Doomsday Joins Injustice: Gods Among Us Roster

[Earnest Cavalli]

Doomsday Joins Injustice: Gods Among Us Roster


Though NetherRealm Studios hasn't officially announced Doomsday as a character in its upcoming DC Comics-based fighting game Injustice: Gods Among Us new gameplay footage confirms his menacing presence.

Those of you who came of age during the 1990s likely recall Doomsday as the character who did the unthinkable: He killed Superman. Granted, since we're discussing comic books it should come as little surprise that Supes only remained "dead" for a few short months, but his ostensible passing remains one of the biggest events in comics history, and served as the pinnacle of the 90s comic book collector's bubble.

As one of the few characters capable of giving DC's most powerful, iconic hero a run for his Kryptonian money, it makes perfect sense that NetherRealm Studios would want to include the alien behemoth within the cast of Injustice: Gods Among Us. Despite this the company has yet to officially announce the character. Fans have long speculated that he'd be a shoe-in for inclusion, but to date there's been no official word to confirm the idea.

That said, he's absolutely in the game, and we've got gameplay footage courtesy GameStop which cements that idea.

The video embedded above stands as the first real glimpse of Doomsday in action. As you'd expect, he's a big, tough jerk. Somewhat akin to standard fighting game brawlers, Doomsday appears to move a bit sluggishly, but when he connects with an attack his pure, raw strength makes his lack of speed completely moot. Even when pitted against one of DC's most powerful beings -- Shazam is widely considered only slightly less powerful than Superman himself -- Doomsday comes off as a bipedal tank capable of standing toe to toe with any living organism in the vast DC universe.

Perhaps most impressively, NetherRealm Studios designed the character as an almost exact aesthetic match with his mid-90s incarnation, yet he still looks cool in our modern era. If you'll recall what we collectively considered to be engaging design tropes during that decade, you're well aware of how difficult a feat this can be.

Injustice: Gods Among Us is slated to make its retail debut on April 16. As we mentioned, the full cast list has yet to be revealed so expect more iconic DC characters to get the official nod over the next few weeks. Fingers crossed for Mister Mxyzptlk [http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Mister_Mxyzptlk].

Source: YouTube [http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=9Bd7mmZPejY]

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[Agayek]

This has no bearing on anything in the article, but I really need to point this out:

Fans have long speculated that he'd be a shoe-in for inclusion, but to date there's been no official word to confirm the idea.

"shoe-in" is a meaningless phrase. It's somewhere between an onomatopoeia [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onomatopoeia] and "eye dialect" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_dialect] for the phrase "sure win".

People are too lazy to pronounce the r in sure, so it sounds to the ear like "shoo win", which somehow got morphed to "shoe-in" through various levels of failure in communication.

On top of that, "shoe-in" doesn't make any sense in this context if you think about it. What is the shoe in? Why is it there? What does that mean?

The turn of phrase could hypothetically be used to describe something used to pique someone's interest (as an analogy to the old "foot in the door" phrase), or as a way to denote that something has been forcibly included despite there being no place for it (derived from "shoehorn it in"). As a means to say "X is a certainty" however, it fails utterly.

TL;DR: I am irrationally bothered by the constant misuse of the phrase, so for the sake of my blood pressure, if you ever want to describe how something is a certainty, "sure win" is the grammatically (and logically) correct phrase, not "shoe-in".

Edit: And yes, I do realize how petty this all is.

OT: Doomsday certainly seems like a fun guy to play. Nobody beats Solomon Grundy though.

 

[Earnest Cavalli]

Lots of words.

I'm sorry that you hate colloquialisms so much. Out of curiosity, where are you getting this etymology from? Is it an actual, official source or are you just making things up as you go? I don't care either way, but would really love to see a link to wherever you're sourcing all of this from.

 

[Kmadden2004]

Can't say I'm really surprised by this reveal, considering you can clearly see him in the background in some of the previous videos.

Just as long as they don't make him a cheap boss fight, like Shao Khan.

 

[hazabaza1]

Holy shit that final move is some Asura's Wrath stuff jesus.

Also who's that kidbutnotakid guy?

 

[4173]

Holy shit that final move is some Asura's Wrath stuff jesus.

Also who's that kidbutnotakid guy?

Shazam, formerly known as Captain Marvel. The kid's name is Billy Batson.

 

[hazabaza1]

Holy shit that final move is some Asura's Wrath stuff jesus.

Also who's that kidbutnotakid guy?

Shazam, formerly known as Captain Marvel. The kid's name is Billy Batson.

See, now that you've said Shazam, all I can think of is Shaq.

The movie of movies.

