One aspect of 80’s gaming that fits squarely within my memories is when movie tie-ins really began hitting their stride. One of the biggest was Ocean’s Robocop which pulled elements from Data East’s arcade game while throwing in additional elements to hew it closer to the film’s storyline. It was a pretty big deal at the time and a top seller too. A number of games over the last 35+ years have leveraged the IP further but developer Teyon’s Robocop: Rogue City might just be the first that really taps into the tone of the films and gives you the definitive experience.

Set between the second and third films, the drug Nuke is still on Detroit’s streets and chaos reigns. When the local news network is taken over by a crime gang, it’s time for the big shiny guy to step on and clean things up. This opening stage does a great job of setting the tone for combat and is big and bloody with plenty of enemies to shoot and environments to destroy. It’s gleefully over the top with the destruction you can cause when suddenly Robocop starts glitching and new problems develop with OCP, the megacorp overseeing the police department. It’s definitely familiar territory for fans of the IP but’s also what a makes the story easy to pick up and dive into.

At its heart, the game is a first-person shooter but a number of adventure elements have been included to give you glimpse into the life of all the characters in the game. Whether it be helping at the front desk of the police station or investigating a murder, these side quests provide a minor distraction to the main storyline while rewarding you with XP. Yes, the game has XP which is used to skill up Robocop’s traits to beef up his abilities and your play style and there will be tradeoffs in what you can spend them on… most players will likely want to focus on combat and health skills. The famous Auto 9 pistol also has its own levelling up mechanic with circuit boards and components which can be used to boost its abilities significantly. For me, anything with an autoloader was best for my play style. With all of this, you can almost say that here RPG stands for Robocop Playing Game.

In terms of presentation, the team made a lot of wise decisions and securing Peter Weller’s voice and likeness is definitely the biggest and that really goes a long way in setting a high mark with Robocop looking and sounding exactly as you’d expect. Coupled with ultra detailed environments and you really feel that you’ve been inserted into this world. Revisiting the steel mill from the first film shows just how far gaming graphics have advanced in terms of fidelity… it’s scarily realistic. The glitch sequences are very well done in terms of helping the player to understand what’s going on inside Robocop’s head and they do a good job of taking what was done in the films and expanding on them.

The soundtrack is outstanding and really adds to making the game feel like a movie, with my favourite being the piano version of the Robocop main theme played during the menus. There are times when you are out there dealing justice with the full orchestral theme backing you that are simply awesome to behold.

On the downside, other characters and voices aren’t up to the same level and some of the enemy AI can be outsmarted through environment obstacles but in the end it feels more like nitpicking because I just had so much fun being Robocop that it didn’t impact my enjoyment at all. Worth noting that the game has been well supported since launch with one of the first updates included a New Game Plus mode which is perfect for those wanting to max out Robocop’s skills.

Robocop: Rogue City distills the essence of the movie’s dark humour and ultraviolence while finding a smart way to neatly weave itself into the existing narratives. The developers really show a lot of insight into what made the films work and did an amazing job of translating that into a shooter where you really could step into the metal boots of the main character. I loved every minute of this game.

Robocop: Rogue City is out now for PC, Xbox and PlayStation.