Media Essays: My Idea for a Superman Video Game

Written by The Wandering Fox

Well everybody, here we are, the big essay. I’m the Wandering Fox and I like to talk to you about Superman having a video game all to himself. This will include my own take on it, so Warner, if you’re looking for somebody to do you a game for Superman then I’ll come help ya. But firstly this is my own take on how a game can work for Superman. If anybody really does want to use my idea then please come to me so we can talk it out.

As you all know Superman hasn’t had the best of histories with gaming, with only Superman Shadow of Apokalips being the really big game he got as well as a tie in game for Superman Returns, but the exposure Supes has had the most to gaming is fighting games be it Mortal Kombat or MultiVerses which is extremely frustrating. Though funnily enough, Rocksteady was going to do a Superman video game but it was cancelled.

I’ve seen many people to this day argue constantly over how to do a Superman game, with some thinking his too powerful to do, how do you weaken him, how do you make the gameplay work, how do you tell a story with him? It’s easy to me and I thought I’d give a go at making it work. So, here we go.

Gameplay

For gameplay I think we can best start with the controls. You obviously have the middle buttons for figure movement and camera movements, but for abilities I’m gonna go like this.

Press X for jump.

Hold X to fly and direct him around with one of the middle buttons. If you want him to fly up, hold X and press the top left button.

Press the square button to punch. You can press it repeatedly for a combo.

R1 to use heat vision.

Hold O and R1 to concentrate your heat vision on guns if a criminal is taking somebody hostage.

The triangle button can be to grab and press square to throw your enemy.

L1 for super breath.

While flying press the square button for a stomp.

The R2 button for X-Ray vision.

L2 to dodge.

Superman has a select few moments in the game as Clark, which is more of a detective mode of playing in which you can use Clark’s x-Ray vision for finding clues or use his super hearing to overhear anybody being sneaky of what they’re doing.

There are a few different ways you can change from Superman to Clark, you find a telephone booth to change out of, you fly to the Daily Planet to get changed, Clark’s apartment or the Fortress of Solitude.

The options menu allows you to change different outfits which you unlock throughout the game, the outfits throughout Superman’s history from any of his previous comic book suits to his film suits or cartoon suits.

You are obviously gonna ask how does his health bar work in the game. The first level of the game sees Superman exposed to Kryptonite while fighting Metallo. This lets Superman take a few blows but his health bar will be depleted. The only way for him to restore health is if he flies up in the sunlight to heal. The game will have Intergang as a key foe of Superman’s to fight, allowing them to supply a few Metropolis criminals laser guns which can damage Superman, forcing him to be careful.

The other big thing others raise about the game is how can you play as Superman when fighting ordinary goons. It’s easy. Superman can fight them, the character can pull his punches in fighting ordinary criminals so he can easily punch them or throw them around without any worry of killing them. Spiderman is strong enough to shatter the bones of his foes and he fights ordinary criminals without hurting them badly.

The game will have two base areas to play in, Metropolis and the Fortress of Solitude. Metropolis you can fly around anywhere in it and there’s a few spots you can stop at. There’s a few side levels you can do either by stopping a car robbery, a bank robbery, rescuing cats out of trees, stopping s fire. There’s even a few which allows you to fight a few other baddies in the rogues gallery.

The Fortress of Solitude is where you talk to Kelex and do some training while Clark can also do some research on some things he obtains after fighting his criminals, allowing him to discover the tech the criminals have are from beyond Earth and doing a data file on the criminals you fight and your friends you meet.

Doing certain levels allows you to unlock a few things be it outfits, Easter eggs, music soundtracks, a black and white background or little things here and there you can add to the Fortress.

I think Lois and Jimmy can be playable in certain levels with Lois having a chance to not only interview certain people but you can select certain questions she can ask. Jimmy can take photos in stealth missions and provide them to either Clark or Lois.

DLC I haven’t thought much of though I guess maybe a level in which Superman teams up with Steel in stopping a few crazed followers of Blackrock’s causing more damage could be done?

Clark wears baggier clothes to hide his muscular form. Jimmy I’ve given him green shirt and brown trousers just to tie back to his classic design. Lois has a more modern look to her with brown hair.

