Highlights

  • Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League's sales and player numbers are not meeting expectations, with low active player counts on Steam compared to other games.
  • A release on Xbox Game Pass could potentially save the game by boosting its player-base and providing a mutually beneficial opportunity for fans and the developer.
  • Another DC game, Gotham Knights, saw a significant increase in active players after being released on Xbox Game Pass, highlighting the potential positive impact it could have for Suicide Squad.

It's been a bit of an odd few weeks for Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League. Heading into 2024, many fans weren't really expecting much from Suicide Squad. After a disappointing gameplay reveal back in February 2023, many fans had lost faith in Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, and the prolific leaks surrounding the game's story in the last few months really didn't help the game's pre-release hype.

But it's been a week since Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League first hit store shelves, and the general perception around the game has only continued to get more complicated by the day. While many fans are enjoying Suicide Squad for the co-op looter-shooter it is, many other fans just can't shake the feeling that Rocksteady could have done so much better, and it seems as though the game's sales are reflecting this mixed reception. At a time like this, Xbox Game Pass could be Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League's savior.

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Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League Toyman
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Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League's Support Squad Needs More Post-Launch Deep Cuts

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League's Support Squad consists of some lesser-known DC villains, something post-launch content should double down on.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League Could Benefit From an Xbox Game Pass Release

Gotham Knights Received a Big Boost From Xbox Game Pass

While Xbox Game Pass can't fix a game's inherent issues, it can offer a mutually beneficial win for both fans and the developer, offering fans a high-profile game for no extra cost, while giving the developer a healthy boost in player-count. This doesn't always work, but for a big game like Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, the results could be great.

A perfect example of this is DC's very own Gotham Knights. Released back in October 2022, Gotham Knights was a pretty big disappointment on launch. While some fans found enjoyment in the game's storytelling, world, and melee-focused gameplay, many found Gotham Knights' loot-based gameplay loop far too repetitive, resulting in a mixed critical reception and some disappointing sales numbers for Warner Bros.

In September 2023, Gotham Knights came to Xbox Game Pass, and according to some statistics from the months following, this Game Pass launch resulted in 6% of Xbox's entire player-base trying out the game in its first week on the service, causing a massive spike in active players. While Gotham Knights came to PlayStation Plus soon after, it only managed to capture 3% of PlayStation's overall player-base, still resulting in a sizable increase in active players, but not quite like Xbox Game Pass' numbers.

Suicide Squad May Want to Make the Leap to Game Pass Soon

Though it's still early days for Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, the game's initial sales aren't looking great. While Suicide Squad was technically number one on the UK physical sales charts in the week of its release, that actually paints a false picture of success. Right now, physical sales are down across the board, so while Suicide Squad was number one, it only sold half of what Guardians of the Galaxy did back when it first launched in 2021, according to GamesIndustry.Biz head Christopher Dring in a recent Twitter post.

What paints a far more shocking picture is Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League's current SteamDB statistics. At the time of writing, Suicide Squad has just 4,409 active players on Steam, and an all-time peak player-count of just 13,459. For reference, Persona 3 Reload, a game that sold less in the UK than Suicide Squad, has about 25,000 players online right now according to SteamDB, and a peak of 45,002.

Things aren't looking too hot for Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, and Xbox Game Pass could offer a lifeline. A live-service game through and through, it's vital that Suicide Squad retains a large enough player-base to make that seasonal content worthwhile to produce, and the best way to get new players through the door might be via Xbox Game Pass.