Current Events > Why is a Superman game hard to make?

(+) Yeah! (+)

He doesn't have to just be limited to Metropolis. Superman has godlike powers. He can go almost anywhere and do almost anything.Your imagiation is the limit with him.

He should be traveling to other planets visiting alien civilizations, fighting alien overlords, stopping astroids from hitting the earth and fighting gods.

Because he's godlike. Removes most suspense of challenge when you know he's nigh unkillable.
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You're right, but I imagine anyone making a Superman game would feel obligated to limit the setting to Metropolis. Boss fights would be no problem because Superman has plenty of powerful villains. But they'd need something better than a human thug for generic enemies. That's why I like your idea of setting it on some other planet. You could make the generic enemies into powerful aliens instead.
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Just play gta with hacks.
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KingWhiteKnight posted...

He doesn't have to just be limited to Metropolis. Superman has godlike powers. He can go almost anywhere and do almost anything.Your imagiation is the limit with him.

A he should be traveling to other planets visiting alien civilizations, fighting alien overlords, stopping astroids from hitting the earth and fighting gods.

Too big of a scope. Most companies can't even get open world games in a small region right. Imagine trying to make a game like No Man's Sky except you do a ton more shit than scavenging, harvesting, minor battles. Either there would be a lot more re-used assets/reskins or they risk too much money making it and the potential for monetary flop is too big.
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Could have Darkseid as the villian who conquers earth with his slaves. His minions instantly become the thugs.
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Ok first of all it wouldn't feel like a Superman game if it were on Thanagar or Io or Mogo or whatever. Sure, he goes to those places, but then it becomes a Hawkman story or a Green Lantern Corps story, or just one scene in the context of a larger story. It's the kind of thing that could maybe work as a side story I guess but since every Superman game sucks, they'll want to do a reboot.

Secondly, being too powerful is no more a problem for a Superman game than it is for Superman comics, which are among the most successful in history. Superman is faster than a speeding buller, more powerful than a locomotive, etc. Well so is Doomsday. And Darkseid. And Zod. And when you can't beat his stats, you can turn the sun red or grab some Kryptonite, or drain his power, or be publicly untouchable like Lex Luthor.

The problems are control and environment. The only thing that makes sense for a Superman game is to go open world, because indoor environments or a single street are not only just not big enough, but why can't Superman burst through the walls? But on the other hand, he's so fast that open world would actually be a problem. He's way faster than Sonic, and even Sonic mostly does corridors.

And on the third hand, there's nothing in Metropolis that Superman wouldn't demolish just by brushing into it as he flies by, which combined with the speed thing and the fact that not only do humans have about a quarter of a second reaction time, but Superman hinself can travel several miles on every frame makes for a Superman game where Superman recklessly destroys everything in Metropolis. Even if you did manage to resolve the matter of managing the realistic demolition of a thousand or so buildings in memory.

I've seen mechanics in lots of games that actually look like they might have some promise in a Superman game, like ZoE2's Zero Shift, but it's no small task to combine them all and scale them for an open world.
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GeneralKenobi85 posted...

But they'd need something better than a human thug for generic enemies.

Lexbots
Darkseid's minion guys
Brainiac minionbots
Zod's army
Something with a gimmick, like self-replication or regeneration.

All could be found in Metropolis
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Its hard because when was the last time a competent dev tried their hand at one?

Titus is infamous for crappy games and Superman Returns was a movie-tie-in. (To be fair, the last one had an interesting mechanic to keep Superman invincible)

Give a Superman game to Rocksteady, or Platinum, I dunno.

Travel back in time and convince Capcom to make a proper Superman beat-em-up.

The reason Superman games suck is the same reason Iron Man games suck.
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You could have him travel to different cities around the globe same way that you have to travel to different kingdoms/ strongholds in Shadow of War. Another WB game.

Could give some of his enemies the power to drain the sun from his system. The closer you are to the sun the faster your health regenerates.

Kryptonite, Magic, Sun draining weapons, Brute strength as weaknesses. I think we could make it work.

Like the above guy said too, use the mechanic from superman returns where if the city is too destroyed or too many people die in a mission he loses/ game over.
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Reskin Saints Row: Gat Out of Hell and it is done.
Darkseid teleports Superman to a planet around a red sun so he got no superpowers.
Darkseids minions and sons have taken over the planet, making it a hell for the original population.
Darkseid simply want Superman to suffer, to feel helpless and not being able to help instead of killing him directly.
Lets say that Kalibak decides to betray his father and gives Superman a device that turns souls or whatever into sunpower, so Superman can slowly build up his powers while helping the planet.
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AlisLandale posted...

Titus is infamous for crappy games and Superman Returns was a movie-tie-in. (To be fair, the last one had an interesting mechanic to keep Superman invincible)

If there's going to be a good Superman game, it would have to follow a pattern like this imo.

Make him basically invincible except for in boss fights, and make the overall well being of the city be your health bar in all other cases.

parkman32 posted...

AlisLandale posted...

Titus is infamous for crappy games and Superman Returns was a movie-tie-in. (To be fair, the last one had an interesting mechanic to keep Superman invincible)

If there's going to be a good Superman game, it would have to follow a pattern like this imo.

Make him basically invincible except for in boss fights, and make the overall well being of the city be your health bar in all other cases.

Hell no.

The last thing any game needs is some asshole two streets over punching a building while you can't find him.
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Has any game mastered flying and super speed?
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True answer = Supes was always the victim of shitty game publishers and developers that made nothing but bad video games

Give the IP to a studio like CD Projekt Red, Rocksteady, Naughty Dog, or Guerilla Games and you'll definitely see a damn good Superman game the industry has needed for decades.
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Superman's invulnerability isn't the problem for a game. The problem is accurately representing his powers in a way that controls well. The kind of 6DOF flight that Superman has is extremely tough to put into a game where you can fly around feeling like Superman. Other games have flight but are typically limited in some way.

His speed is also difficult to represent.
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Squall28 posted...

Has any game mastered flying and super speed?

Infamous first light is an exceptional representation of super speed. DC online wasn't bad either though.
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pres_madagascar posted...

Because he's godlike. Removes most suspense of challenge when you know he's nigh unkillable.

Whenever I see this as an answer to this question, I just assume the person doesn't understand video games.

Squall28 posted...

Has any game mastered flying and super speed?

Like I mentioned above, the ZoE2 Zero Shift implementation was actually really solid.

When you're locked on to an enemy and have ZS equipped, you push circle and you'll pause for about a quarter to half a second (for balance) and then move super fast until you're right in front of the enemy in the next quarter to half second or so. It's almost more like teleportation but it does take somewhere around half a second to a second to do it. And of course, the game automatically locks you on to something else when you kill the enemy. If you're not locked on, it sends you in the direcion the camera is pointing.

But that wasn't an open world game and it would be annoying to keep constantly pushing the button to cross the map. It wasn't really meant for travel but for chaining melee kills together across the map and clearing lots of enemies really quickly. So they would have to rework it some.
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