Tech Romancer

"Capcom Robots Fighting FlashingLights Non-Sensical"

First a little health warning...
THIS GAME CONTAINS FLASHING LIGHTS
The kind that are even worse than the title screen of Ninja Scroll, the kind that make you think 'Hmm this can't be good for my eyes' just before your eyes explode and spray a mixture of blood, eye-juice and general body gloop onto your shaking Dreamcast controller.

If you don't mind flashing lights of this sort then you'll probably want me to review on-and review on I will! It seems as if somebody wanted to make a sequel of Gundam Wing:Endless Duel (that great Snes robot fighting game) on the Dreamcast in 3D, but without the Gundam Wing licencse. The games 'feel' very similar, despite the fact that Tech Romancer is in the third dimension. In fact Tech Romancer is a 3D fighting game that almost feels as if it should be in 2D. Unless they are in a longish attack or you're a fast robot, moving very fast the other robot automatically faces you and attacks have a way of homing in, even when you think they shouldn't. Despite the weapon pickups the controls are as simple as any other fighting game, with shoulder buttons assignable to the super special finish moves for all you LAZY ********* ******* ******** ******* out there.

Graphically this game is rather poor. The textures are very simple on everything in the game and the bits that are most likely to impress are the drawn parts which (try to) tell you the story, although there are some nice effects, such as the way in which parts of the robot break and have blue electricity running through them. The story is one of my favourite parts of Tech Romancer. Each character has their own story, these range from the old animé kids who pilot a huge robot and protect the Earth for some undescribed reason to a young girls unhealthy obsession of a fully grown man. The characters, although occasionly generic, are all cool in their own special way. My favourite is the aforementioned Bollin & Pollin, the young girl, her robot is made up of old toys and other rubbish in general and her finishing move involves a house magically appearing, the enemy robot lying on the floor, Bollin & Pollin then shouting something in Japanese, followed by a huge explosion.

The game could last quite a while, or you could be finished with it quickly. Unlike almost all games Tech Romancer has a lot of VM mini games to unlock and completing it with every character (needed to unlock them all) is probably much harder than it sounds. The multiplayer is always fun for 2 people and will keep you entertained even if you can't be bothered to play the 1 player game. Its on the Dreamcast so although it may be hard to find it should be quite cheap and is definitely worth your money.

YADA VS SHMADA

+Easy to pick up and play
+VM Mini-games!!!!!!!!
+Uniquely Japanese, in a very charming way
-Graphics leave much to be desired
-May not last too long

All in all an extremely fun, although not without flaws, insane robot fighting game
8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 10/22/02, Updated 10/22/02