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A few days ago, Kali at Possibly Irrelevant Information posted about how cool Superman was which subsequently reminded me why Superman games are so problematic. But let me sidestep. On Halloween, we watched Frankenstein, The Evil Dead, and 25% of Cabin Fever. In 1931, technology just worked (electricity thingy brings corpse to life). In 2002, you had to explain why technology doesn’t work (cell phone out of range). In horror movies, this problem keeps getting worse — 2007’s Vacancy spent most of the movie explaining why cell phones weren’t working or destroying ones that did. Jumping back to Superman, every game based on Kal-El arbitrarily limits his powers or contrives to explain why he can’t use his powers to the fullest in order to make gameplay challenging — in other words, game designers seem to feel that the only way to make Superman interesting is to handicap him.
Historically, this would be the time to jump all over 1999’s Superman 64, which is one of those games everyone acknowledges as being terrible even if they haven’t played it. There’s not much more to be said about a game that features Superman swimming through floating rings in a virtual “virtual” Metropolis shrouded by a Kryptonite fog, however it is notable that most of his core powers are granted in the form of limited use power-ups. This is nowhere near as egregious as the balancing in 1995’s Justice League Task Force which puts Superman’s strength at the same level as Aquaman’s, but’s almost as ill conceived as having the Dark Knight and the Last Son of Krypton go on a dungeoncrawl together (2006’s Justice League Heroes). Suddenly Superman kissing Lois Lane to remove the effects of Kryptonite poisoning (1978’s Superman) doesn’t sound so implausible.
Now, let me admit that I haven’t played every Superman game out there. Using MobyGames’ Superman Game Group as a guide, I can safely say that I’ve played half of them and, though I’ve only played the demo level of 2006’s Superman Returns, it seems to be the most tolerable, while still offering mediocre entertainment. Limiting superpower usage with a stamina bar is wrong, but giving Metropolis its own health bar is genius. Superman is invulnerable, but the city isn’t, so shifting the emphasis from keeping Supes alive to keeping the city alive makes sense. Of course, picking up a robot and throwing it into a building hurts the city, so you wind up being your own worst enemy. Also, the game is rather bland.
I just reread The Greatest Superman Stories Ever Told and Superman: From the 30s to the 80s and the most notable connection between best Superman tales isn’t that he can outfight his opponents, but that he can outwit them. To quote Kali, “I love Supes when he’s written well,” and when he’s written well the emphasis is on his mind, not his fists. Superman’s powers have been continually limited so combat isn’t too easy and the result has been twenty years of crappy gaming. What if his powers weren’t constricted? Could gamers handle a Superman game that didn’t involve punching an endless army of robots? While the current gaming market recognizes innovation, it doesn’t reward it — so it would be a brave move for DC to sign off on a game that took a different approach, but can’t we expect bravery from our superheroes?
On November 4th, 2007 at 4:22 pm, Acro wrote:
Thanks for linking me to this. I must say I haven’t played any Superman video games. It does seem, though, that they suffer from the same thing as the comic book. At a basic level, both genres structure his powers wrong. In one he’s too powerful for a shared universe and in the other he’s too weak to get much enjoyment out of it.