Rocksteady Studios has been forced to pull Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League offline just one hour into its Deluxe Edition's early access launch due to a bug that automatically completed players' games.
Though the Batman Arkham universe live service game doesn't launch proper until February 2, those who paid an extra $30 for the Deluxe Edition were granted three days of early access. This means it now should be available in New Zealand, but as reported by VGC, the game is currently offline and will be for "several hours".
Rocksteady issued a statement on X/Twitter addressing the issue, though didn't indicate if the game would still be offline as of its launch in the U.S. or other regions. The developer didn't say if it would issue refunds for customers who paid the extra $30 either.
"We’re aware that a number of players are currently experiencing an issue whereby upon logging into the game for the first time, they have full story completion," the statement said. "To resolve this issue, we will be performing maintenance on the game servers.
"During this time the game will be unavailable. We expect this to take several hours and will update once we have more information. We apologise for the inconvenience."
Those looking forward to Suicide Squad have responded with frustration to the game being taken offline, adding more fuel to the fire of what's already been a rocky reception. "That's pretty poor that they did not catch this in quality assurance. Sucks for the people that paid extra to play it early," ethan_mac said on Reddit. "Absolutely does not help with the image that the game has," added Mr_Rafi.
The issue also brought upon more calls for the importance of an offline mode, which Suicide Squad doesn't have despite Rocksteady's refusal to call it a live service game. An offline mode will be added after launch, but the developer only gave a vague 2024 release window.
Rocksteady has faced an uphill challenge bringing its fans on-side following the announcement of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League and the revelations about its live service elements, with many hoping for a return to the developer’s roots with a Batman Arkham-style game in the future.
The PC community will also likely grow frustrated at the quiet addition of digital rights management (DRM), which has long been a controversial subject as players claim it negatively impacts performance. As reported by PC Gamer, Rocksteady added Denuvo to Suicide Squad's Steam page just a week ahead of launch.
Official previews for Suicide Squad were also largely critical, with IGN's own saying: "Once the fun story bits end, you’re left with a much less inspired combat system, and an open world that’s filled with tedious tasks."
Rocksteady lifted the non-disclosure agreement for its closed alpha in response, letting fans who were granted early access share their opinions too.
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.
