I didn’t really know what to expect when playing Insane Robots… I initially just thought that it was like a babies first strategy/card game and it still kind of is that to some degree… But I also found it to be just a very accessible, simple and fun game for any age group.
So the story of the game is that you are a robot deemed insane and malfunctioning, because you didn’t obey your orders and directives; any and all defective robots are put into tournaments where they have to kill each other Battle Royale style, which is a pretty neat premise and something I could see happening with our own world when robots (Eventually) rebel.
So you start on a grid type map where you move a certain number of spaces until you end your turn. All across the map are special little events and secrets that are hidden around – You hit those spaces and you get things like extra money or a special area where you can spend that money on upgrades, and even spaces that will screw you over. It all feels like a really neat board game similar to Mario Party or Monopoly even.
But, then you encounter an enemy and the game really begins. I guess this game is considered a card game but you really only have one deck which is a shame, since my favourite thing about any card game is the idea of customising it your own play style. One run through of the tutorial will get you all up to speed with what you need and then you’re off. So you mulligan the cards you don’t want to start with in the beginning and begin your assault. Each turn you get more energy to play more cards. You have 4 circuits in which you can either slot defense or attack cards into to augment yourself – Once you have two of the same kind of circuit slotted it activates and is in play. Defense straight up negates amounts of damage while attack, well, attacks. You can have up to 10 with each value. Then you have cards such as swap and hack where you can either lower the enemies attack or defense or increase your own or straight up just swap out your stats for the enemies’ ones. This is where the game gets tense as sometimes you’ve set up the perfect stats for your robot and then straight out of nowhere the enemy can just hack them to be useless or steal them for themselves and begin to attack you with no defense and go in for the kill.
A small inconvenience in this game is that every time you go into a fight there’s a small loading screen, which really shouldn’t bother a lot of people but it did for me since it was somewhat annoying having to wait a while before we get into a fight. After the first tournament, you unlock a character and much more as you progress through the game. These characters have their own unique abilities that interact with the map sections -This changes things up and keeps things from going stale for a bit longer.
But that’s just about where the game ends. It’s a very fun system but it doesn’t really get any more complicated or interesting than that. The game is fairly short though, so it doesn’t overstay it’s welcome… Though I wish there was still more customisation options in the game so you can have way more fun matches in online play or local multiplayer. Speaking of, this game is fairly generous with modes which is a really nice thing for them to do. You have online, local multiplayer, quick battles and then your standard tournament mode. The extra modes do add a bit more to one’s playtime but not by much.
The game has a really nice and friendly look to it. It can look a little generic sometimes like you’ve seen it somewhere before, but it’s not like it’s unpleasant to the eyes or anything. On top of this, the designs of the robots are all varied and rather unique – They feel like they could be made in action figures or something.
I would reccomend Insane Robots to anyone who is looking to get into card games like Hearthstone. It’s quick, simple and to me is like a much larger tutorial to way more complicated games. I think this game served it’s purpose well and it’s fun for any audience.
I give Insane Robots a 7/10