Injustice: Gods Among Us Review

Injustice: Gods Among Us Community Page

I’m glad Netherrealm returned to making a DC heroes fighting game. Their last attempt at a DC heroes fighting game was MK vs DC which was a crossover fighting game between the Mortal Kombat characters and DC heroes. MK vs DC was panned widely by critics and was definitely a subpar entry in Netherrealms fighting game roster. So one could be forgiven for thinking that Netherrealms wouldn’t attempt another DC fighting game. However, Injustice: Gods Among Us is Netherrealms second shot at a DC fighting game, but is it any good?

Injustice: Gods Among Us is your standard fighting game, with each of the game modes you’d expect. Story mode, Local or Online versus mode, Training mode etc. What it does differently though is that the single player modes are much more varied than other fighting games. You can do the a normal battle against 10 computer controlled players in a row, do the same but all on one health bar, fight as many enemies in a time limit as you can and many others. I like how there are many different variations to play than just the standard mode.

The fighting mechanics are very similar to Mortal Kombat in the sense that the moves are generally quite simple to execute with the super moves being particularly easy to pull off. Having simple fighting controls however, is a double edged sword. On the one hand, people new to fighters will not be overwhelmed with a bunch of complicated combos and moves to try and pull off. However it leaves players who are more experienced in fighting games, especially ones like Street Fighter 4, a little disappointed. This best exemplified by the aforementioned super moves. In Street Fighter 4 the typical ultra combo involves one maybe two complicated analogue stick movements followed by pressing all three of wither the kick or punch buttons. However as I said, the super moves in Injustice: Gods Among Us just involve pressing the right and left triggers at the same time. This takes out a lot of the skill involved in the combos and takes away from the impressiveness of executing a particularly long one. Overall however the fighting mechanics although simple, are up to scratch with the other fighting games on the market.

Netherrealm did a really good job with making each character play as you would assume. Big bulky characters like Bane and Doomsday are slow and hit hard, while characters like the Flash feel fast and agile. The detail is also very good with each fighter using moves and weapons consistent with their character. Joker uses a crowbar, knife and throughs canisters of poison gas while Batman uses gadgets and his martial arts skills.

For a game released in April this year I found the graphics a little lack lustre. In my opinion Mortal Kombat 9 released a whole two years ago  looks better. It looks somewhat unpolished and less crisp than other games released. Each of the characters have been reproduced really well and look exactly like their comic counterparts. Injustice: Gods Among Us has really epic music. It has a really nice orchestral opening theme and the in game music fits nicely with the games atmosphere.  Overall Injustice: Gods Among Us presents itself decently.

Injustice: Gods Among Us is one of the few fighting games that actually has a storyline worth playing, or a storyline at all. It concerns an alternate universe where Superman becomes a dictator after Joker tricks him into murdering Lois Lane, Superman’s wife. The game involves Batman, Aquaman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern and the Joker who are all sent to the alternate universe with dictator Superman to stop him, well maybe not Joker. The story is actually interesting and i found myself compelled to keep playing and find out what was going to happen next. I was so compelled that I played through the whole campaign in two play sessions. However the story mode is quite short as it only took me four hours to complete. This can be kind of forgiven by the many other game modes on offer but for modern game standards, four hours is still very short. The story has no real replayability. Once you’ve played it once there is no real reason to do it again.  Overall Injustice: Gods Among Us has a really decent story, and I can tell that Netherrealm put a lot of effort into this story and It pays off.

Injustice: Gods Among Us has a really good lifespan. With all the game types on offer Injustice: Gods Among Us will keep you entertained for hours. You can spend hours practicing a character so you can beat your friends or the online community.