Robotech: Invasion

PS2 review by Jim Smith - Tuesday 8th February 2005

A couple of years back, Robotech: Battlecry was released upon a largely indifferent gaming community. It was a fairly run of the mill shooter that did nothing we hadn't seen done better before hand, but it did make decent use of the Robotech franchise name not least because of the gutsy decision to develop the title using a cel-shaded graphics engine. Cel-shading worked in Jet Set Radio brilliantly and we were all suitably wowed, but inevitably that brought imitators and soon cel-shading was yesterday's news (a bit like gravity guns and psychic powers in FPS's will be in a few months time - you watch).

The aim of the game is to get the weird monster in the middle of that big circle and press fire.

But Robotech: Battlecry had other ideas. For a start, it was based the very successful anime of the same name, or more importantly the first of the three Robotech mini-series, and the cel-shading represented the cartoon style of the action perfectly. It was a case of 'if the shoe fits…' and it worked, elevating the title from a standard arcade shooter to a very pretty arcade shooter in one foul swoop. It also sold pretty well, meaning a sequel was always on the cards. However, if you accepted that Battlecry was just above average, you'll be very disappointed to hear that Robotech: Invasion is slightly below average, and for a few decisive reasons.

For a start, Invasion is set in the third series, Robotech: The New Generation. Now you may not know this, but the story of Robotech is a slightly controversial one. Originally there was no Robotech, only a bizarre Japanese anime named Macross. In the early eighties some bright spark at Harmony Gold spotted the cartoon on Japanese TV, bought the rights and re-edited it by cutting out all the really crazy Japanese bits (any of you who watch anime will know what I mean). They then re-dubbed it with a new script, added a new soundtrack and hey presto - Robotech was born.

This is what you look like in Cyclone Mode.

Planes that transformed into robots, shoulder mounted rocket batteries, spaceships the size of cities (which could also transform into robots), giant blue aliens in huge weirdo alien battlesuits - it was great and everyone wanted a piece of course. As much as I love them, do you think we'd have Transformers without Robotech - sorry, Macross? I doubt it, but that's just one example of the blatant plagiarism going on at the time. Any of you that know the Mechwarrior games may be surprised to know that it started out as a table top board game in the 80s called Battletech, produced by a company called Fasa. And of course a great many of the designs for the mecha in Battletech were remarkably similar to those in - you guessed it - Robotech, so much so that lawyers stepped in and deals were soon struck, which just goes to show that this giant transforming robot malarkey was turning into big business.

So, where does Robotech: Invasion come in? Well the main problem is fundamental; the third series of the Robotech cartoon is not borrowed from Macross, it's borrowed from a completely unrelated Japanese anime called Genesis Climber Mospeada. Goodbye giant transforming fighter planes, so long should mounted rocket batteries, farewell Zentraedi. Say hello to magic flower-hungry Invid and troopers that transform into futuristic lightly armoured motorbikes called 'cyclones'. And that's it, just guys that transform into bikes, which just isn't the same. It's sad to say but the cyclone bikes were under-powered and essentially quite boring in the cartoon series and consequently they don't fair too much better in the video game either.

My money's on that guy on the right.

In Robotech: Invasion, you play the part of one of these cyclone troopers repelling the first waves of the Invid attack. The intro and the first few levels play as by the numbers as most first person shooters do as you get used to the feel of the game, discover the nuances with the aiming, learn how to ride a cyclone, stuff like that. As the game progresses the plot thickens and not entirely thrilling secrets comes out, while all the while you blast away at wave after wave of Invid scum. And you'll probably do most of your blasting in robot as this whole 'being able to transform into a bike' thing sounds great I know, but in really isn't all that. The bikes are ultimately too slow to be thrilling and too poorly armoured to be durable. For some reason your shield also goes down in bike mode and your guns are put away, leaving you to rely on a limited supply of fairly random homing rockets and a lot of foul language. Your viewpoint is also irritating - the camera automatically positions itself behind the bike and low pointing upwards. This is presumably to allow you to see what your ineffectual rockets are hitting, but in the end it just means it's really hard to see where you are going. What's more you can only use your cyclone bike in open areas, which is plain ridiculous as the game features many long tunnel sequences which would have been cool to burn down on two wheels. Instead you have to plod along them in boring old slow robot mode - what a wasted opportunity.

Hang on, what have these two been up to behind that shed?

The robot mode itself is perfectly functional, but nothing special. You have the choice of first or third person view and a highly informative HUD that keeps track of everything from health to target destination to ammo consumption amicably, but we should expect nothing less from games these days. You get a standard weapon called the Gallant, which is pretty cool as you can get it upgraded at certain points as the game progresses. You also have the ability to pick up a dropped weapon for the other hand if you find one, which you inevitably will, although obviously you can't use both weapons at the same time. The good news is that ammo is plentiful - both you and the Invid use the same protoculture power source and they drop tonnes of it when they die, so you generally don't have to be shy when blasting away.

Even Ron Burgundy makes a guest appearance.

And blast away you will, in fact I'm sure you'll use every FPS trick in the book to kill wave after wave of flying Invid and, um, evil humans who I assume are only in the game to drop weapons for you to pick up. The objectives are very predictable - search and destroy, escort, door and key, rail shooter, that kind of thing - and you will tire of them very quickly. Also, look out for the words 'checkpoint reached' flashing up on the screen. That's slightly misleading; it should read 'Predictable ambush around the corner!'

The sound in Invasion is cool and all that, but as usual some lousy voice acting undermines the story. Graphically, Invasion has even more issues. For some crazy reason, some genius at Vicious Cycle decided to ditch the cel-shading and go with a standard gritty 3D engine, and the effect visually is devastating. In normal 3D the game just looks, well, normal, and when you round that up with all the other issues, you wonder why you're playing this game at all.

Say... How'd you get up there?

This pretty much sums the whole experience up. The game is £20 and does have an online mode, but why bother? There are better FPS's out there, better robot transforming games out there (like Robotech: Battlecry for instance) and better games with bikes in. So there - unless you really liked Robotech: The New Generation (or maybe Genesis Climber Mospaeda), I'd simply give this one a miss.