Robopon - Sun Version

2016-03-13 09:45:48 pm

Nostalgia Kills

There is finally hope for this game. An existing 3hour run is on speedrundotcom, and with the increasing popularity of Awful games done quick, someone might use it as a base. There are plenty of topical jokes to make about robopon... besides the obvious one that its a pokemon clone that the Next official pokemon is going to have the same subtitle as!

What follows are my thoughts on the game, which I hope will encourage anyone who sees the thread to try it out.... Personally, I plan on doing a run in the new future (shamelessly using existing strats, but relying more heavily on level up auto heals) because heaven knows I need some more humor in my life.

I found game in a pile of random Gameboy cartridges while I was trying to remember where I put my legend of Zelda: oracle of ages. I was intrigued by the oversized cartridge, so I put it in. Immediately, I came to the conclusion that this is possibly, the most blatant pokemon clone in history. But then, as I went further, I noticed that it was something more. While the graphics would be at home in red,blue,gold, or silver, Robopon is actually pretty serious about its "robot" theme. The monsters use RAM, and software, and you use items like oil, and upgrades rather than potions or food. The battle system was interesting, because while Robopon has supereffective damage, you aren't half forced to use fire pokemon to acess fire attacks, instead, any monster can have any mix of three elements attached to it, and you can create combos from thunder/fire/water, or slap three fires to get high level attacks early on. This means that picking "viable" pokemon shouldn't really matter, even robopon incabable of evolution can be fairly useful. The graphics are not very impressive(attack animations are particularly bad), but the designs on the robopon and the trainers are more amusing than the generation 1 pokemon counterparts. There are quirky things like the nurse carrying a giant hypothermic needle, actual mecha style robots, and things like screwy, which are like household appliances with eyeballs. It's almost as quirky as earthbound! Exploration sometimes works to reward you.... you can even find an evolution item before the very first battle!

Sadly though, this game is BAD. You can't check the damage values or special effects of the different attacks, only their type and MP cost, which makes it hard to tell whether something is better other than trial and error and assuming expensive does more damage. In battle, there is no "super effective text" so it is hard to know if you are using a good move, a resisted move, or a neutral move, other than fighting the same monster again and testing the other attacks. Finally, none of the status effects are explained, so the only way to learn what they do is to have them used on them. Out of battle... this game features very slow menuing and area transitions, but that's not a major problem. The lack of direction is. The next objective after the early game is incredibly vague, and you are required to visit some completely nondescreipt houses. They don't look special compared to the rest of town in any way. Robopon features teleport and boulder puzzle/mazes like pokemon red/blue, but they are much more frustrating. When you get to the second legend 7 "aka gym leader" you are confronted with the true horror... RNG based minigames. If you thought randomly spawning and sometimes undodgeable patterns in say, the animorphs bat minigame were bad, you haven't seen minigames where you lose ALL control, and can't put in any inputs for up to a minute and a half, as your monster tries to navigate a maze. Even having seen the chao garden part of a sonic adventure 2 100% could not prepare me for this. While the upgrading system is fairly interesting, shops are much harder to identify in pokemon, and robopon is actually much more difficult, you will WANT to have MP and HP restoratives and escape ropes on you, a strong move in robopon could vent your MP in 4-6 turns, and since you use the same MP for all attacks-more like a traditional rpg than pokemon, this is pretty serious. If you thought magikarp was bad you won't believe the bad robopon. No robopon has unredeemable stats. Instead the bad ones afflict themselves with status conditions at the start of battle. This might sound like something bearable, but instead of hitting yourself in confusion, robopon can EXPLODE.

However, what I loved most about the game, is finding how much it reminded me of pokemon. Comparing the professor to Oak, the bully (with a theme while he walks) to gary, some of the robopon designs, the boulder mazes, the legends to gym leaders, the stamps to badges, etc. Each and every similar mechanic had me rolling on the floor laughing. As did the overworld sprites. Is that nurse joy!, is that the same maze of trees on the edge of town as in red/blue? Man they sure like having potted plants inside of stores! And of course, when the game was different It made pokemon look kiddy. If monsters are our friends why do we get an option to SELL THEM, and the further option, to SCRAP them for parts to upgrade our more deserving monsters. This game will have you thinking like a sicko in no time. In actuality it's just as PG as pokemon. Adding to the irony is the subtitle for the two versions of robopon. Both having 150 monsters and evolution. Sun and Moon.. the same as the upcoming pokemon games! Sun version the English and Japanese release, like pokemon Red, while Moon is the Japanese only release, like pokemon GREEN. Like pokemon, they both have exclusives, notably the starters (you don't get to choose in either).

