How to make a good Superman game...

Great stuff man!!

CrisisKing. you are a genius. I agree with you on all of this. every game Superman has had really sucked. Superman Returns, I had so much hopes for that game then i played it and the best and obly good thing about that was the flying. but i would have 2 add one more villian to that list. I think Darkseid should be involved. He is one more of the villians who could actually go toe to toe with Superman

To make a great Superman game, have Flash run up to Clark Kent's apartment and sneeze in his face and rub his eyes with kryptonite. Then Clark get's swine flu and kryponite poisoning and has to wash his eyes out and take a break from crime fighting. So, you have to play the Flash and fight the bad guys for him. Utilizing all his abilities and doing an infinite mass punch to Doomsday's balls a thousand times in a half second launching him into space at the end. Then the bonus round is to make out with Lois Lane while Clark cries in his chicken noodle. I'd totally go for that game.

darkside should be for a third game contuning this story line and they should introduce some justice league members(cameos) and supergirl and i think doomsday should not b in the first game but they should tlk about him to set him up cuz if superman fights doomsday he dies and then theres no seguel to the first game

I would like to see what you have to say for a gL game.. because different ppl have different preferenceson the powers from the ring

Might be a bit late to the party, but I always try to chime in on game threads when I see 'em. Here goes.

I'm not totally convinced of the developer Rocksteady. Superhero games aren't universal in their concepts, or management. ie - Batman: Arkham Asylum isn't Spiderman 2, isn't City of Heroes, isn't Freedom Force. What you really need to look at are the mechanics of the game. So let's dig into it a bit.
Batman: Arkham Asylum was a Stealth/Fighting game, firmly in the action area. It was based on sneaking, stealth kills, and a fluid, martial arts combat system. It used dynamic set pieces with incredible, dark, gritty, detail. None of that is really what you want in place for a Superman game. Especially when you start talking 'Open World' instead of linear and story driven. That worked fantastically for Batman, but I'm not convinced that's what Supes needs. So let's look at what a Superman game does need.

Superman is defined most obviously by his powers, and by a magnitude of scale that you can't find elsewhere. ie - a good punch from Batman knocks someone out, a good punch from Supes knocks them into the next city. He's invulnerable, bulletproof, he flies, he shoots lasers from his eyes, and he uses breath powers. He's also super fast, come to think of it. That's a lot of ground to cover, but dumbing down the powers (ie - flight becoming jumping) doesn't work. They are what make Superman fun to play, and they're part of what makes him iconic.
The big hurdle in a Superman game is the fact that he's invulnerable. So how do you handle a 'life' meter? If you make it so that the thugs in the game can't hurt him much, but bosses (ie - Metallo, Doomsday, whatever) do then you end up with a game that feels like a long slog through hundreds of minions to get to an interesting boss fight. So that doesn't work. Likewise, you can't put Superman in a position where every thug off the street hurts him (probably using a cop out like 'kryptonite bullets') because that makes him feel . . . well. Less Super. What I would do is take a tactical approach of using a variety of things. Start the game with thugs that barely hurt you, but move up to guys with heavy firepower, then light robots, then heavy robots, then soldiers from Apokalyps, and so on. Keep it appropriate to the villain you're fighting, and have most enemies use numbers and tactics to chip away at your health - keep the combat interesting by the enemy having good AI that takes cover, runs, ducks, and tries to stay out of range. I'd also use a story that lets you drag out every villain in his Rogues Gallery, and then some - even grab villains from other DC characters when appropriate.

The next big hurdle is thus: Superman flies. And that's okay. But does every Superman game need to be an open world, sandbox experience just to have him flying around? Does that mean that we should never get a game based on highly detailed, linear, set pieces? I'm not sure. The swinging mechanic in Spiderman 2 certainly justified an open world game just on its own, since it was so fun. Is flying as fun? I'm not convinced. Though in the long run what would be best, in my opinion, would be several smaller 'open world' areas. One on Metropolis, one on Apokalyps, and one somewhere else. They wouldn't be as big, but it would give you the ability to use Superman's flight, and not entirely sacrifice detail, and a quick development cycle.

As for the mechanics itself . . . Superman doesn't do the fluid, smooth martial arts attacks that Batman does. I wouldn't *mind* seeing a fight system like the one in Batman: AA but it would need a big overhaul to make the attacks into two-fisted hammerblows, heavy punches from the hip, and throws. For variety, I'd have Supes toss in use of his heat vision during the combos on occasion, just to spice it up. There should also be a mechanic for partially destructible environments, and hteir use in combat - part of the fun of superstrength is bashing your opponents with cars, light poles, and other unimaginably heavy things.

I do like your idea of binding Superman's special abilities to the D-Pad though, like Batman's gadgets. That might work very well.