Custom Robo is a severely underrated and under appreciated series. Custom Robo Arena on DS was the only one in the series that came out here in Europe so it's taken me far too long to play this one.
As an action RPG, it cuts out all the fluff of other traditional RPGs like experience points and random encounters instead putting the majority of it's focus on it's fantastic battle system with customisable robots that duke it out in real time in a wide variety of battle arenas.
There's nothing else I've experienced quite like it and I adore it. Battles rarely last a few minutes and everything is in your control for how well you do. Using the various arena's layouts for cover and attacking from range with bombs or air dashing into a pressurised attack are all viable strategies and as you unlock parts throughout the story via winning battles, you gain even more options to experiment with.
The story itself isn't much to write home about until it takes a weird but interesting turn towards the end. It's short and sweet but does a good job at getting at getting you used to how the battles function and the characters and music help push it along nicely. The post game is all tournament stuff, designed to get you used to different rulesets like tag battles or 2 on 2 battles and unlocking the rest of the parts. It's a little repetitive but also includes additional context for the aftermath of the main story so it's a welcome addition for those that need a bit more time with the game.
Where this shines compared to the DS game for me is in it's multiplayer. Local multiplayer allows up to four people to duke it out including 2 on 2 battles as well as 3 and 4 player battle royales which are chaotic fun.
For me Custom Robo is a quintessential GameCube era game. It offers a solid story mode for single player and a great multiplayer mode as the cherry on top and neither side feels like an afterthought. This would've easily been up there with F-Zero GX, Mario Kart Double Dash and StarFox Assault as a multiplayer classic for me and my brothers if it released in Europe back in 2004. While we may have missed out, it doesn't stop this being added to my favourite GameCube games of all time and further cementing the GameCube library as one of my favourites. Now if Nintendo would like to make a new one of these I would very much appreciate it
As an action RPG, it cuts out all the fluff of other traditional RPGs like experience points and random encounters instead putting the majority of it's focus on it's fantastic battle system with customisable robots that duke it out in real time in a wide variety of battle arenas.
There's nothing else I've experienced quite like it and I adore it. Battles rarely last a few minutes and everything is in your control for how well you do. Using the various arena's layouts for cover and attacking from range with bombs or air dashing into a pressurised attack are all viable strategies and as you unlock parts throughout the story via winning battles, you gain even more options to experiment with.
The story itself isn't much to write home about until it takes a weird but interesting turn towards the end. It's short and sweet but does a good job at getting at getting you used to how the battles function and the characters and music help push it along nicely. The post game is all tournament stuff, designed to get you used to different rulesets like tag battles or 2 on 2 battles and unlocking the rest of the parts. It's a little repetitive but also includes additional context for the aftermath of the main story so it's a welcome addition for those that need a bit more time with the game.
Where this shines compared to the DS game for me is in it's multiplayer. Local multiplayer allows up to four people to duke it out including 2 on 2 battles as well as 3 and 4 player battle royales which are chaotic fun.
For me Custom Robo is a quintessential GameCube era game. It offers a solid story mode for single player and a great multiplayer mode as the cherry on top and neither side feels like an afterthought. This would've easily been up there with F-Zero GX, Mario Kart Double Dash and StarFox Assault as a multiplayer classic for me and my brothers if it released in Europe back in 2004. While we may have missed out, it doesn't stop this being added to my favourite GameCube games of all time and further cementing the GameCube library as one of my favourites. Now if Nintendo would like to make a new one of these I would very much appreciate it