 

[Therumancer]

To be honest the inclusion of Doomsday surprises me a bit given DC's overall roster. Doomsday was one of those characters who was "cool" for like 30 seconds because he killed Superman. Albiet because the writers said so, and because Superman was acting like an idiot and doing stupid things because the plot demanded it (and also so they would have reason for him to win the inevitable re-match). It's sort of like Bane, who while an interesting character, is mostly "cool" because he beat Batman in a rather epic storyline, but otherwise has sort of just been there, never having rose to the prominance or popularity of say a "Joker" or "Lex Luthor". In the whole Doomsday fight with Superman the guy pretty much starts out cocky pretty much giving Doomsday a free shot, and not realizing he has to take him seriously until later on in the fight. Not to mention that Doomsday only won because Superman for some idiotic reason told characters like Titania (I think it was) to pretty much back off, and she was doing extremely well against Doomsday, in part because she seemed to take him seriously right from the beginning.

To me Doomsday kind of ceased to be all that awesome during the whole "Our Worlds At War" storyline with Imperiax, where one key plot point was freeing Doomsday so he and Superman could make a run at Imperiax Prime, both of them wound up getting pwned, but Doomsday was kind of crushed like a kitten. Superman himself survived due to being rescued by Darkseid using a Boom Tube, before offering him the "Entropy Aegis" (I think I remember the name correctly) which Superman turned down.

Superman incidently managed to eventually recover, supercharge in the middle of the sun, and for the finale wound up destroying Imperiax at the beginning of the universe where he became the big bang that started all life (or something like that). For the final battle/sequence Superman's final "team" was pretty much him Captain Marvel, and Firestorm if I remember as they were among the only characters that could reliably destroy the Imperiax duplicates (yes he duplicated humself), especially seeing as taking one out caused an explosion that tended to wipe out the hero that did it, unless they had prodigious levels of raw invulnerability... such a blast channeled by Prime, pretty much reduced Doomsday to his component Atoms while it merely injured Superman.

The point of all of this nerdery is that I sort of don't buy Doomsday taking out Captain Marvel or any hero on that level that takes him seriously. Of course this IS a fighting game so it doesn't matter. It's just that I don't truely consider him in that league as per the original article statement. As far as a fighting game goes where in theory you can have The Joker punch out Superman, I suppose it works, but unless they are boasting a roster of unprecedented size with like 60-80 characters Doomsday seems like a bad choice, there are far more worthy characters.

I guess you could sort of say characters like Doomsday or Bane are to comics are like what Leon Sphinx was to boxing. The guy got lucky and beat Ali when Ali got cocky, nobody can ever take that away from him, he did beat "the best" and got to be champion, BUT when it comes to lists of all time great boxers or great champions he's typically not there because literally all you can say about him is that he beat Ali. Doomsday or Bane shouldn't be forgotten, but it surprises me that they show up as much as they do in the media with so many more wrothy characters around, especially Bane because it seems like nobody even remembers how to write him (he typically comes accross like a thug, not the master planner/genius he was supposed to be). Doomsday didn't even ever really have any great writing, you pretty much "get" the character just by looking at him... he's big, ugly, strong, and stupidly fast (which is odd that they forget this, being able to match the speed of guys like Superman or The Flash when fighting was part of the point). Heck, Mongol probably deserves more credit than Doomsday does in the scheme of things.

 

[Therumancer]

Holy shit that final move is some Asura's Wrath stuff jesus.

Also who's that kidbutnotakid guy?

Shazam, formerly known as Captain Marvel. The kid's name is Billy Batson.

See, now that you've said Shazam, all I can think of is Shaq.

The movie of movies.

Actually the Shaq movie was called Kazaam, and it was arguably loosely based on Shazzan, an old cartoon series about a couple of kids who can summon an all-powerful Genie by uniting the rings that they wear.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shazzan


I can see how it gets confusing.

Someone gave a version of the story to you already about the comics "Shazam" and the relation to Captain Marvel. The character is actually a little more complicated than that though. The name "Shazam" actually refers to a now dead wizard who guarded a mystical stone called "The Rock Of Eternity" which can grant people linked to it great power. Before his prophecized death he found a worthy successor for the power, which he passes on to a young kid named Billy Batson who by invoking the name of the wizard can gain his power and transform into "Captain Marvel" (which was later just changed to him becoming Shazam). He can also do things like commune with the spirit of the wizard in the cave where the rock is, much like Doctor Strange in Marvel communes with his old mentor "The Ancient One", and this ancient mystical wizard (much like The Ancient One) is probably one of the most powerful beings in his universe even if he has "ascended" beyond mortal affairs, only getting involved occasionally, and only then by giving advice (as it's the job of Billy to handle things on Earth now, much like how as Sorceror Supreme Doctor Strange is now earth's guardian).

The odd thing is to make it even stranger is that the name "Shazam" is actually an Acronym, the invocation grants the person using it: The Wisdom of oloman, The Strength of ercules, The Stamina of tlas, The Power of eus, The Courage Of chilles, and The Speed Of ercury.