The suit with the yellow background on the emblem is the first costume, the one with the black is the main suit he wears throughout the game.

There you go then, there’s the gameplay and controls. Now, up next are.

The Villains

With a game adapting a comic character you gotta have a few baddies to fight from their rogues gallery. This being Superman and the first in what could be a series of games, you wanna choose a few that at least makes some sense for the game. Lex is in the game but I’m having him as a setup baddie rather than being a full on baddie you fight in the game. The villains I’ll have are:

Metallo

Bruno Manheim

Bloodsport

Livewire

Silver Banshee

Blackrok (the Peter Silverstone version)

The Black Zero

Equs

Intergang

The Ultra Humanite in his human form and the ape body he has to control.

Siobhan Smythe is from the New 52 and is Jimmy’s love interest. She is a heroic Banshee who helped Supergirl.

Black Zero is a combo of his pre-Crisis and evil Superboy looks with him as a space saboteur but has his pyrokinesis, has gauntlets to help him fight Superman. Livewire is mostly the same. Blackrock looks similar to how he did in old comics though has his jaw bare. Bruno has the classic gangster suit you imagine from the old comics.

Superman battling Equss.

And the baddie of the game is the Ultra Humanite. I was originally gonna have Parasite as the big baddie but in my research I remembered the Ultra Humanite was Superman’s first ever arch enemy. With Ultra Humanite as a man who can transplant his mind in others I thought it’d be great to have him as the enemy in the first Superman video game.

Let’s go back to Metallo though. He’s the first boss of the game and is equipped with Kryptonite weaponry and drones to back him up. He wants to kill Lois and Jimmy for helping expose his compartments to Superman. The level begins with Clark, Lois and Jimmy going to a museum to interview the oldest caretaker who had looked after it for years, but Metallo arrives and holds the room captive, Clark escapes and becomes Superman, saving Jimmy from Metallo then punches him through to the other room. Metallo fights back by sending his drones after Superman with them getting a few shots in though Superman destroys them. Metallo then holds a woman captive which Superman saves by melting the gun. Metallo shoots Superman with Kryptonite energy, giving him the chance to take Jimmy and Lois to the roof though Superman chases him and saves them then fights Metallo, lasers his limbs off and freezes his chest to stop him from opening up the compartment with the Kryptonite. He returns later in the game after the Ultra Humanite mind controls the other villains in taking over the city.

Bruno Manheim is the big crime boss of Metropolis and appears throughout the game with him co-leading Intergang. He ends up wearing a tech suit which grants him size altering powers as a gift from the other co-lead of Intergang. Superman ends up battling him with Bruno holding an entire building captive which Superman saves by taking the suit apart. Bruno is arrested by the end of the game.

Bloodsport serves as a sniper who tries shooting Superman a few times in the game while he’s flying around, with him using Kryptonite bullets. If Superman is shot he will land and Bloodsport will come out to fight him until in their final confrontation Superman stops Bloodsport and finds his helmet is made of a strong metal to block out the Ultra Humanite’s mind control. Figuring Bloodsport isn’t working for the Ultra Humanite, Superman questions who hired him though Bloodsport refuses to tell him anything and is arrested after their fight.

Livewire isn’t actually herself in the game at first. Lesley ends becoming Livewire during the game after Blackrock summons a lightning strike which zaps her. Lesley was being shafted around her radio company by the owner Miguel who had grown fed up with her insults to Superman who had saved his wife though the radio company did a joint interview with Blackrock which resulted in the lightning strike and Lesley was struck. Superman battled Blackrock but was stopped by Lesley who angrily laid into Superman for not saving her, questioning if he hated her. Superman stops her by luring her to an alleyway and traps her in ice and melts it, knocking her unconscious. Superman is sorry this happened to Lesley and promises to try and turn her life around. Livewire returns in the final half of the game after being brainwashed by the Ultra Humanite though she can’t help but feel she enjoys her eviler look.

