Injustice (gamemeetsgirl)

There is no time like Summer time. It makes even the palest, grimiest, most shut-in outcast venture out into the world, get some sunlight, breathe some fresh air, and wait in line for that limited edition exclusive figure, poster, or signature.

Of course when I mention Summer time, I definitely mean convention season. You’ve got the world’s largest Anime Expo, the world’s largest fighting game tournament, and the world’s largest comic book convention all jam packed into a measly three weeks (and that’s just what I managed to get through, not counting all of the other various events past and upcoming).

But for the sake of simplicity, and in the spirit of comics and conventions, not to mention the lack of any strong details for most other titles, I’ll just briefly cover some insight on a couple of comic book games that particularly stood out to me.

First off, is a game that was introduced back at E3, displayed at EVO, and playable at Comic-con. Injustice: Gods Among Us is a fighting game being developed by NetherRealm Studios (the people behind the infamous Mortal Kombat series) that pits many of your favorite heroes and villains from the DC Universe against each other. 

 Although the game plays very similar to Mortal Kombat 9 (it runs on the same engine) Injustice still has many new features to differentiate itself:  Fighters can interact with stages (throwing parked cars or smashing heads into the background, launching opponents into other areas of the arena, and my favorite, using the Batmobile to launch missiles at your opponent), players can enter a “wager match” mid-fight to try and steal their opponents’ special meter, playable characters are separated into different categories from power (Superman) to speed (Flash) to gadget users (Batman), and the ‘specials’ of these various characters are as intense and over the top as you’d expect from beings that can easily punch you through the atmosphere only to meet you up there and smash you back down.

 The developers over at NetherRealm Studios are not ready to discuss details of the story mode, but after the warm reception of Mortal Kombat 9’s story mode I doubt we have anything to worry about.  

The real news here is that two new playable characters, Nightwing and Cyborg, were announced at Comic-Con, bringing the current roster to eight known fighters (the other six consisting of Batman, Superman, Flash, Wonder Woman, Solomon Grundy, and Harley Quinn).  Be sure to expect many more to be revealed leading up to the game’s launch in early 2013.

And then there’s a game that truly hits my heart, right through the soul. I love nothing more than humor and over the top antics, which are both generally grouped with copious amounts of violence, so hearing that my favorite 4th wall breaking, gun-toting, katana wielding, health regenerating, never-stops-talking-even-if-it’s-to-himself, Marvel anti-hero assassin is going to be starring in his own game, was a pleasant and unexpected surprise. 

Other than a slapped on graffiti picture over The Amazing Spider-Man, no one else saw this game coming (comic-con)

And when I say surprise, it more or less caught everyone by surprise. One day there was an Amazing Spider-Man game poster hanging on the side of the San Diego Convention Center, and the next it was graffitied over with Deadpool Game and the anti-hero’s memorable logo (it’s his face). 

Other than the trailer reveal, there isn’t a whole lot of information out yet. But fortunately, the main site for the game (which happens to have pictures of chimichangas and other Deadpool oddities) was a short press statement from Deadpool himself, mostly consisting of gloating how awesome he is and how he took over Activision, followed by a statement from an actual developer for the game that goes as follows “We weren’t actually planning on making a Deadpool game,” said Peter Della Penna, formerly Head of High Moon Studios and now second in command.  “But,Deadpool came by the studio one day, said he was taking over, and that if I didn’t hire Marvel writer Daniel Way pronto and make the most amazing Deadpool video game, he’d break both of our arms and beat us to death with them. I have kids, so we’re making the game.”

And thus we now have a game in the works that involves Deadpool, hostages, and Daniel Way. We’ll be seeing what mischief will happen sometime in 2013.

And that’s about it for this week! Let us know what you think, what your speculations are, and if you have any interesting convention experiences!

Reach columnist Eric Parra here and Jordan Austin here: here 

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