Rocksteady Studios’ new game, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, is famously one of the last times that Batman fans will get to hear late actor Kevin Conroy as Gotham’s Caped Crusader. And while longtime Arkham and Batman: The Animated Series fans may not relish having to battle (and kill) Batman, they’ll at least get plenty of time with him in the Suicide Squad game — maybe more than you think.
Yes, Batman is one of the many bad guys you have to dispatch during the events of Kill the Justice League, but more so than other league members, he’s a regular presence in your ear. Early on in the game, Task Force X is outfitted with in-ear communication devices and shortly thereafter, a computer hacker assisting the Suicide Squad taps into the comms of big bad guy Brainiac’s forces — you get to hear a lot of Batman’s scheming with Flash, Green Lantern, and Brainiac, as well as Batman’s discussions with Wonder Woman, who manages to escape being mind-controlled.
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League also features a nice design touch: Early in the game, you’ll occasionally see Batman lurking in the distance, on towers and rooftops, monitoring the movements of Task Force X. In true Batman fashion, he stalks you. Attempt to attack him, and he’ll vanish in a cloud of bats.
And as the World’s Greatest Detective, evil Batman uses knowledge, not just his fists, for power. Batman psychologically trash talks Captain Boomerang, Deadshot, Harley Quinn, and King Shark, attempting to undermine the group’s cohesion. Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League plays on these criminals’ fears in ways that tap into how the Batman of Rocksteady’s Arkham games toyed with his foes, setting traps for them and bursting forth from the shadows.
But best of all? Without spoiling it, there’s sweet, sentimental Batman stuff in here too. It’s all undercut with Suicide Squad’s constant barrage of jokes, but there are a few nice payoffs too.
So while this version of Batman may not go out the way that longtime Arkham fans were hoping for in Suicide Squad, Kevin Conroy gets a chance to flex his mastery of Batman in a new and interesting way for Kill the Justice League. It isn’t Rocksteady’s greatest game, but at least it gives us more of the best man to give Batman a voice.
