Why Doesn’t Marvel Have A Game Like DC’s ‘Injustice’ Series?

If you aren’t familiar with Warner Bros.’ Injustice series, it’s one of the best fighting-game experiences available—think the DC’s heroes and villains being inserted into a supercharged but less violent Mortal Kombat game. There are many characters, and each hero or villain has their own unique set of moves that have to do with their comic-book and movie powers. Batman uses his trademark utility belt and Batarang, while Superman can do flying attacks and use heat vision.

 

Injustice: Gods Among Us was the first of the series, and it released in 2013. Then, Injustice 2 was released last year (a year ago tomorrow, actually). Both games have spectacular story modes, as the story continues from one game to the other. It’s worth playing for any fans of the DC universe.

 

The first game was fun, especially the story mode, but things really picked up with Injustice 2. The customization is stunning, as there are many unique skins and gear that can be applied to each character. As good as Gods Among Us was, Injustice 2 somehow blows it away. It would be a surprise if a third Injustice game wasn’t on the way at some point in the next few years, but Marvel doesn’t have a game that comes close to matching up with it.

 

Given Marvel’s popularity, they would probably sell a ton of copies of an Injustice-style video game. So why hasn’t it happened?

 

It isn’t Marvel’s style

While things might have gotten intense with a couple recent movies with “War” in the title, including the destructive Avengers: Infinity War, the Disney-owned Marvel is light-hearted for movies that involve supervillains that want to destroy the world. Meanwhile, DC has been dark, tough, and gritty. A game that is based on fighting is more of DC’s style than it is Marvel’s.

 

Marvel vs. Capcom

Marvel does have a fighting video game series, as they’ve had a partnership with Capcom since 1996. A lot of you have probably played the arcade game at some point in your life. They just had a game, Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite, release last year; but it wasn’t close to as highly-regarded as Injustice 2. There’s nothing wrong with Capcom, but a solely-Marvel game that is as in-depth as DC’s fighting would probably sell well—but it doesn’t appear Marvel is interested in that.

 

DC fighters are more skilled

The Marvel vs. Capcom games are fun, but the fighting isn’t quite as realistic as in Injustice. Part of the reason is that DC’s characters simply have more skill as fighters than Marvel’s characters. Ironman, Captain America, Thor, the Hulk, and company are awesome, but for the most part, they don’t have the skill nor the unique superpowers that DC heroes do. The skills and abilities of Batman and Superman translate better to video games than Ironman in his suit or Captain America’s ability with the Super-Soldier Serum.

 

Marvel doesn’t have many great villains

The Injustice series features Superman becoming a villain of sorts. While the Avengers might have their squabbles, it’s hard to see any of them actually turning into a villain. Even without Superman going against some of DC’s heroes, the universe has some of the most iconic villains of all-time, like the Joker, Bane, Scarecrow, Braniac, and Darkseid. Thanos (who is based on Darkseid) is certainly gaining in popularity with Infinity War, but Marvel’s quantity and quality of villains does not match DC’s.

 

Marvel doesn’t own something like NetherRealm Studios

The biggest reason DC is able to make something as great as Injustice is they have the infrastructure to do so. Warner Bros., who owns DC, purchased Midway and Mortal Kombat in 2009, and they created NetherRealm Studios shortly after to oversee the series along with Injustice. Mortal Kombat has been at the top of the fighting game for over a decade, so the tools were there to create a very similar game featuring DC characters. Ultimately, Marvel would need to either make a big commitment to building something similar from the ground up to construct the same type of games as Injustice.