El Supermo gives me a strange feeling that he isn’t a good guy!
Robonauts – Nintendo Switch – Released: 9/15/2017 – $14.99
Short Review: (Review Code provided by the Developer)
This was a game that went completely under my radar but when I saw the gameplay trailer I fell in love with the music. At first I thought there was a little too much hand holding but after a few stages the game’s difficulty sky rocket and then I knew mistakes were made. The game starts off really innocent and the trailers make it seem like an easy going game but it isn’t this game gets hard very quickly if you want the gold medals. The game can be somewhat easy on normal mode in the first 7 stages but then jumps if you want the medals. It does offer a hard mode that does up the ante with more enemies but does not impact the medals. I mainly have been playing it in single player mode but I did try out co-op mode for a little bit with my nephew. It is no different than the single player mode and I didn’t think it was any harder. The game has a versus mode which I didn’t spend much time on since my nephew is pretty bad at games for his age, he is 5, but it does offer some unique objectives. You don’t fight each other but you kill enemies either in certain ways or you have to kill a set number in a time frame. I really like this mode but sadly know I won’t get anything out of it. I really enjoyed this game but have to say it is a game that would be better at $9.99 but currently is on sale for the next few days at $13.49.
Icon people here you go once again:
I do have to say the Physical Contact Speed icon is better than the SteamWorld Dig 2 icon.
Long Review:
History
I spent a while trying to find information about the team…. then I found a Facebook page and there I was able to find out there was a Kickstarter. Then it all came back to me, this was a Kickstarter that was unsuccessful. I had seen it from time to time on my Kickstarter feed since I like to donate to Indie games and I remember I didn’t back it because it didn’t even come close, 9K out of 35K earned. It was even a game that had a beta and was one of Kickstarter’s projects we love. A team of 16 people created this game and surprisingly it seems like a few of the Kickstarter items were actually produced. The arcade machine is a real thing they made that was a reward on Kickstarter but now they have it at their studio according to the FaceBook page. It was an interesting project if you want to see the full page here: Click Here
Story
The game is about a robot called Robo. He gets ejected out of a ship while he is playing “Robonauts” on an arcade machine in the docking bay. He lands on a mysterious planet where he finds a suit of armor and he puts it on. The adventure starts here where he learns that he can take weapons from the enemies he kills on this dangerous planet. There is a few unique weapons and types, one arm has a blaster that has the typical shotgun, long ranged shot, machine gun, and a few others. The other arm has a bomb bag that he can pick up different types such as a bomb that goes up into the air and explodes into multiple smaller bombs, a rocket launcher that goes into the air and homes in on targets, and a bomb that blows up and leaves a trail of fire.
After clearing out this first planet a mysterious man named El Supermo picks you up and saves you from the planet. He then recruits you to help him gather a few things in the solar system and you find yourself clearing out planets of their lifeforms. Now my tag line may have ruined it already but from the start this guy just rubs you the wrong way. I won’t go into it any further but the story is pretty mediocre and generic but enjoyable for the time I’ve spent playing.
Gameplay
As noted in the short review and story this game is a run, dodge and shoot your way through things type of game. You can play this anyway you want but I always tried to go for the Gold Medals which always felt out of reach since you need to combo well which you do by not getting hit and killing multiple things at once. The enemy types can get a bit crazy the bulk of them are actually in the screenshot above. The spiked red and blue creatures just jump toward you, the spider looking ones will shoot an arching bomb at you, the blue ones with lasers will stun you if the laser touch you, there is a flying one that dives after you and a Rhino looking one that will machine gun you down. All of these enemies if you let them will overrun you in area certainly the last three levels where they can get crazy aggressive over trying to kill you.
The game has a lot of hand holding in the beginning but just like one day you will stop picking up your child half way through the game it takes a nose dive. The game gets really hard on level 7 all of sudden which is a rescue mission to save some machines. This stage just starts off with a lot of enemies to clear out so getting a good score was out of the question for me. I really had to slow down and take the stage slow or I would be overrun by enemies from the pods they spawn out of. The game does have a varied amount of missions from your standard kill everything, collect items, escort mission, touch the switches to stop lasers and finally the defend missions.
Personal Experience
Alright I need to explain something. I had a slight issue with motion sickness the first time playing while on a bus. It quickly ended but just wanted to note that while playing in handheld mode on a bus I felt slightly ill. So on with my personal experience outside of that.
