In light of Rocksteady Studios ending post-launch support for Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League last month, the esteemed developer - who suffered a big "L" with its attempt at a live service game - looks to be returning to its roots.
In a new report from Bloomberg that delves into the behind-the-scenes workings of the Warner Bros. video game division, it is claimed that Rocksteady is "looking to return to Batman for a single-player game." The mere mention of Rocksteady and "single-player Batman" in the same sentence is surely enough to get fans excited, though reporter Jason Schreier claims that the "the new project is years away from landing," so it might be wise to temper expectations until we get an official announcement.
Still, even the possibility of such a game being in development offers fans disappointed by Suicide Squad a ray of hope. It's been a rough couple of months at Rocksteady, especially following the release of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League.
The multiplayer action-adventure shooter was released last year to mixed reviews and, ultimately, disappointing sales. We never got specific sales numbers, though publisher Warner Bros. did admit that the game failed to the company's expectations financially. It was later revealed that Warner Bros. had taken a $200 million loss on the game.
The commercial failure of Suicide Squad eventually led to layoffs at Rocksteady. The studio's QA department was reportedly halved from 33 members down to just 15. The poor sales of Suicide Squad were directly cited as the reason for the studio's "restructuring," according to sources.
In January, post-launch support for Suicide Squad officially ended. Season 4 Episode 8 marked the end of new seasonal/episodic content for the game, although all online features still remain available at this time. An Offline Mode was also introduced just in case server support also ends down the line.
While it sounds like this new Batman game is still years away, at least, it could be the win that Rocksteady so desperately needs right now. Rocksteady made a name for itself with the Batman: Arkham series, which date all the way back to 2009 with Batman: Arkham Asylum. The success of Arkham Asylum led to two more sequels from Rocksteady: 2011's Arkham City and 2015's Arkham Knight.
In 2016, Rocksteady delivered the virtual reality adventure game Batman: Arkham VR. From there, they moved on to Suicide Squad, a spin-off to the Arkham series set five years after the events of Arkham Knight. Suicide Squad followed the titular supervillain team assembled by Amanda Waller and sent to Metropolis to stop Brainiac and kill the brainwashed members of the Justice League.
Meanwhile, developer Camouflaj just recently put out Batman: Arkham Shadow, an action-adventure virtual reality game released for the Meta Quest 3 and Meta Quest 3S in October. Batman: Arkham Shadow is a sequel to Arkham Origins, set six months after the events in the game. It follows a younger and less experienced Batman as he tries to stop a mysterious villain known as the Rat King from destroying Gotham City. The game was met with largely positive reviews.
Despite the impressive reviews, a VR game was not exactly what Arkham fans were hoping for. Many fans of the franchise prefer the traditional console experience, so news that Rocksteady may finally be working on a new single-player Batman game is an exciting prospect.
In the same Bloomberg report, it was claimed that Monolith's highly anticipated Wonder Woman game is still a few years away from release. You can read more about that here.