When making a game where you spend a lot of time shooting at things, it's important that the shooting feels good. Most games seem to forget this, but it was apparently Teyon's #1 priority when making Robocop: Rogue City, perhaps the closest thing to a F.E.A.R. 1 successor... That I've played, anyway. Most firefights result in an absolutely insane amount of debris, sparks, dust, and human body parts flying in every direction. Despite using Murphy's iconic Auto-9 exclusively for 90% of the game, it never got boring as a result. The people don't need ray tracing, we need every environment to explode like it's the lobby in The Matrix!
Really, making a RoboCop game is a pretty hard thing to do. After all, he used One gun, and walked in the same manner and pace of an elderly man with severe constipation. Here, you can pick up guns dropped by enemies, though they're usually not worth using except for the grenade and rocket launchers, and you can upgrade the Auto-9 by inserting chips you find in OCP chests onto PCB boards that you get throughout the game. These can have effects ranging from turning it into a full-auto machine pistol (useless), splitting the bullets to make it more devastating in close quarters (situationally useful), to increased gore effects (essential). One time I shot a guy and all of his limbs flew off and left him looking like the Black Knight. That's worth a full star right there.
The game does somewhat break Robo-Canon by also giving Murph a dash move, as well as letting him "sprint", which is really more like a light jog. But (bangs gavel) I'll allow it! Considering the size of some of these maps, forcing the player to walk everywhere would be cruel and unusual punishment. Nobody would do that, right? Just as an aside, in my review of Terminator: Resistance, I had mentioned that the Terminator mode felt like a dry run for this game. I am happy to report that Robocop features the exact same grab/throw that they put in that Terminator mode. It is always funny.
Speaking of things carried over from Terminator, the basic structure here is the same: Go from your home base (the police station, in this case) to large hub levels that split into smaller areas for side quests, and then complete discrete linear levels before heading back. The immersive sim-like elements return, though I felt they were under-utilized here. I maxed out Psychology, but I never got a psych dialogue check after the first couple of missions. I only had one Engineering check, and it seemed like it made no difference. Most of your skills here are combat-based, so it's disappointing that the 2 or 3 that could give you alternate ways to complete objectives went almost entirely unused.
Branching story paths return, and I found those to be executed better than in Terminator. The mayoral race that you can influence doesn't matter much, but you have 3 or 4 long-running questlines with side characters. Plot-wise, this takes place "between RoboCop 2 and 3," according to Teyon, probably for licensing reasons, because this feels more like a finale. There are references to the Kanemitsu Corp, but it also retcons several things about 3. The main villain is the supposed brother of Emil Antonowsky, who was last seen melting before getting splattered by a car. Wendell, a very funny name for a villain, looks like Alan Rickman dressed in RE8 Chris Redfield's outfit. And hey, you're never gonna believe this, but OCP is up to some shady shit!
The game features the likenesses of Peter Weller, Nancy Allen, and Robert DoQui (Sgt. Reed), with Weller also providing his voice. He does a great job, sounding like no time has passed since he shot Robocop 2. He injects the sometimes-flat writing with the sort of dry, deadpan humor that Robocop requires. The rest of the voice acting is... Variable.
Alright, tech time: playing on PS5, performance mode was... Mostly okay. In larger areas, in big firefights, it could drop pretty severely, and in a couple of areas, with a LOT going on, I had hard crashes. However, it looks good, if blurry due to -- you guessed it! -- temporal AA and upscaling. The checkerboard upscaling is hella aggressive as well, as you can see the artifacting every time the camera cuts during conversations. In gameplay, it's not too bad. Apparently the XSX version is more stable, but I went with PS5 because I assumed they had more experience developing for PS. Xbox having the edge seems to be occurring more frequently now, though, so maybe the tide is turning...
If you're a big fan of RoboCop 1 and 2, as I am, I absolutely recommend Rogue City. Even if you're not, you can probably have some fun blasting Nuke-heads into tiny pieces and decorating walls with their guts. They didn't come quietly, so there was...
Trouble.
8/10
Really, making a RoboCop game is a pretty hard thing to do. After all, he used One gun, and walked in the same manner and pace of an elderly man with severe constipation. Here, you can pick up guns dropped by enemies, though they're usually not worth using except for the grenade and rocket launchers, and you can upgrade the Auto-9 by inserting chips you find in OCP chests onto PCB boards that you get throughout the game. These can have effects ranging from turning it into a full-auto machine pistol (useless), splitting the bullets to make it more devastating in close quarters (situationally useful), to increased gore effects (essential). One time I shot a guy and all of his limbs flew off and left him looking like the Black Knight. That's worth a full star right there.
The game does somewhat break Robo-Canon by also giving Murph a dash move, as well as letting him "sprint", which is really more like a light jog. But (bangs gavel) I'll allow it! Considering the size of some of these maps, forcing the player to walk everywhere would be cruel and unusual punishment. Nobody would do that, right? Just as an aside, in my review of Terminator: Resistance, I had mentioned that the Terminator mode felt like a dry run for this game. I am happy to report that Robocop features the exact same grab/throw that they put in that Terminator mode. It is always funny.
Speaking of things carried over from Terminator, the basic structure here is the same: Go from your home base (the police station, in this case) to large hub levels that split into smaller areas for side quests, and then complete discrete linear levels before heading back. The immersive sim-like elements return, though I felt they were under-utilized here. I maxed out Psychology, but I never got a psych dialogue check after the first couple of missions. I only had one Engineering check, and it seemed like it made no difference. Most of your skills here are combat-based, so it's disappointing that the 2 or 3 that could give you alternate ways to complete objectives went almost entirely unused.
Branching story paths return, and I found those to be executed better than in Terminator. The mayoral race that you can influence doesn't matter much, but you have 3 or 4 long-running questlines with side characters. Plot-wise, this takes place "between RoboCop 2 and 3," according to Teyon, probably for licensing reasons, because this feels more like a finale. There are references to the Kanemitsu Corp, but it also retcons several things about 3. The main villain is the supposed brother of Emil Antonowsky, who was last seen melting before getting splattered by a car. Wendell, a very funny name for a villain, looks like Alan Rickman dressed in RE8 Chris Redfield's outfit. And hey, you're never gonna believe this, but OCP is up to some shady shit!
The game features the likenesses of Peter Weller, Nancy Allen, and Robert DoQui (Sgt. Reed), with Weller also providing his voice. He does a great job, sounding like no time has passed since he shot Robocop 2. He injects the sometimes-flat writing with the sort of dry, deadpan humor that Robocop requires. The rest of the voice acting is... Variable.
Alright, tech time: playing on PS5, performance mode was... Mostly okay. In larger areas, in big firefights, it could drop pretty severely, and in a couple of areas, with a LOT going on, I had hard crashes. However, it looks good, if blurry due to -- you guessed it! -- temporal AA and upscaling. The checkerboard upscaling is hella aggressive as well, as you can see the artifacting every time the camera cuts during conversations. In gameplay, it's not too bad. Apparently the XSX version is more stable, but I went with PS5 because I assumed they had more experience developing for PS. Xbox having the edge seems to be occurring more frequently now, though, so maybe the tide is turning...
If you're a big fan of RoboCop 1 and 2, as I am, I absolutely recommend Rogue City. Even if you're not, you can probably have some fun blasting Nuke-heads into tiny pieces and decorating walls with their guts. They didn't come quietly, so there was...
Trouble.
8/10