Give Me Weirder Superhero Games

This week, our first look at the cancelled 2003 Iron Man game emerged, set to be called The Invincible Iron Man. The game was going to be a movie tie-in, and its developers believe that it was cancelled in part because the movie was, meaning there was nothing to tie it to. It’s unclear whether this movie was the animated Iron Man movie that came out in 2007, or the planned New Line Cinema Iron Man movie of the mid-’00s cancelled after studio head Bob Shaye said “Iron Man was too heavy to fly”.

Whatever the story behind it, it got me thinking about some of the older superhero games I played in my youth. While The Invincible Iron Man was planned as a movie tie-in and therefore doesn’t quite fit this category, I miss superhero games that trusted the playerbase to just go with it. No cast-iron IP, no multiverse, just a cape and a really hard punch.

Superhero Games Are A Little Too Safe

I still love superhero games today, leaving aside the two live-service disasters. The Batman Arkham games ushered in this era before Spider-Man took centre stage, while Guardians of the Galaxy delivered a great time too. But the former two are based on the two biggest superheroes in the world, while Guardians leaned heavily on the design and personality of the movies. Though they all tell original stories, while Spider-Man and Batman use lesser known supporting stars, it still feels as though the net could be much wider.

To unleave aside the two live-service disasters, they’re also part of this way of thinking. People like Iron Man/Harley Quinn, so they will pay monthly for pointless upgrades that keep the cash rolling in for years despite very little being offered. I mean hey, people went to see Ant-Man 3, right? Gamers are less committed to the superhero universe than cinemagoers though, and so live-service hamster wheels have proven to be superheroes’ Kryptonite.

It stands to reason that the most popular superheroes are going to get the most games. Everyone loves them and wants to play as them. Wonder Woman is next in line for a game, and it’s a surprise that she’s not had a starring role in a video game until now. But while the biggest characters deserve a lot of the spotlight, there are a lot of weirder heroes who should get a sliver too.

Other Superheroes Offer More Interesting Video Games

Video games are closer to comic books than movies are. There are fewer technical restrictions around showing superpowers, there’s less need to condense stories down to a suitable runtime, and both are niche mediums that have grown more mainstream. Movies are a mainstream art form that absorbs and dilutes more niche stories to make them palatable, but as games ape movies, we’re seeing that happen more in games too.

Marvel’s Midnight Suns, though using a collection of classic Marvel heroes, won critical acclaim for its character dynamics and its use of some lesser-known stars. Spawn and The Punisher have had great games despite being lower-tier names than Spider-Man, while even the ‘big names’ seemed to be a longer list in yesteryear. The likes of The Flash and The Hulk have both had great games in the past, but now seemed doomed to the sidelines after their movies flopped. The IP is no longer safe, and thus the heroes are deemed no longer interesting.

Ant-Man is such a black sheep of Marvel that I used it as a punchline above, but think how great those mechanics would be in a game. Let’s go even stranger: give me Squirrel Girl, give me Beta-Ray Bill, give me John Constantine, give me Big Barda. I am being completely serious when I say I want a Jonah Hex game right now. I’m on my knees asking for a Dazzler game.

I love the current crop of superhero games, don’t get me wrong. But it feels like they’re all staying with well known characters whose personalities and arcs have already been established, and it feels like there’s an extra cylinder not quite firing. Who knows, maybe Beta-Ray Bill is the one to get it burning.