The game is pretty awesome but is rather short. Looking at this screen i thought it was 12 stages per level but that wasn’t the case the game is only 12 stages long. Rather short but I did enjoy my time with it. It is an arcade style game so it wants you to repeat multiple times until you Gold each of them. Really wish the Switch had a proper time telling so I can say exactly how long it took me to finish but I was able to finish it over the course of a week with at least an hour a day with the last two days being the only game I played and taking it to my nephew. I do have an issue with the auto aiming since it can be the cause for some stupid deaths because it refuses to lock on to where you are going but would rather aim at the flying enemy. I hated this part but if you take it slow you won’t have any issues but racing against the clock and trying to kill multiple enemies at once results in death 100% of the time.
Simon Viklund, I have no idea who you are and what you do outside of making video game music but man keep it up. The soundtrack was so good I found him on YouTube and subscribed to his channel since it really gets you in the mood to play. It is another game that doesn’t have a ton of tracks but the tracks it does have are spot on and worth the listen to now if only he would upload the entire soundtrack for a PWYW service so I can buy it like I did for NeuroVoider. It is on the Kickstarter make it happen it was only $22 for the game, soundtrack, and a PDF of a poster. I would gladly pay $10 for the soundtrack if I was given the option.
Final Thoughts
I would say buy it currently because it is on sale for $13.49 and worth it either way but if you don’t already like what you see it would be better just to wait for a sale. I really enjoyed the game and had a great time playing but considering how short it is I would say hold off until it hits $10.
Trailer:
I have no clue who is doing the trailers for this but when I saw this one uploaded I couldn’t help but use it to show off the game. Amazing job Jakub!
Update: 4/2/18
I would love to give this game an 8 out of 10. While it does offer some solid gameplay, it is a game that I rarely return to. I’ve played a few times with my nephew but haven’t played on my own.
End Credits?
I see you have returned once more to see me rant a little bit and hopefully you aren’t here just because of the last review’s end credits. Now this past week I’ve spent a lot of time replying to people about what I do and how I cover the games. First things first respect for the developer and the game and I will always give my honest opinion about all games I review. In doing so means when I receive a review copy the review itself will likely never be ready for launch or even a day after launch. I don’t mind giving my two cents about a game like I did for SWD2 over the past few days once the embargo has passed. Good segway into my giveaway on Wednesday which if you don’t remember from yesterday will be held on the review of SWD2. What you need to do will be on the bottom of the review just like my hints to it are here. I ask that you think about the title “end credits” since it will have something to do with that. There are rules but you will need to comment on the review of the Nintendo Switch Subreddit. More details will be provided when the review launches and remember this is a secret to everyone.
I am in no rush to finish a review because I don’t like reviews that are quick a dirty. I saw SteamWorld Dig 2 reviews go under fire because of this. I am not sure if it was because I mentioned that review copies went out early Tuesday and the embargo was ending on Wednesday morning but I don’t think any of the Switch Subreddit reviews had a good time there. So hopefully mine does well…. One advice I gave someone that asked me for advice was that just be consistent on when you post. If you have noticed when I say a review will come out on a certain day it comes out on that day. Polished and links are sent to the developer or publisher. You don’t have to post as much as I do but if you do it once a month, every other week or once a week just make sure when that day comes you are ready with a review. It looks great and before you know it you will have dozens or reviews out and people will love it.
When it comes to review copies sadly I really don’t have great advice outside of posting solid reviews that are well edited and not sitting down and writing them in one go. People will be able to tell…. If you don’t think so check out my “36 Fragments of Midnight” post which one user called it out right away. I commend him for that since that changed my entire outlook on my short reviews. So if a random user on Reddit can tell something like that, how quickly do you think a public relation worker that has to look at hundreds to thousands of emails will notice how well you write from just your email. It also isn’t like I get them all the time I just spread them out to fit into my time slots and I get denied more often than not. Many of my review copies are from the same developers or publishers. I try my best to be apart of every AMA and talk with them before sending them anything. I don’t email all of them either sometimes I need to decide on things and chance getting a review copy. Be honest with them too so if you can’t get a review on a certain day let them know right away. Never let someone bring you down either… you are the creator of your review and no troll should stop you from posting them. Just remember they took the time out to click, look at your post and respond just to troll you so they aren’t worth fighting since you already got them to read your review. As you may have noticed I am not linking my reviews directly anymore. I have been flagged as spam so I will be linking them as a comment. I am trying to figure out what is the best way of doing this so my first option is this method which is post the short review and anyone who wants to go to my website can follow the link but that may not work so this is the first test. SteamWorld Dig 2 will be the second test where I post the entire 2.5K word review as a post and see how that works out. I know it is a pain but I know people enjoy reading the reviews and I enjoy making them. Either way lettings the mods know that you enjoy the reviews and don’t want to read them off reddit like this would be greatly appreciated.
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