Rarely do games manage to balance unhinged absurdity and heart, both in gameplay and story, but Justice Sucks does so with ease. Developed by Samurai Punk, this stealth-action game is a sequel to Roombo: First Blood that refines and adds to the gameplay experience while providing a story that everyone can enjoy. From its bright and adorable art design to its brutal and truly visceral combat, Justice Sucks is a well-balanced and addicting experience.
Justice Sucks is centered around Dusty, an average Roomba-style vacuum living a quiet life with its loving family until it is forced to defend them from the FamilyCorp warranty squad. During the battle, the family is kidnapped and Dusty is thrown into the TV and is on the verge of death; luckily, its consciousness enters the TV realm and meets its incredibly buff fighting spirit. Most of the game takes place in this TV dimension where Dusty trains and masters its abilities in order to rescue its family.
Justice Sucks had to find a way to make hiding in bushes feel dynamic, and since Dusty has no appendages with which it can fight, hacking became the weapon of choice. Each area is littered with hackable objects that deal different kinds of damage like AoE attacks from blowing a fuse, direct attacks from making disco balls and TVs fall on enemies, and even elemental damage through flaming stoves and ice-cold freezers. Players can also combine attacks for greater damage, such as setting off a sprinkler and blowing a fuse or dropping a lamp onto oil and setting the room ablaze. Everything works together so smoothly and effectively, resulting in an addictive combat system that encourages creative combos and provides Dusty with plenty of meat and blood to suck up.
As if being a sentient, hacking vacuum wasn't enough, Dusty also makes sure to clean up the mess. Over time, Dusty can unlock a variety of abilities that can be used for combat or stealth, but all of them require a certain amount of blood to use. To get said blood, Dusty either needs to vacuum blood left over when enemies get injured or literally consume the dead bodies and the pool of blood and meat it leaves behind. This becomes a surprisingly addicting part of the gameplay loop thanks to its use of the Dual Sense controllers, which vibrate aggressively and hammer home the absurdity of what's happening on screen.
Vacuuming up the remains is often used as a level's button as well, accompanied by a countdown and upbeat music to make the macabre act a fun minigame. It's also used as the sole objective for the "Cleaning Frenzy" mode, which is one of the many different game modes that make up each stage. Other examples include "Invasion" which tasks players with stopping intruders from taking valuables, "Rescue" which requires Dusty to stealthily rescue the TV versions of its family, and "Elimination" which requires all enemies to be killed. Completing each game mode rewards players with new perks and abilities to play with and after beating a certain amount, the next stage will unlock.
The main critique that can be thrown at Justice Sucks is that the abilities are easily forgotten about while playing. Enemies move at a variety of different speeds and so much of the time spent in each encounter consists of figuring out which traps will do maximum damage and how to get the most enemies in those traps as possible. This doesn't detract from the fun in any way, but there's no need for anything other than the Dusty's best passive abilities since each level is filled with everything players need to deal damage. There's plenty more to be said about this game, such as its killer soundtrack and heart-warming story, but the most important takeaway is that Justice Sucks is simply so much fun to play.
Justice Sucks is available now for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X, Nintendo Switch, and PC (Steam). Screen Rant was provided with a PlayStation 5 download code for the purpose of this review.