RoboCop
System: NES
Release Date: December 1989
Developer: Data East, Sakata SAS
Publisher: Data East
Genre: Action
I never had watched RoboCop before, so I turned it on as I played through the NES game. I can probably say I feel the same about the movie as the game. Nothing amazing, but it’s good enough for an hour and a half of your life. As Officer Murphy, you’ve been wasted by the gangs of Detroit and brought back as the cyborg RoboCop. Now it’s up to you to put an end to the crooked businessmen who set the wheels into motion.
RoboCop can shoot his gun, sometimes, with the A Button and punch away with the B Button. Not being able to always shoot my gun is an annoying design choice. Why wouldn’t I shoot at people trying to kill me? Besides Murphy’s trusty Auto-9, there is also the machine gun and cobra gun that can be picked up and used. The machine gun has incredibly short range and not very useful. The cobra gun is maxed with a few bullets, but you’re going to want to have that maxed out for the final boss.
There are two meters that you have to keep an eye on. The power meter drops when you take damage. The energy meter is essentially the timer for the level. Running out of either will cause you to lose a life. This isn’t much of a problem until the last level. You do not have enough time to get through the level and defeat the final boss normally. I believe you have to have your cobra gun maxed out in order to beat the time limit. If you come into the level without full ammo, you can’t win.
Enemies and bosses are mostly a pushover. Even when you can only punch, enemies run into you and you knock them out. Powerups are placed somewhat generously through the levels. After some levels is a shooting range bonus level that isn’t particularly fun or useful overall.
The stairs are awful to move up and down, taking a ton of tries to get it to work. I crossed an invisible barrier, I guess I should put my gun away, dumb. I guess the best part is the end of the game when Directive 4 is cleared, which was the best part of the movie, too.
Graphics: 1.5
Graphics are alright, but there’s a lot of brown and gray.
Sound: 1.0
Music and sounds are mostly bad. You’ve got one song in the levels and final boss theme. Neither good.
Gameplay: 1.5
There are a lot of questionable design choices, but it’s playable.
Difficulty: 2.0
It’s not a difficult game, but getting to the last level without enough ammo is a death sentence.
Fun Factor: 1.0
Eh, I can’t say I had fun with this one. I totally used codes to give me unlimited time to beat the final boss.
Overall Grade: 1.4
RoboCop earns a D+. I guess the movie is probably better than the game. I probably won’t ever watch it or play it again, though.