Robotron 64:  Relaxation, Rubbish and Relief
review by Zube (zube@stat.colostate.edu)
Created:  Jan 30, 2003
Updated:  Oct 25, 2011
http://www.stat.colostate.edu/~zube/robotron64.txt

[original 2003 title:  Utopia and Myopia]

I'm very lucky.  I spent $10 and bought Robotron 64 (used) and got
more than $10 worth of entertainment.  It captures the fast and
furious nature of the original Robotron very well.  It also can
be played with two joysticks, which is the way Mr. Jarvis intended
and is essential to Robotron happiness.

[Aside:  NES Smash TV can be played with two joypads and it's
pretty good, especially for the NES; SNES Total Carnage cannot and
it collects dust.]

Crave did many things right with this update: more and different
enemies, power-up weapons, a simple techo soundtrack, different
playfields.  They also added bonus rounds (ala Galaga) and a boss
round (round 100 and probably round 200).  Neither of these appeal
to me, but they don't detract in any significant sense.

The game can also be played from four persectives:  arena (the
whole board can always be seen), smart (arena with zooming, gives
me a headache), third (ground level, not much fun) and overhead
(an interesting change of pace).  The only issue I have with these
choices is that they are selectable on the fly during the game.
There should have been a way to lock the perspective so that the
player's rhythm isn't broken by mistakenly pressing the wrong button.

At any rate, much of the learning curve of Robotron 64 is a lot
of fun.

Sadly, this pleasant world contains a breathtakingly stupid design
decision.  Perhaps it was some combination of idioticy, laziness,
not knowing or ignoring the history of the game, or perhaps it was
just some manager deciding that lengthening gameplay was far more
important than fun.  It doesn't matter.  What is clear is that they
blew it.

Round 50 begins the "flash waves", a misnomer of there ever was one.
Instead of "over in a flash", nearly every bloody round ends with
a long, tedious battle against wave after wave of ever faster and
ever magically-appearing-two-pixels-away enemies.  Rounds take
minutes to complete and those minutes are about as exciting as a
cold cup of tea.

The original Robotron was a series of sprints.  As the level was
generated, one had a few brief moments to decide how to play it
and then BANG!, the starter's gun went off and the result was
quickly determined.

Robotron 64's end-of-round tedium, however, turns the game into a
marathon.  If you think singing _99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall_ from
start to finish is so much fun that, upon completion, you jump up
and scream with glee "One more time!," then this is the game for you.

This design decision is, quite possibly, one of the worst ever
made in the history of video games.  It ranks right up there
with the removal of Bub and Bob from Bust-A-Move Again and any
decision related to SNES Space Ace.  The decision turns a game
with a lot of merit into, literally, a waste of time.  Nothing is
more disappointing than snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
Robotron 64, alas, does this with great flourish.

The more I play this game, the more upset I get.  The fun keeps me
coming back, but the end-of-round bits are so painful that I want
to brain the dim bulb who made this decision.  It's like Paradise
with Paperwork.  My sincere wish is that Mr Dim goes to heaven,
is awarded five minutes of unequalled pleasure and then is forced
to dig a large hole with a needle.

It gets nearly unbearable starting at Level 150, titled _More
Flash Waves_.  Whereas before you spent minutes killing dozens upon
dozens of robots at the end of every round, now you spend an even
longer time killing hundreds upon hundreds of robots at the end
of every round.  Innovation, thy name is Crave.  It's almost as if
the designers were engaging in one-upmanship in a boredom contest:
"If you thought that was boring, just get a load of this!"

There is an object lesson here.  Video games are supposed to be fun.
When fun is sacrificed for any reason, the game is ruined.

If I were a professor, I'd tot up the grades as follows:

rounds 1-49   -- A-, a good deal of fun
rounds 50-149 -- C, boredom is not fun
rounds 150+   -- F, extreme boredom is extremely not fun

The above grades improve slightly if you change the difficultly
from normal to insane.  The end-of-round stupidity becomes more
like doing paperwork with a timer rather than just doing paperwork.
Dying is far more frequent, so you can turn off the game sooner
and do something worthwhile with what's left of your finite and
ever-decreasing lifetime.

After playing for many weeks, I've gone from happy to disappointed
to mad.  But now that I'm done, I feel mostly sadness.  This was
Crave's best effort?  This was their highest truth?  A game so
bereft of ideas that all the designers could think of was "instead
of sending out 50 robots, we'll send out 100, then 200, then 300"?

Robotron 64 mirrors how I often feel about life:  somewhat lucky
to be playing, at times enjoying the fun and challenge of it, but
the rubbish quickly overwhelms everything else, it isn't the way
it would be If I Ran The Zoo and it was (and will be) a relief to
stop playing.