within the laws of DC fiction while making it accessible to those who don’t follow the fictions. It still remains consistent to this philosophy, and continues innovating through the entirety of plot.

I can admit that the natural suspension of disbelief stretches whenever you encounter scenes like Harley Quinn stomping the life out of Ares. However, the attention to character actions and how they interact with certain elements makes up for it and where the presentation really shines. Achieving brilliant fan service in the cognizant tense is one thing, but Injustice it goes a step further in the tangible aspect of physical gameplay.

To start, here is where presentation oozes through real hard through solid gameplay, through the real stars of Injustice, the stages. Each scenario is loaded with enough content to play out the way you would imagine them to through every identifiable caveat you could imagine. Fighting within the corridors of Arkham Asylum, for example, you’re treated to detail in every sense, from the visuals that demonstrate the influence of Poison Ivey’s vines and Jokers graffiti to the stage transition involving the room of Dr. Crane. To highlight, the Scarecrow’s fear-toxin armed assault even pays tribute to reenact the art style and design of the psychedelic stages from Rocksteady’s Arkham series, Injustice spares no expense to deliver the fan service to the finest detail that DC lore has to offer in line with sharp stage design to boot.

The various set pieces you’ll encounter have a position and look about them that don’t ostracize them from the environment, and yet still stands out enough to be recognizable without defeating the illusion that they’re just organic to the stage. If that wasn’t enough, you can also send your foe into a shit storm of bad news by expelling them from the stage with a launch attack in order to get treated to a sequence of tragic events that befalls your opponent to a different section of the stage. The end result mixes up the frenetic action of interactivity that’s consonant with Power Stone into the strictly tactically-minded, combo-driven 2D format that Injustice is, and always when interacted with.

The direct gameplay is no slouch, either. The physics and dynamics of the combat system aren’t just a carbon copy of Mortal Kombat; it’s a brand new formula from the ground up that’s mostly solid, sans a few hiccups. Combat composes of light, high, and strong strikes. The remaining button layout goes to the throws, super triggers, and character specific abilities. Simple layouts with complex nuances make the experience feel intuitive no matter the skill of the player.

Also, let it be known that after 20 years, Ed Boon and company have caught up with the times and completely eschewed the use of a block button. In its place is traditional blocking. You know, the system in where players block by holding the direction opposite to the attack that's being defended against.

I mean, who knew just how much better this system worked over the other one, right? Because blocking is much more tactile, there’s a bigger emphasis towards being offensive. The layout allows for easy-to-use special moves that can help build up a super meter, which allows for an even easier-to-use super finisher to be executed. The super bar can also be used in increments in an effort to deploy alternative tactics such as beefing up super moves to extend damage potential, or for performing an escaping breakaway that opens up or sometimes even stuns opponents, and finally, the wager system (more on that later).

The real versatility in being successful when it comes to attacking in Injustice involves the combos. With combinations, the attacks can pave the way to extend damage by chaining into special moves, grapples, bridges into juggling combos, and your skill on towards chaining these techniques. These strategies are not only enjoyable and engaging to discover or learn but each character within the roster has their own strengths and weaknesses against the different classes of combos through an effective Rock-paper-scissors system. Of course, one key element is set into place to change up and balance out the binary nature of the Rock-Paper-Scissors formula, which is the Clash technique.

The move basically acts as a trump card; when initiated at the right moment against an a foe’s onslaught, it starts a Clash event that pits you two into a dangerous rush where the victor is determined based on the number of super bars wagered prior to the attack. The aftermath of clash rewards varies depending on who started and defended with the wager, which determines either extra damage or even a marginal health regain, adding another layer of strategy to consider when determining how to best use your super meter. While the deceptive complexity is refreshing and easy to pick up, the capital of the system’s core is a bit thin, and with certain characters that have attacks that can exploit the system. Regardless of size (other than height being the only exception for high attacks), each character has a nearly identical hit-box. Because of this, the hit-boxes don’t accommodate the capacity for all speeds of attacks from diversity of placement; this leads to some cases of infinite spamming possibilities through characters that have overarching or insanely speedy reach with characters like Solomon Grundy and Catwoman, making them infamous examples of the flaw. Regardless of these setbacks, there are ways to maneuver about them, so the game never feels broken -- just a tad flawed.

The only other major flaw that holds back Injustice is an odd choice of using a modified version of the Unreal engine. Now we all know that graphic don’t break a game’s enjoyment factor, but the visuals of Injustice play a big role as half of the fun is the presentation. Injustice uses in-game visuals that switch in and out of Inverse kinematics whenever a stage transition or a super move is initiated. The graphics don’t terribly suffer from the frequent changing, but it can be incredibly jarring to the eye regardless. It affects textures and graphic mapping to details of the settings like set pieces or architecture of the stage involved, which ends up conflicting the visuals to a somewhat annoying degree at times.

Aside from the DC license, Injustice is a competent fighter that shakes up the foundation of the genre and gets most of it right in the process. Indeed, the trend continues beyond the Arkham series, as Injustice is yet another worthy entry to stand testament for the revitalization of the DC property in full force for the modern video game landscape.