Robocop: Rogue City Review

Initial Release Date: November 2, 2023

Developer: Teyon

Platforms: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Series S, Microsoft Windows

Engine: Unreal Engine 5

Mode: Single-player

License: Proprietary License

Genres: Shooter, Role-playing

SPOILERS THROUGHOUT!!

Introduction

I remember my father taking me to see Robocop in the theaters back in 1987. Robocop was synonymous with one liners, cheese, violence and action. A few years after the original Robocop movie I played the arcade version which was okay but required quarters. Robocop: Rogue City Video Playlist

Fast forward decades later, Teyon the makers of Terminator: Resistance are no strangers at turning my child-hood 80’s action movies into video games. Which brings me to Amazon Robocop: Rogue City. To make a long story short Teyon ending up making the best Robocop video game. Keep reading!

Presentation

Robocop: Rogue City’s presentation is a mixed bag leaning more on the positive side. I loved the overall portrayal of the characters, OCP and Detroit. From what I understand Rogue City takes place between Robocop 2 and Robocop 3 films.

The visual presentation was amazing at times and weirdly inconsistent in others. Rogue City implements a dialogue tree system that impacts choice in the story. Sound design wasn’t good but helped by familiar Robocop tunes when large battles played out.

Robocop: Rogue City really had me feeling like Alex Murphy Robocop in Detroit. As far as bugs and glitches are concerned they mostly related to when I’d grab and throw a bad guy he’d get stuck half way through a wall literally. Just a little immersion breaking.

Story

You play as Alex Murphy Robocop, police officer with The Detroit Police Dept. The story goes Robocop must take out a new crime lord being funded by the OCP in Wendell Antonowsky. Wendell shoots Robo’s partner Annie Lewis (she lives).

By the end of the game’s ten plus hour story you end up shooting, killing Wendell Antonowsky off a construction site. Other story arcs included OCP and their attempted take over of old Detroit through Max Becker’s UED Robots.

OCP also wants to build Delta City over old Detroit. I must be honest, Robocop has always been cheese when it comes to it’s story. For what it’s worth the story was faithful to Robocop with funny one-liners throughout.

Gameplay

I would catagorize Robocop: Rogues City as an action-adventure story-driven first person shooter. You can level up Robocop’s abilities and statistics. I maxed out the “Combat” and “Health” trees which unlocked very useful abilities.

The gunplay was good not great. You have a head’s up display as Robocop targeting enemies with green outlines. You can pick various weapons of corpses like LMG, heavy pistols and SMGs.

Pacing and quest design were impressive which at times made it feel like a adventure game while walking through Detroit while on the beat back or back at the precinct. Dialogue sequences were decent when dealing with NPCs. You can even contribute to Detroit’s mayoral election by how you talk to the candidates.

For reference, I did played Robocop: Rogue City on my Playstation 5 on Normal and Easy difficulties. During the last three or four main missions the difficulty and number of enemies and turrets ramps up.

Visuals/Graphics

I can see some brilliance with inconsistences with Teyons use of the Unreal Engine 5. It’s early I get it. At times while walking thorough Detroit as Robo the game looked amazing in quality mode with some minor stutters.

Performance mode did appear more inconsistent visually with a much higher framerate. Art design was impressive in regards to environments but NPC faces at times were not consistent. Some NPCs looked way better than others in dialogue sequences.

Sound/Music

Sound design was mostly just Robocop thudding as he walked, his head’s up display and the Auto-9 were pin point accurate in sound design. ED-209 also had the “growl” which had me laughing. Dialogue and voice acting are pure 80’s action movie movie cheese and one-liners.

Final Thoughts/Score

Robocop: Rogue City is the best Robocop video game I ever played. It’s inconsistent at times sure but I respect how Teyon approached one of my favorite 80’s action movie franchises. Next Up, Big Trouble In Little China? Thank you for reading people – Jason