Great dick shooting simulator
But in all seriousness, Teyon really did a smart move by basically taking whatever lessons they've learned from their last 80s action icon adaptation Terminator Resistance Which i reviewed here and its expansion also reviewed here, And decided alright lets make the robocop sequel we SHOULD have gotten with this blueprint.
Basically take the gameplay from that terminator resistance infiltrator mode like throwing around enemies like bowling balls, the dashes, ripping enemy turrents into guns, the slow mo punch, etc. mix in some slow mo bullet time like in F.E.A.R or Trepang2 but with rigid movement (which is good in this case because this isnt 2014s reboot sleek robocop, this is OG TANKY SLOW WALKING robocop), destructible environments, ricochet bullets with your trusty Auto-9, some VERY light detective work (literally press and hold the aim button to scan evidence, Don't expect some L.A. Noire shit), and You get a game that makes you FEEL like robocop, its like Teyon looked at that old ass robocop game from titus and said "Ok lets not repeat the same mistakes and get an actual BUDGET this time" Because unlike with Annihilation Line where they unfortunately couldnt get michael biehn for kyle reese, They made sure to get Peter Weller for Robocop. It just wouldnt be the same without him. On top of that, Running on Unreal engine 5 with destruction physics and lumen lighting really makes this otherwise budget game look a lot more polished than their previous work. On top of being semi open world hub (just one town of old Detroit) with bombastic setpieces here and there. Including a shit ton of enemies from armored goons, to punks with gas canisters to turrents to OCP copbots to bikers to a handful of ED-209 bosses, Yes- Bosses, Plural. and all of em have a borderlands esque enemy intro detailing you what they are capable of.
And while the story isn't groundbreaking, and takes its sweet ass time to setup (if you do side missions as well, you WILL feel the length of this game), it is simple and sweet, even get to do little mini side stuff around the precinct and have dialogue options to make this game really feel alive and make ya care about the characters including newcomers like "pickles" the druggie fed informant, Ulysses, the rookie appointed by OCP, and Olivia blanche, a psychologist that you evaluate with at the end of most levels. What i didn't expect was all the glitchy trippy sequences where murphy is fighting within himself and his psyche as robocop to go all out and pull something straight out of condemned or that doctor who episode with the mannequins, or some screwed up visions while chasing down the main bastard. Im a sucker for those kind of sequences so of course, thats a plus.
But id forgive the long setup because of the payoff and when the payoff of just straight up chaos happening in the 3rd act of the story due to a major plot twist, thats when the game came into its own. Until it decides to drag it out near the end, it even had the triumphant main theme going on like with Terminator Resistance's last level.. On the 2ND to last level. Which just feel so damn bizarre to me where its like, shit i can really feel the runtime here. At the END of the game, which is weird because i thought teyon did have a better sense of pacing with resistance where it all came ahead to a satisfying conclusion, This was bittersweet where i was ready for it to end one mission before the final fight. Honestly, if they had save the theme for the final fight, i'd wouldve been super hyped but alas.
What also didnt help was the skill tree, now like resistance, this has a skill tree thats focused on Combat, Armor, Dialogue Deduction, Health, Movement, etc. Here's the thing, this is one of those games you'll have to play the new game plus to actually unlock the TRUE potential of the combat.
And i'd love to, if it wasnt for the frame rate drops, holy hell, Look i ran with this game with my rig which is a GTX 1660 super with an i5-10400f and with a DLSS to FSR mod which gives me more frame rates because my god, this is more shoddly optimized than terminator, which unfortunately is to be expected from a stutter engine 5 game but christ, It went into SINGLE digits during one section where you pick up a trash can and slide it across to activate all the landmines. The combat was great but damn did it feel like ass when everything was going on and my framerate TANK when its otherwise normal 100+ fps, on top of the open world sections having the same issue while linear levels is much smoother to play with.
But don't let that deter you from trying this game, You should try it but before i play this again and actually appreciate the combat with all the skills unlocked, i oughta play a patched version that doesn't CHUG the framerate hard while attempting to do so.