What follows are my thoughts on the game, which I hope will encourage anyone who sees the thread to try it out.... Personally, I plan on doing a run in the new future (shamelessly using existing strats, but relying more heavily on level up auto heals) because heaven knows I need some more humor in my life.

I found game in a pile of random Gameboy cartridges while I was trying to remember where I put my legend of Zelda: oracle of ages.  I was intrigued by the oversized cartridge, so I put it in. Immediately, I came to the conclusion that this is possibly, the most blatant pokemon clone in history. But then, as I went further, I noticed that it was something more. While the graphics would be at home in red,blue,gold, or silver, Robopon is actually pretty serious about its "robot" theme. The monsters use RAM, and software, and you use items like oil, and upgrades rather than potions or food. The battle system was interesting, because while Robopon has supereffective damage, you aren't half forced to use fire pokemon to acess fire attacks, instead, any monster can have any mix of three elements attached to it, and you can create combos from thunder/fire/water, or slap three fires to get high level attacks early on. This means that picking "viable" pokemon shouldn't really matter, even robopon incabable of evolution can be fairly useful. The graphics are not very impressive(attack animations are particularly bad), but the designs on the robopon and the trainers are more amusing than the generation 1 pokemon counterparts. There are quirky things like the nurse carrying a giant hypothermic needle, actual mecha style robots, and things like screwy, which are like household appliances with eyeballs. It's almost as quirky as earthbound! Exploration sometimes works to reward you.... you can even find an evolution item before the very first battle!

Sadly though, this game is BAD. You can't check the damage values or special effects of the different attacks, only their type and MP cost, which makes it hard to tell whether something is better other than trial and error and assuming expensive does more damage. In battle, there is no "super effective text" so it is hard to know if you are using a good move, a resisted move, or a neutral move, other than fighting the same monster again and testing the other attacks. Finally, none of the status effects are explained, so the only way to learn what they do is to have them used on them. Out of battle... this game features very slow menuing and area transitions, but that's not a major problem. The lack of direction is. The next objective after the early game is incredibly vague, and you are required to visit some completely nondescreipt houses. They don't look special compared to the rest of town in any way. Robopon features teleport and boulder puzzle/mazes like pokemon red/blue, but they are much more frustrating. When you get to the second legend 7 "aka gym leader" you are confronted with the true horror... RNG based minigames. If you thought randomly spawning and sometimes undodgeable patterns in say, the animorphs bat minigame were bad, you haven't seen minigames where you lose ALL control, and can't put in any inputs for up to a minute and a half, as your monster tries to navigate a maze. Even having seen the chao garden part of a sonic adventure 2 100% could not prepare me for this. While the upgrading system is fairly interesting, shops are much harder to identify in pokemon, and robopon is actually much more difficult, you will WANT to have MP and HP restoratives and escape ropes on you, a strong move in robopon could vent your MP in 4-6 turns, and since you use the same MP for all attacks-more like a traditional rpg than pokemon, this is pretty serious. If you thought magikarp was bad you won't believe the bad robopon. No robopon has unredeemable stats. Instead the bad ones afflict themselves with status conditions at the start of battle. This might sound like something bearable, but instead of hitting yourself in confusion, robopon can EXPLODE.

However, what I loved most about the game, is finding how much it reminded me of pokemon. Comparing the professor to Oak, the bully (with a theme while he walks) to gary, some of the robopon designs, the boulder mazes, the legends to gym leaders, the stamps to badges, etc. Each and every similar mechanic had me rolling on the floor laughing. As did the overworld sprites. Is that nurse joy!, is that the same maze of trees on the edge of town as in red/blue? Man they sure like having potted plants inside of stores! And of course, when the game was different It made pokemon look kiddy. If monsters are our friends why do we get an option to SELL THEM, and the further option, to SCRAP them for parts to upgrade our more deserving monsters. This game will have you thinking like a sicko in no time. In actuality it's just as PG as pokemon. Adding to the irony is the subtitle for the two versions of robopon. Both having 150 monsters and evolution. Sun and Moon.. the same as the upcoming pokemon games! Sun version the English and Japanese release, like pokemon Red, while Moon is the Japanese only release, like pokemon GREEN. Like pokemon, they both have exclusives, notably the starters (you don't get to choose in either).