This year, there are two major AAA games that are being used as examples to talk about over-investment in live service, resulting in large-scale bombs, Ubisoft’s Skull and Bones and WB’s Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League. But now, one appears to be performing worse than the other, according to the data we have available.
It appears that even though Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League launched poorly, Skull and Bones might be doing even worse.at launch, it quickly fell out. That’s much worse than Suicide Squad, which at least debuted at #1 on PlayStation when it was released, and slowly sunk down the list rather than immediately falling off.Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League as the third highest selling game of the month, behind only Helldivers 2 and Final Fantasy VII Rebirth.
Without question, the biggest thing sinking Skull and Bones is that most players simply did not want a live service pirate game where you play as a ship, rather than a pirate, which is baffling given that AC: Black Flag inspired the game in the first place. It feels like Sea of Thieves, now six years old, does everything better than Skull and Bones minus its graphics. It never felt like this game ever had a chance to succeed, and launch has proven those suspicions correct.
This isn’t to say Suicide Squad is doing well. It definitely is not, ahead of its first, delayed Joker season coming at the end of this month. But it is doing a lot better than Skull and Bones? It sure seems like it.