Silver Banshee serves as a boss with this being Siobhan Smythe, Jimmy’s neighbour in his flat and there’s clear feelings between them though Siobhan is nervous and often says she’s cursed. Bruno and the Ultra Humanite go to her and offer her a gift after she sees the tech of Lex Luthor’s, with the Ultra Humanite seemingly working for Lex he offers to cure her. Instead the gift ends up forcibly changing her into the Silver Banshee, where she ends up hurting a few folks. Superman is forced to stop her and takes the gift away though Siobhan is arrested Lois and Jimmy promise to get her out. Superman tries to convince Maggie to let her go but Maggie is going to interview her and find whatever evidence that proves her innocence or guilt. In the final half of the game Siobhan is freed while the criminals are rampaging. Though the Ultra Humanite tries possessing her her magic stops him, thus this helps her to let Superman find the Ultra Humanite. Siobhan is cleared but is so ashamed she tries to flee but Jimmy stops her and says she can’t run from her fears, which results in them kissing and thanks him for having faith in her. Silver Banshee’s boss fight is in Bill’s bar where she was doing a song for Bibo, Clark, Lois and Jimmy. Superman has to dodge her screams and avoid her punches as she can drain him of his health, he freezes her gob and takes the device controlling her.

Blackrock. A independent tv company are dedicated to doing crazy things with Peter Silverstone as the scientific advisor and owner of the Blackrock, which had been given to him by Bruno. The Blackrock is an alien rock which has a symbiotic relationship with its host and can manipulate energy. Thinking they can have lots of fun with this, Peter and his company do a joint show which results in a lightning strike. Coming to enjoy the Blackrock, Peter creates all kinds of energy to fight Superman with. Superman has to dodge Peter’s energy and shoot him with his heat vision to try and get the rock off him and lands a few punches on him until finally he gets the rock off. Peter is arrested with his crew for handling such a alien thing while Clark takes the Blackrock back to the Fortress of Solitude, though he’s broken out of jail by the Ultra Humanite with him getting another energy powered suit to fight Superman but loses. In the end Peter is obsessed with finding the rock and goes crazy while in jail.

The Black Zero is an alien who comes to Earth to kill Superman, telling him he destroyed one of Krypton’s moons. He was summoned to Earth by Bruno who had been growing fearful he was about to be exposed and wanted Superman out of the way. Superman and the Black Zero battle each other through Metropolis until Superman flies him to the Fortress and throws him in the Phantom Zone. The Black Zero flies at Superman to punch him, can shoot him with fire. Superman has to deflect the punches and shoot him with heat vision before the boss fight goes to the Fortress in which Superman has to freeze and then beam the Phantom Projector on him. The battle with the Black Zero does wear Superman down enough that he is at first overwhelmed by the brainwashed baddies until he recovers .

Equss is a cyborg the Ultra Humanite created as his personal bodyguard which ends up beating Superman down in their first fight but after Superman recovers he battles him again before fighting the Ultra Humanite. Equss can slash Superman with his claws and jump and smash him as well as grabbing him then stabbing him with his claws. Superman has to dodge his slashes and beats him back with his heat vision and super breath. Superman manages to disable the cybernetic components of Equss’s body which forces him to close down.

The Ultra Humanite has a few phases before he’s defeated. He will fight Superman first in the body of the gorilla with him fighting Superman with guns and throwing his fists around. The Ultra Humanite then transfers his mind to his real body in which he subjects Superman to lasers which Superman has to destroy with his heat vision. The fight then continues with the Ultra Humanite returning to the gorilla’s body and summons mechanical gauntlets to shoot Superman and electrocute him. Superman tears these off and the fight goes to the roof, the ape begins tearing chunks off the building to throw at Superman but is either shot or has the debris thrown back at him, he knocks the ape out with him confronting the Ultra Humanite’s true form as the frail old man. He then shoots Superman with more lasers and is about to escape through a Boom Tube but Superman lasers the guns and the Father Box. Superman takes him to the street and has his arrested by Maggie with everybody cheering him on, with Superman proving to him Metropolis doesn’t belong to him it belongs to them.

