BattleBots: Beyond the BattleBox

"From a bot builder: The game is simply O.K."

As a builder of combat robots and having participated in a few Battle Bot events, I figured I'll pick up BattleBots: Beyond The Battlebox just for the heck of it. Overall, the game isn't TOO bad. Not really much in the game, but I didn't really expect too much out of it. Here is what the game features:

3 modes of play
1)Tournament Mode - This is the main mode for the game. It can be split into two main portions: Building and Fighting. But before you do that, you start by creating a name for your team. You start out in the lightweight class (25-60lb) and after defeating the four robots in the class, you proceed to the middleweight class (60-120lb), then heavyweight (120-220lb), and finally the super heavyweight class (220-340lb).

Building a bot As with the real robots, before you can fight, you have to build. All of the components they provide for you to use on your robot have varying costs and weights and you have to stay both underweight and within budget. You are given a selection of chassis, though it is somewhat difficult to tell exactly what they provide as far as weapon mounting (more on this later). Once you select your chassis, you select your tires, power source, engines/motors to provide power for both drive and weapons, various weapons to mount to the chassis, and armor of various types. What type of chassis you select at the start will determine what type of weapons you can choose from and how many you can mount (you can fit hammers and horizontal saws on a tank bot, but not on a spinner).

Fighting - Once your bot is finished, it is off to fight your first match. As I said before, the tournament mode pits you against 16 actual robots from the 4 BattleBots weight classes. In the classes, you will find Backlash, Mouser Mecha Catbot, Toe Crusher, and Ziggo for the LWs; Complete Control, Deadblow, Hazard, and Sunshine Lollibot representing the MWs; Biohazard, El Diablo Grande, Overkill, and Tazbot in the HW class; and Diesector, Jaws of Death, Minion, and Toro finishing the game off in the Super Heavyweight class. Fights are one-on-one in one of the 5 different arenas of your choosing (the Battlebox, an Oil Rig with grease and a ledge to fall from, an Airplane Graveyard complete with a turbine to suck you in and a compactor, a platform over a Volcano, and a Machine Plant with conveyer belts). When you win, you earn some money that can be used towards repairing and upgrading your robot (or saved to go into the heavier robots when you advance in the weight classes) and occasionally you win a free part through a ''sponsor''. Loose, and you will have to repair your robot (assuming you still have enough money), maybe try a different weapon or two, and try the fight over again.

Defeat the 4 in your weight class and you win a ''Silver Nut'' and advance to the next class and you have to build a new robot. Defeat all 16 and you get the ''Golden Nut''. Sadly, defeating the Tournament mode isn't all that rewarding. Yeah, you get access to all 5 arenas in the other two modes (normally only the Battle Box, Oil Rig, and Graveyard are available in those modes), but it is otherwise anticlimactic.

Brawl Mode - Essentially, this is just like the fighting portion of the Tournament mode. Only significant differences is that you can either choose from one of the robots you built in the Tournament mode OR one of the 16 actual robots included. You can also fight against between 1 and 3 AI controlled robot to make up to a 4 robot rumble to test your skills. Also, if you have the ''Arcade Mode'' option set, temporary power-ups will randomly appear. Not too bad, but you can only fight against the computer so many times before it no longer becomes interesting.

Link Mode - Just like Brawl Mode, but this time you can link up to 4 GBA's to play against other people and their robots. This is really where the game somewhat saves itself since there is a good number of ways that people could have spent their cash and weight budgets during the tournament mode and truly test how well they could design (with what they provide) and drive their robots. When the other builders are waiting around in the pits, GBA's and links are likely to be brought out and a few ''digital fights'' may break out while waiting for the real fights to occur.

Now, for my opinions and rating of the game:

Graphics - 6/10
The arenas and robots based on the real robots show up rather well and look clean, though some of the bots you build don't end up looking as well. It also would have been nicer if the view was a bit further back and a larger area could be seen as early in my fight against Biohazard, Bio seemed to be FLYING past me faster then I could react. Also, with the full body spinners, they didn't provide any way to allow you to tell which way is ''forward'' when driving the bot around.

Gameplay & Control - 8/10
Driving the bot around is fairly easy to do and I'm glad the controls are a ''rotate'' and ''drive forward/reverse'' rather then pushing left causing the bot to go screen left. Firing the different weapons is also done as simple as it would be on a real bot as well. But as stated before, using one of the spinbot chassis (as all of the robots I created in the game were) doesn't really provide any visual clue as to which way the robot is facing other then trying to drive forward or backwards to see which way it is going and turn from there. Fights go by rather well and fortunatley if your robot gets flipped, there is a good chance it will be able to right itself if you haven't taken too much damage. However, the ''build your bot'' pit area menus get a little clunkey and takes a bit to get used to. You also have to hope that the chassis you pick can be equipped with the weapons you want.

Sound & Music - 7/10
I once heard that if game music is O.K., you hardly notice it, but if it is horrible, you get distracted by it from the rest of the game. I hardly noticed it even though I had the music, sfx, and main volume turned all the way up, so I would have to say that the music wasn't too bad (I went back to play another fight or two while writing this review to make sure). Sounds of the crashing and smashing is all the same, but of course, in real robot matches, the sounds don't change all that much anyway. The audio isn't something to rave about, but it isn't too detracting either.

Length & Replayability - 3/10
This is the weakest part of the game. After you complete the game in Tournament mode (which took me under 2 hours), there seems little reason to play it again. The only reason to play the game again is to link up with other people. Most of the time, I'm sure people would choose to link together a different game though. Maybe in the pits at an event with a bunch of other bot builders or fans, there would be a greater chance of having someone wanting to link up and fight digital robots.

Overall value - 3/10
If you are a big fan of Battle Bots and robotic combat, then it might be a choice to pick up to at least play. If you are a typical gamer, there are better titles out there. Unless you feel that you are going to get a chance to play against other people over the game link, you may consider passing on the game.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 01/01/03, Updated 01/01/03