To be entirely honest I was never into DC enough to really find out what the greek gods that tend to pop in and out of Wonder Woman comics (most of whom are NOT nice) think about this, especially seeing as Hercules in paticular was kind of a jerk in how he's portrayed in the origins of the Amazons.

A while back they did an entire storyline where the JSA thought Captain Marvel/Shazam was a pedophille due to his romantic interest in another super heroine who was an underage girl. None of them realized that Captain Marvel was actually a young boy in possesion of "The Wisdom Of Soloman" who simply looked like an adult man when transformed,
and he was simply interested in someone his own age (and it was fairly innocent as far as such things went to boot) causing some drama between those who knew who Captain Marvel was and what was going on, and those that did not, and pressures over his secret identity and revealing the truth to make it seem less wierd... and well.. yeah.

There you go, more than ever ever wanted to know about "Shazam" especially that last paragraph in all likelyhood.

 

[Alluos]

Doomsday is probably one of my favourite villains of the DC universe, so this pleases me greatly.

 

[Mr. Omega]

Considering the story, I can bet either one or both of these two things happen.

1: Batman/Luthor/Someone else unleashes Doomsday to try and stop Superman.
2: Doomsday shows up, and Superman promptly beats the shit out of him to prove that he's not fucking around anymore.

A good addition to the cast, especially glad to see another Superman character.

 

[Not G. Ivingname]

Why Doomsday? There is not much to his character than "smash" and "smash things harder."

Spoiler: If you ant a big bad guy that can punch things, why not the obvious choice.

Spoiler: I hope you appreciate, Kal-El, that everything that happens from this point on will be on your head. The skies will rain fire, the oceans will boil, the streets will run red with the blood of billions. Only then, after your last pitiful hope is extinguished, will I end your life. Let's go.

Yes, I know he made a cameo in one of the advertisement fights, but as far as we know he is a simple background object, nothing more.

 

[Baresark]

This has no bearing on anything in the article, but I really need to point this out:

Fans have long speculated that he'd be a shoe-in for inclusion, but to date there's been no official word to confirm the idea.

"shoe-in" is a meaningless phrase. It's somewhere between an onomatopoeia [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onomatopoeia] and "eye dialect" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_dialect] for the phrase "sure win".

People are too lazy to pronounce the r in sure, so it sounds to the ear like "shoo win", which somehow got morphed to "shoe-in" through various levels of failure in communication.

On top of that, "shoe-in" doesn't make any sense in this context if you think about it. What is the shoe in? Why is it there? What does that mean?

The turn of phrase could hypothetically be used to describe something used to pique someone's interest (as an analogy to the old "foot in the door" phrase), or as a way to denote that something has been forcibly included despite there being no place for it (derived from "shoehorn it in"). As a means to say "X is a certainty" however, it fails utterly.

TL;DR: I am irrationally bothered by the constant misuse of the phrase, so for the sake of my blood pressure, if you ever want to describe how something is a certainty, "sure win" is the grammatically (and logically) correct phrase, not "shoe-in".

Edit: And yes, I do realize how petty this all is.

OT: Doomsday certainly seems like a fun guy to play. Nobody beats Solomon Grundy though.

That is because it's spelled incorrectly. It's not "shoe-in", the proper spelling is "shoo-in", which is derived from horse racing. It means a winner of a rigged race. So when they say he was a "shoo-in", they mean that it seemed like a competition for the roster, but he was always gonna make the cut.

Edit: in the context it comes from, you were quite right when you referenced it as a form of onomatopoeia. To Shoo means to drive a person or an animal in a certain direction with sounds the gestures, and the word is derived from the sounds people make when doing it.

 

[DJ_DEnM]

His final attack looks kinda dull compared to others...other than that, I'm sure he'll be a pretty fun character to play. I want to see how he's incorporated into the Story mode.

 

[Draconalis]

That trailer...

If had any interest in it to begin with... I'm pretty sure it would have killed it.

 

[Drauger]

Yuk.....I love DC comics but really this game looks awfully bad.... its like I'm seeing again dc vs mk, really would it kill dc comics to chose a better developer?, yeah yeah I know lots of people liked the mortal kombat rebot 9 or what ever it is, but there are lots of people who just don't like Mk because well.... it plays stupid..... wonder woman looks like a amateur drag queen. I don't know ask namco? sega? some other developer.

 

[K84]

Did something change with Capt...Shazam after new52?
He's yelling Shazam a lot, should'nt he turn back into Billy?
*though..seeing Doomsday pummel a boy is not something i want to see*

I like the larger than life scale of this game, the superpowers, destruction and the transition scenes.
Looks like lot of fun.

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

I seem to recall Doomsday being bigger. Funny how your mind plays tricks on you.