Those are the villains. For the characters we meet we end up getting Lois, Jimmy, Maggie, Perry, Steve, Bibo, Lex, Mercy and Kelex. Lois and Jimmy are at first unaware Clark is Superman but after his beat down by Equs they end up learning the truth after he brings them to his apartment. They are incredibly surprised though Lois realises the dots were all there the entire time and didn’t notice and Jimmy takes in how Clark disguised himself and thinks he’s a bad friend for not ever thinking of what Clark ever got up to and they both feel they have been inconsiderate to him. Clark though is fine and tells them he kept the secret when all along he should have trusted them so much. You get the clear chemistry with Lois and Clark while Jimmy is often turning to Clark for support in finding confidence and greatly appreciates Lois’s kind words for his hard work.

Lex in the game is incredibly clever in how he presents himself as a well meaning billionaire and even somewhat believes in it. Lex has employed the Ultra Humanite’s human self as his top scientific advisor on his space research though it’s revealed Lex has secretly been sending Bloodsport after Superman to test the effects of Kryptonite. Lex did sage John Cohben by giving him a cybernetic body and did find the Kryptonite as a power source to help him. Lex was indeed surprised by the fact Metallo could hurt Superman and hence employs Bloodsport to try killing him. Lex covered his back by explaining he hadn’t a clue the Kryptonite could hurt Superman and to his credit he didn’t which at least has thrown suspicion off him though Clark does come to suspect he’s up to something thanks to the Kryptonite bullets and how he doesn’t buy that Lex hadn’t a clue of the Ultra Humanite’s secret ties to Bruno or having Equss. Lex is indeed revealed to known all along about it with him as the other co-lead of Intergang as though the Ultra Humanite made contact with Darkseid Lex offered himself up as a favourable partner to Darkseid, he’d send him a bit here and there, he’d give things to him in return to try and give Superman some trouble.

The Ultra Humanite is a man who has lived well into his hundreds having concocted a drink which granted him immortal life though slowly his body has began to wither. In a wheelchair he has lived to believe the greatest of minds deserves to rule the entire world and has been working through the ages, developing his technology and believes he has outlived so many he feels he deserves to rule the Earth and doesn’t think Superman deserves to be the man who everybody looks to. Wanting to live forever in a proven body, the Ultra Humanite began creating an artificial ape for his brainwaves to reside in, all the while practicing having control over the minds of others. He is the man having been behind Metallo’s escape, with him mind controlling the guards in freeing him.

Bruno has been in partnership with Lex for a long while, them both agreeing to have each other’s backs, Lex gives him a little bit of dollars here and there, Bruno keeps his gang away from Lex’s works, though Lex getting the Ultra Humanite to work for him has given Bruno more requests in having more tech to fight Superman. With Darkseid’s technology they can at least have these to throw off any connection to Lex. Bruno wanted complete control of Metropolis though he fell to the Ultra Humanite’s control as soon as he got his size altering suit.

I gone with the Siobhan Silver Banshee because I do think it’s good to have some sympathetic Superman villains who clearly want to live a better life, and her being a love interest to Jimmy is not only interesting but it gives Jimmy the understanding of being there for somebody, even if that somebody has powers they still need somebody to be their hero.

With that done we can go on with.

The Story

The story begins with Lois, Clark and Jimmy interviewing an old caretaker in the art museum when Metallo appears and wants to kill Lois and Jimmy. Superman defeats him with Maggie coming to take him away while Superman traps the Kryptonite in a box. Superman has a small interview with Lois and Jimmy with him telling them Clark had called for the cops and is just on the phone to his mum and dad to assure them he’s okay. Lois is concerned of how Metallo escaped prison and Superman is eager to get to the bottom of this. With his suit damaged Superman goes to the Fortress and has another suit ready for him. Back to Metropolis, Superman meets with Maggie who helps him see that the guards were leading a scientist called Dr Ultra to Metallo to study his cybernetics as he’s currently working for Luthor and the guards suddenly freed Metallo and gave him the Kryptonite. Luthor being involved does raise Superman’s suspicions. Going back to his apartment, changing back to Clark he’s met by Lois and Jimmy who have come to see if he’s okay and gets him to work at the Daily Planet to fill in for Perry who is suspicious of Luthor and wants Lois and Clark to interview him. Clark walks home with Jimmy and meets his neighbour Siobhan and sees that Jimmy has feelings for her though he can tell something is a bit strange about her. Jimmy asks Clark for advice on how to ask her out though Clark sadly tells him he isn’t that good with girls either and Jimmy tells him he’s gotta be open hearted with Lois.

