After pressing the start button, you will be taken to the first cutscene of the game where you are introduced to the story that preceded the actual death of Superman, where Kal-El must stop the Underworlders in their attempt to control the power lines of Metropolis.  The instant you set foot on the stage, you will smell that ancient scent of a good beat ‘em up (yeah, remember that genre?). This beat ’em up, however, has a very particular thing: you can throw your enemies in different directions, right, left and also up, which causes damage to the different objects in the stage such as columns, electrical equipment, doors, windows and allows you to discover different power ups, extra lives and energy boosters. This feature may go unnoticed but I have seen it only once, in Batman Returns, also for the SNES and I believe it adds something different to this type of title.

Another thing that happily surprised me when I played the game for the first time was the addition of a sub-genre within the game. In between stages, the different Supermen take off and the game is turned into a kind of shoot ‘em up, where your character must atomize different enemies to reach the goal. Is it a good shoot ‘em up? Not at all, but it gives the player a different experience, although short, and a break from breaking mutant skulls and smashing thugs with chainsaws against walls. 

The controls of the game are just typical for beat ‘em ups. You use the D-pad to move the character around and with the rest of the buttons you punch, jump (or fly if you punch it twice), use a special technique to obliterate all the enemies on stage and finally another button activates a special power that varies depending on the character you are using. You get to play with all the Supermen in the saga: the original Superman, the Cyborg, the Eradicator, Superboy, Steel and Superman reborn.  The characters, unfortunately, are pre selected for the player and you play with them depending on the stage you are without the chance to actually select them at will. All Supermen have a different and unique feature, but there are no mayor differences except for the way they walk or fly. 

On top of the fact that the game controls are pretty responsive and easy to get, the graphics look great. The stages are designed according to the places shown in the comic book and help to build the atmosphere of the game. On the other hand, the enemies look repetitive, bigger variety of thugs, soldiers and robots would have been much better, but this in no way interferes with how the game feels. I ‘ve mentioned the cut-scenes earlier, and they are indeed of graphical importance. Here the developers have been absolutely faithful to the actual comic by including these semi animated comic strips and you have the same feeling as if you were turning the pages of a digital comic book when you advance through the story.