If you look around at videos and old magazines the coverage for Rise of the Robots leading up to its release was a little insane. They really truly thought they had a winner with this one, enough so that there were plans for a multi media franchise. While intended for a Q1 1994 release (sources seem to vary between January and February), problems arose and delays happened until it released at the end of the same year. It sold well enough due to the marketing, but critical reception was horrible, with such scores as 5 out of 100. Magazines that threw out positive reviews were seen as a total betrayal of trust by their readers. This isn't really an exaggeration, either. The game is pretty goddamn awful.
You can only play as Textureless Pepsiman out of 7 characters total, which is still a small ass roster. In two player mode, player 1 is still confined to only playing as aforementioned Textureless Pepsiman for some reason, while player 2 can pick whoever they please. You could argue for single player mode that it's for story purposes or whatever, but you can't really defend the two player situation at all. How do you even go through with that in a final fucking product?
Rise of the Robots boasts complex artificial intelligence in its computer opponents, which learn and adapt to your playstyle. This is not true. What it does is it starts countering an attack if you use it too many times in a row, unless it's jump kicks, which they are apparently totally unequipped for. If you jump kick around mindlessly you can beat some versions of the game in 20 minutes, maybe less. This isn't always the case in the SNES version, where instead you have to jump kick and also Dodge Sometimes! Wow!
One of its selling points is also a soundtrack composed by Brian May from Queen (who I'm not huge on to begin with), which isn't true either. He did make a soundtrack, but label antics ultimately led to it being left out. The SNES box still advertises this for some reason, and it turns out what made it into the game is like a 15 second sample from an already existing song by him or something, while the rest of the music is done by someone else.
Rise of the Robots at the end of the day is a tale as old as time, overhyping and underdelivering hard, and every time it repeats it still amuses me to some degree. It's honestly more interesting to talk about its buildup and failure than the actual game itself, so I would recommend looking for a video or two about that. I will say it has an edge over Ballz 3D for 1) looking honestly pretty impressive for the time and 2) not being the most annoying thing ever. Having an edge over Ballz 3D is like having an edge over a newborn in a skateboarding competition, though.
You can only play as Textureless Pepsiman out of 7 characters total, which is still a small ass roster. In two player mode, player 1 is still confined to only playing as aforementioned Textureless Pepsiman for some reason, while player 2 can pick whoever they please. You could argue for single player mode that it's for story purposes or whatever, but you can't really defend the two player situation at all. How do you even go through with that in a final fucking product?
Rise of the Robots boasts complex artificial intelligence in its computer opponents, which learn and adapt to your playstyle. This is not true. What it does is it starts countering an attack if you use it too many times in a row, unless it's jump kicks, which they are apparently totally unequipped for. If you jump kick around mindlessly you can beat some versions of the game in 20 minutes, maybe less. This isn't always the case in the SNES version, where instead you have to jump kick and also Dodge Sometimes! Wow!
One of its selling points is also a soundtrack composed by Brian May from Queen (who I'm not huge on to begin with), which isn't true either. He did make a soundtrack, but label antics ultimately led to it being left out. The SNES box still advertises this for some reason, and it turns out what made it into the game is like a 15 second sample from an already existing song by him or something, while the rest of the music is done by someone else.
Rise of the Robots at the end of the day is a tale as old as time, overhyping and underdelivering hard, and every time it repeats it still amuses me to some degree. It's honestly more interesting to talk about its buildup and failure than the actual game itself, so I would recommend looking for a video or two about that. I will say it has an edge over Ballz 3D for 1) looking honestly pretty impressive for the time and 2) not being the most annoying thing ever. Having an edge over Ballz 3D is like having an edge over a newborn in a skateboarding competition, though.
2 Comments
My newborn would shred
maradona
1 year ago