Interviewing Luthor he tells them he hasn’t any idea how Metallo could have got that Kryptonite to which they interview his scientist Dr Ultra, who tells them he’s helping Luthor in researching space and went to look at Metallo’s suit to see if it can be suited for space travel. Clark notices the floor and room around them is full of lead hence he can’t see. Going for a drink at Bilbo’s, Clark tries to tell Lois how he feels but they end up seeing Bruno in the bar and bossing Bibo around to which Jimmy and Siobhan calm things. Bruno goes and Bibo is told Siobhan is a singer and offers her a job. At the Daily Planet, Clark and Lois are to go with Jimmy to a radio and tv recording of Badass TV, in which Silverstone has the Blackrock and creates Livewire. Superman sees Bruno leaving the scene and starts guessing he had to have been who Silverstone got the Blackrock from. Clark and Lois confront Bruno and asks him as to why he was there at which Bruno just merely says he’s there as a concerned man. Wanting to have them killed, Bruno gives Siobhan a gift which can relieve her of her fears. At Bono’s, Siobhan sings but the gift causes her ti become the Silver Banshee. Superman defeats her and Maggie arrests her. Siobhan tells them Bruno was the man who gave her the gift. Jimmy, angry, goes to get incriminating evidence on Bruno and takes photos of Bruno meeting with who he thinks is Lex. Jimmy is almost caught but Superman saves him.

Though the photos do show Bruno talking with somebody it isn’t enough but Maggie at least thinking of letting Siobhan go. But it’s then a strange man called the Black Zero comes and fights Superman who fights him and flies him to the Fortress where he traps him in the Phantom Zone. Tired but wanting to get back, Superman goes back and switching back as Clark, they clean up the photo enough and see it’s not Lex Bruno had met, it was Dr Ultra. Going to LexCorp Lois and confront Lex and ask him if he knows Dr Ultra has met with Bruno. It’s then Mercy comes out and stuns Luthor and Lois. Clark feigns being stunned and Mercy is joined by Dr Ultra and has Clark thrown off the roof though he switches to Superman. Dr Ultra says Mercy is under his control and all of them will. Superman tries to grab him but he’s then battled by Equss. Lois watches as Superman struggles before Dr Ultra is then joined by a big ape in red armour and the ape starts talking like him and both beat down Superman with Kryptonite then throws him off with Dr Ultra calling himself the Ultra Humanite. Lois goes to Superman with Jimmy coming. Ultra Humanite then sends out a brainwave connection to the many baddies of the game, bringing them under his control and takes over the city, forcing Superman to confess who he is to Jimmy and Lois by bringing them to his apartment. Ultra Humanite brainwashes Bruno after giving him a size altering suit. Superman has to wait until the sun rises for him to be rid of the Kryptonite’s effects then. With this he confronts the freed criminals. Siobhan flees from the police and finds Jimmy and Superman realises she isn’t being controlled, thanks to her magic. Siobhan helps Superman track the Ultra Humanite and after a battle Superman finally defeats him. With Siobhan trying to leave, Jimmy convinces her to stay and they kiss. With the big criminals of the game locked up, Lex dodges jail by convincing investigators he hadn’t any idea of what Dr Ultra was doing in his lab and wants Mercy to be given a lot of much rest from this. The game ends with Superman meeting Lois at the Daily Planet and asks if she can get use to him, to which Lois calls him Clark and that he’s by far the bravest man she’s ever known and always loved him, kissing him. There’s an after credits in which Lex is talking with the other boss of Intergang: Darkseid.

That’s the story.

That’s how I would do a Superman video game. What do you think everybody? Do you think this can work for Superman or am I just grasping at zero? Tell me what you think below.

I’m the Wandering Fox and I’ll see you later.