But in all seriousness, Teyon really did a smart move by basically taking whatever lessons they've learned from their last 80s action icon adaptation Terminator Resistance Which i reviewed here and its expansion also reviewed here, And decided alright lets make the robocop sequel we SHOULD have gotten with this blueprint.
Basically take the gameplay from that terminator resistance infiltrator mode like throwing around enemies like bowling balls, the dashes, ripping enemy turrents into guns, the slow mo punch, etc. mix in some slow mo bullet time like in F.E.A.R or Trepang2 but with rigid movement (which is good in this case because this isnt 2014s reboot sleek robocop, this is OG TANKY SLOW WALKING robocop), destructible environments, ricochet bullets with your trusty Auto-9, some VERY light detective work (literally press and hold the aim button to scan evidence, Don't expect some L.A. Noire shit), and You get a game that makes you FEEL like robocop, its like Teyon looked at that old ass robocop game from titus and said "Ok lets not repeat the same mistakes and get an actual BUDGET this time" Because unlike with Annihilation Line where they unfortunately couldnt get michael biehn for kyle reese, They made sure to get Peter Weller for Robocop. It just wouldnt be the same without him. On top of that, Running on Unreal engine 5 with destruction physics and lumen lighting really makes this otherwise budget game look a lot more polished than their previous work. On top of being semi open world hub (just one town of old Detroit) with bombastic setpieces here and there. Including a shit ton of enemies from armored goons, to punks with gas canisters to turrents to OCP copbots to bikers to a handful of ED-209 bosses, Yes- Bosses, Plural. and all of em have a borderlands esque enemy intro detailing you what they are capable of.
And while the story isn't groundbreaking, and takes its sweet ass time to setup (if you do side missions as well, you WILL feel the length of this game), it is simple and sweet, even get to do little mini side stuff around the precinct and have dialogue options to make this game really feel alive and make ya care about the characters including newcomers like "pickles" the druggie fed informant, Ulysses, the rookie appointed by OCP, and Olivia blanche, a psychologist that you evaluate with at the end of most levels. What i didn't expect was all the glitchy trippy sequences where murphy is fighting within himself and his psyche as robocop to go all out and pull something straight out of condemned or that doctor who episode with the mannequins, or some screwed up visions while chasing down the main bastard. Im a sucker for those kind of sequences so of course, thats a plus.
But id forgive the long setup because of the payoff and when the payoff of just straight up chaos happening in the 3rd act of the story due to a major plot twist, thats when the game came into its own. Until it decides to drag it out near the end, it even had the triumphant main theme going on like with Terminator Resistance's last level.. On the 2ND to last level. Which just feel so damn bizarre to me where its like, shit i can really feel the runtime here. At the END of the game, which is weird because i thought teyon did have a better sense of pacing with resistance where it all came ahead to a satisfying conclusion, This was bittersweet where i was ready for it to end one mission before the final fight. Honestly, if they had save the theme for the final fight, i'd wouldve been super hyped but alas.
What also didnt help was the skill tree, now like resistance, this has a skill tree thats focused on Combat, Armor, Dialogue Deduction, Health, Movement, etc. Here's the thing, this is one of those games you'll have to play the new game plus to actually unlock the TRUE potential of the combat.
And i'd love to, if it wasnt for the frame rate drops, holy hell, Look i ran with this game with my rig which is a GTX 1660 super with an i5-10400f and with a DLSS to FSR mod which gives me more frame rates because my god, this is more shoddly optimized than terminator, which unfortunately is to be expected from a stutter engine 5 game but christ, It went into SINGLE digits during one section where you pick up a trash can and slide it across to activate all the landmines. The combat was great but damn did it feel like ass when everything was going on and my framerate TANK when its otherwise normal 100+ fps, on top of the open world sections having the same issue while linear levels is much smoother to play with.
But don't let that deter you from trying this game, You should try it but before i play this again and actually appreciate the combat with all the skills unlocked, i oughta play a patched version that doesn't CHUG the framerate hard while attempting to do so.