Midas Touch Double Header: Robot Warlords vs Go Go Golf

Having had enough of quality titles for a while, I've decided to return to my quest to find a good game by Midas on the PS2. Today's two titles are from the era when the company was known as Midas Touch, and both look as if they might be pretty enjoyable.

Game: Robot Warlords

Console: Sony Playstation 2

Developer: Nexus Interact

Release Date: 14th December 2001

Upon first inspection, Robot Warlords looks as if it might play a little like the mech sections of Titanfall, or at least function as a decent mech shooter. After all what else could a giant robot on the front of a game mean? Well it turns out that the game couldn't be much further from that sort of gameplay if it tried. While I wasn't expecting wonders from Midas Touch (as several of their other games have disappointed me), I think even they could have tried a little harder. 

The game opens with 7-10 minutes at least of badly voice acted text and character avatars, setting the scene for the game in a long winded and overly confusing manner. I was no more enlightened when the conversation ended than when it began, as the characters reference events outside of the game, say different things to the text that appears and generally don't have any exposition or defining features outside of their physical appearance.

Having decided that I was quite willing to sit through all of this storyline for some killer mech gameplay, it was pretty disappointing to find that Robot Warlords is in fact a turn based strategy combat game. Although the back of the box does mention that the game is turn based, none of the screenshots indicate this, and I'm convinced that the publishers did their best to hide it. Missions are given to the player, alongside a setup screen where weapons, stats and other options can be customised (though its hard to work out what anything means, as the game doesn't explain it). 

Once the mission has begun, players choose from the attack options menu as to whether they wish to move, attack, or use special techniques in order to defeat the required amount of enemies. Each of the 4 mechs on the player's side gets a turn, and while there seems to be some strategy to the game, it's not explained at all before you're thrust into battle, and the damage done by and to your mechs seems to be essentially random. After each allied and enemy turn, a short cutscene showing the desired action happening occurs, which becomes tedious incredibly quickly. 

There are seven missions overall in the game, taking 10-15 minutes each on average, or 14 turns, but most of them are fairly difficult to complete due to the utter lack of explanation from the game, as to how to play. Graphically the game features low resolution textures and poor all round mech models, backgrounds and effects. The music which plays behind the game and menu loops far too quickly and noticeably, and the voice acting and sound effects are also incredibly poor. 

Overall this seems to be the worst kind of budget game; one that attempts to trick players into thinking that it's something more than it really is. The mechs and fighting displayed on the back cover look far superior to the game's content, and with only 7 hard to play missions, and hours of scrolling through text, there's no real reward to picking this title up and giving it a go. Even if you're into robots, strategy games and reading lots and lots of text, I'd give this a miss.

Rating: 24/100

Grade: F

Game: Go Go Golf

Console: Sony Playstation 2

Developer: Mahou

Release Date: 29th November 2002

While I'm not the biggest fan of golf as a sport, I have played a Tiger Woods PGA Tour game or two, and so know vaguely what a golf game should be like. Just moments after starting the game however, I didn't have the best feeling about Go Go Golf, as the options screen allowed me only to choose whether vibration was on or off. No sound or visual options, let alone gameplay and control options reminded me of other painfully simple budget games. 

Beginning a new Tour, I thought I'd attempt to pick up the game's controls as I went along and see just what the game's career mode is like. The core gameplay was indeed painfully simple, with the X button used to time the backswing and hitting of the golf ball, and left/right directional buttons used to choose which of three preset destinations the ball is to be aimed at. There are literally no other buttons used to play the game, and players can usually do without the directional buttons, leaving X as the only button necessary to play. 

Graphically the game is almost up to PS2 standard with its player models, but course details and textures look horribly scaled and low resolution. At many points in the game's three courses, I could clearly see the pixels of the fairway. Soundwise, the game claims to have "dramatic music", but I think it could be better described as 'uninteresting muzak'. All voice clips featured are of strangely low quality also. 

Overall this isn't that bad for an extremely simple golf game, the control feels almost arcade like and the simplicity of gameplay may appeal to some gamers, however the characters have no real personality or defining features, the graphics are extremely poor when compared to other golf games of the time (and earlier ones!), and to have just 3 courses seems like a lack of effort on the developers part. It's almost passable as an arcade style sports game, but it's not short of problems.

Rating: 45/100

Grade: D