When RoboCop’s beloved police precinct is ransacked by a mysterious mercenary company, he has no choice but to hit up their hideout and put down the population of a small country. RoboCop: Rogue City is back, and it’s still good fun — for the most part.
Unfinished Business is basically a mini-sequel. it’s actually entirely separate from the 2023 title — you buy it standalone, and none of your progress from Rogue City carries over. Its story is also standalone; it takes place after the events of Rogue City, but it has little to do with them.
The whole thing is set within the concrete walls of OmniTower, a dystopian living complex that houses thousands of civilians. If you’ve seen 2012’s Dredd movie, you know exactly what you’re getting into, as RoboCop fights his way through floor after floor of gun-toting goons, automatic defence systems, and boobytraps.
However, without the exploration of Rogue City’s Detroit to fall back on, Unfinished Business quickly devolves into a monotonous corridor shooter. We like the game’s punchy gunplay, and some of the new melee finishers introduced here are a good laugh, but the combat alone isn’t enough to carry this 10-hour killing spree.
Admittedly, we’re a bit torn on this one. On paper, a smaller, action-focused RoboCop campaign sounds right up our alley, but in practice, it just goes to highlight how important the downtime between bouts of violence was in Rogue City.
Unfinished Business isn’t completely without moments where Robo has to do some detective work, or chat with comically uncouth residents, but the available side quests are incredibly basic, and the rewards for completing them are barely worth the time it takes to slowly trek between objective markers.
It also doesn’t help that Unfinished Business is a step backwards in terms of overall quality. The NPC voice acting — already questionable in Rogue City — is somehow even less engaging, the facial animations are beyond rough, and text typos are shockingly frequent.
Now, no one’s expecting AAA quality presentation from a standalone RoboCop release after Rogue City, but smaller, expansion-esque projects like this tend to be tighter than the main experience that spawned them. And that’s just not the case with Unfinished Business, which, ironically, does feel quite unfinished.
But look, let’s not get bogged down in the details. For all the game’s flaws, we should reiterate that we still enjoyed blasting our way through OmniTower. Hearing desperate mercs panic over the “metal freak” as RoboCop comes barrelling into their den feels fantastic, and the squishy sound effects that accompany critical headshots are still superb.
The act of actually being RoboCop remains the main draw here, and it’s just enough to hold Unfinished Business together. Peter Weller’s dry one-liner delivery is on point throughout, and you can tell that the developers tried to pack as many cheesy quips into the script as they possibly could. Much like Rogue City, this follow-up understands what makes the iconic property tick.
With that in mind, we were a little concerned about Unfinished Business’ implementation of flashback sequences, which see you play as Alex Murphy, back when he was just a normal, hardworking cop. Fortunately, they’re something of a highlight, despite being used sparingly across the campaign.
The flashbacks help break up some of the title’s more tedious sections, as they tend to be slower-paced, character-driven escapades. Their purpose is to provide backstory for both Robo and the game’s antagonist, and it works fairly well, with some decently directed cutscenes giving weight to an otherwise predictable narrative.
Running and gunning as a human Murphy makes for a refreshing change, too. While he’s obviously nowhere near as tanky as his future self, the simple fact that he’s able to crouch — and move at speed — means that firefights become quite cover-centric. In truth it’s all pretty basic, but it’s just nice to have some variety in what can be a very one-note release.
Conclusion
You can’t really go wrong with Unfinished Business if you enjoyed its underrated predecessor, but expectations need to be kept in check. This standalone follow-up is disappointingly rough around the edges, and although its comically violent combat remains satisfying, it’s not varied enough to elevate the entire action-heavy campaign.
Still, we’re never going to say no to more Rogue City. Teyon still manages to capture the campy 80s spirit of RoboCop here, and that’ll drive most players to the top of OmniTower.
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