Robocop: Rogue City review

12.01.2024 - 08:45 / pcgamer.com

Robocop: Rogue City's combat feels like straight up murder: I totally lost it when I punched someone for the first time and Robocop's fist flew out with the force of a particle accelerator, instantly atomizing their skull. A few minutes later I had to take a breather after picking up a dumpster and squashing four guys into a corner with it, like it was a malevolent hydraulic press adorned with Oakleys and Punisher skull stickers. When taking out hordes of Detroit street trash, Robocop: Rogue City is an absolute blast, but brutally uneven pacing and a coma-inducing plot leave it in the same mediocre arena as the film's sequels.

What is it? Narrative FPS based on the classic film
Release date November 2, 2023
Expect to pay $50/£50
Developer Teyon
Publisher Nacon
Reviewed on Radeon RX 6600, Ryzen 7 5700G, 32GB DDR4 RAM
Steam Deck TBA
Link Official site

There is a tremendous sense of physicality in Rogue City. You can pick up enemies by the neck and fling them against walls so hard that chunks of rubble will rain down on their ragdolled corpses. Bullets scatter reams of paper and turn clutter into hurricanes of plastic and metal shrapnel. When Robocop grabs something with his giant metal gloves it retains its physics, so the computer monitor you're about to whip at some guy's head will thud against a wall or get jammed in a door frame a la Garry's Mod. Environments are littered with a comical number of explosives that behave in hilariously different ways. A propane canister will bonk against the head of whoever you throw it at and then rocket around the area before exploding. Robocop can pick up landmines and whip them like frisbees. 

I loved the way Robocop's auto-9 machine pistol handles, a modular burst fire SMG that just vomits a ridiculous stream of small caliber rounds with pinpoint accuracy. I could go for another whole campaign of doming someone with a full burst and watching their body ragdoll backwards in slow motion. There are other weapons too, but I'm unsure why you'd ever want to use them. The scant arsenal of Cold War-era automatics and shotguns are at best situational and at worst unnecessary, only effective after significant investment into the corresponding «combat» skill tree. 

Yes, Rogue City has a skill tree system, and it's way too bloated. My advice: get the first tier of every ability ASAP, because they're the juice that keeps Rogue City's combat from getting repetitive. There's Max Payne-esque bullet time, flashbangs installed in your eyes, and my favorite, a forward charge where Robocop plants his feet and surges ahead like a flat-footed freight train, bowling over everyone in his path.

This is made all the better by a dismemberment system that seems to prioritize the funniest outcomes