Why not do a superman game like this?

[ProVegaGamer]

Anyone wonder why no gaming company has tried to make a open world superman game similar to these awesome batman games, even that amazing spiderman game.

[Devsman]

Well, it couldn't be too much like these, but I agree they should take another stab at a Superman game.

I think the basic mission and world structure more or less works, though it would need to be a lot bigger since Superman can fly. And obviously Metropolis is a bright happy place instead of a town where it's somehow always night.

But I don't think the freeflow combat works for Superman at all. I think it would be more appropriate to base it on something like Zone of the Enders, where you just fly about at will and hover when you come to a stop. And ZoE2 actually did a great job with super speed, too:

https://youtu.be/MToOdcsxezw

For normal mooks he could fight Lexbots, or Brainiac/Darkseid minions, depending on the plot. Give a couple some Kryptonite or red solar beams to make it interesting.

Where they've screwed up in the past was by not actually understanding the property. "Hurr Durr Superman's invincible, so let's give Metropolis a health bar instead." No. No, he's not. And that's not how it works in the comics either--Metropolis gets largely destroyed all the time and it's not game over. And most importantly, defending stuff in video games is ANNOYING and should be used for like one or two "mix things up" missions at most. Preferably without it causing a failure condition.

I do like Metropolis being able to take damage, though, since that's still a pretty big Superman thing. So they could also add in side missions that let you earn cash where you turn in reports to the Daily Planet after you, I dunno, beat up a bunch of minions hanging out on the street somewhere or whatever. The cash then lets you rebuild Metropolis damage. Of course there needs to be some in-game incentive for that, too, but I can't come up with anything specific.

I also don't like the superpower meter in some Superman games--I think it's a better idea to make these powers situational and/or balanced so that punching is just usually the easiest thing to do rather than what you do when you're out of superpower power. For example, maybe you have to plant your feet on the ground to use gale-force breath, and maybe heat vision doesn't deal a lot of damage compared to your other moves.

[D'Harhan]

With his powers the scale required for those missions you'd need a country to fly around. Which, don't get me wrong, would be awesome.

[Devsman]

Originally posted by D'Harhan:

With his powers the scale required for those missions you'd need a country to fly around. Which, don't get me wrong, would be awesome.

Not necessarily. You'd need more space than Arkham Knight has but you don't have to make him as powerful pound for pound as his comic book versions. His flying speed could max out at 150-ish MPH and he'd still feel plenty fast most of the time without an accidental input sending you out of the city.

Or you could formalize his super speed like they did in ZoE2 so he goes like thousands of MPH for a short burst but otherwise travels at a Batman-like pace.

Then add in a few handwaves to the effect of "oh, Superman has great control of his powers" to explain why he never chops buildings in half with his heatvision. Kinda like the Batmobile mysteriously electrocuting bad guys instead of running them over.

[ProVegaGamer]

All they have to do is make it like that Spiderman game, with a good story, enemies, able to walk around as clark kent, etc. would be cool.

[Holografix]

superman sux

[ProVegaGamer]

Originally posted by Holografix:

superman sux

says the person who has a avatar with a person wearing blue shorts, white shirt and reading a red book. MAHAHHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

[D'Harhan]

Originally posted by Devsman:

Originally posted by D'Harhan:

With his powers the scale required for those missions you'd need a country to fly around. Which, don't get me wrong, would be awesome.

Not necessarily. You'd need more space than Arkham Knight has but you don't have to make him as powerful pound for pound as his comic book versions. His flying speed could max out at 150-ish MPH and he'd still feel plenty fast most of the time without an accidental input sending you out of the city.

Or you could formalize his super speed like they did in ZoE2 so he goes like thousands of MPH for a short burst but otherwise travels at a Batman-like pace.

Then add in a few handwaves to the effect of "oh, Superman has great control of his powers" to explain why he never chops buildings in half with his heatvision. Kinda like the Batmobile mysteriously electrocuting bad guys instead of running them over.

There is also the Destruction Physics that'd be needed. But again, I would love it.

[D'Harhan]

Once we see how Superman works in the new Suicide Squad game this might get more traction.
I always wanted a Green Arrow game in this style based on Arrow\Flash

[Devsman]

Originally posted by D'Harhan:

Originally posted by Devsman:

Not necessarily. You'd need more space than Arkham Knight has but you don't have to make him as powerful pound for pound as his comic book versions. His flying speed could max out at 150-ish MPH and he'd still feel plenty fast most of the time without an accidental input sending you out of the city.

Or you could formalize his super speed like they did in ZoE2 so he goes like thousands of MPH for a short burst but otherwise travels at a Batman-like pace.

Then add in a few handwaves to the effect of "oh, Superman has great control of his powers" to explain why he never chops buildings in half with his heatvision. Kinda like the Batmobile mysteriously electrocuting bad guys instead of running them over.

There is also the Destruction Physics that'd be needed. But again, I would love it.

I think EDF5 destruction physics are more than adequate tbh. Stuff just takes enough damage and falls to the ground. And it's not like they were groundbreaking or anything--I just can't think of an earlier example.

Red Faction Guerrilla would obviously be king but I don't imagine it would run so well when we're talking about a city instead of a few buildings here and there.

[Uhtred son of Uhtred]

Originally posted by Holografix:

superman sux

agree.

[Stormspark]

Superman games are almost impossible to pull off, because Superman might as well be invincible. There are only a couple of ways to pose a threat to him.

1) Give every single thug in the game kryptonite. This is dumb for a number of reasons. Alternatively you could have Superman de-powered for the early portions of the game, and have him get his powers back later, but that would be really contrived, plus noone would want to play a de-powered Superman.
2) Only have him fight other superpowered opponents. Well, that might work for boss fights, but things like the fun stealth sections in the Arkham games would be impossible, because Superman is invincible. I guess you could also go for something like Asura's Wrath, with every opponent being like, say, Darkseid or something.
3) Make the threats to something other than Superman himself, with the challenge being he can't be everywhere at once.

I've seen various attempts at this. Probably the best attempt I saw was a game focused on #3. It actually gave the city the health bar instead of Superman, and you had to choose where to go to have the most impact...like say there are 5 bad things happening at once, and he can't stop all of them. Unfortunately that game fell short in a lot of other ways so it wasn't that good, but it at least was a good idea.

Batman is just a normal human (well peak human, but still normal human) with a lot of fancy gadgets. It's possible to have threats to him. Superman is just WAY too OP for an open world game like this. If Superman were the main character in Arkham Knight the game would've been over before the first cutscene ended.

[jeremyj621]

Here's one way an open-world game might work with Superman: Lex Luthor distributes guns with Kryptonite ammo to henchmen and thugs throughout Metropolis. This way, guns could damage Superman, giving him an incentive to avoid gunfire. Lex Luthor has the resources to fund an army just like like Scarecrow and Arkham Knight, so his own private militia would be conceivable. Add some additional plot twists, such as an invasion led by Darkseid and various other side plots, and an open-world Superman game would be doable.

[FauxFurry]

Someone tried that already. They failed badly.
https://youtu.be/KY-eUtc-gp4