Review georgeypoorgey 3/5 · Aug 4, 2021
My Review of Nintendo Labo Toy-Con 01: Variety Kit
My Review of Nintendo Labo Toy-Con 03: Vehicle Kit
Robot Kit is a bad game, but an excellent pitch for a game. Like it doesn't accomplish the critical things a game should accomplish- there is no story, the gameplay amounts to "break stuff", it has roughly four requisite hours of build …
My Review of Nintendo Labo Toy-Con 01: Variety Kit
My Review of Nintendo Labo Toy-Con 03: Vehicle Kit
Robot Kit is a bad game, but an excellent pitch for a game. Like it doesn't accomplish the critical things a game should accomplish- there is no story, the gameplay amounts to "break stuff", it has roughly four requisite hours of build time before you get to the actual game. I think that sucks. And if you were to combine my family's playtime, I still doubt that we've actually played with the robot backpack that we built more than four hours. Meaning we spent more time building the backpack than we have spent playing with the backpack. 
So you may think I hate the backpack. No! I LOVE THE BACKPACK! I think everyone should experience the backpack. If I was a high school engineering teacher, I would beg my school treasurer into letting me buy a bunch of these for my class so the kids could see the power of creative design. It is a thing of beauty.
I grew up in the 90s which means I grew up watching Toonami. Mech anime was never my favorite, but I certainly wasn't going to say no to big ole robots throwing big ole punches. Like I remember watching Gundam Wing and completely missing the anti-war sentiment and mostly thinking "A mech in space with big angel wings is sick. I'm going to tell my youth pastor about this!"
Mechs still seem cool to me today, and I wear a dress shirt and slacks basically everyday. One of the only things I didn't think was cool about mechs was that you almost always pilot them like, well, a pilot. There is some cockpit that you sit in and pull levers and push buttons and stuff. I didn't want that. I wanted to stiff arm and see my robot avatar do the same. I wanted my miniscule strength approximated on a massive level by a billionaire's machine! But mech show after mech show had cockpit after cockpit. Gundam Wing, Zoids, Neon Genesis Evangelion- heck even Gurren Lagann in all its silliness kept the corndog cockpit!
But then there was beautiful G Gundam. A show that my grandma once saw me watch, and she said "I don't understand why you would spend your time this way"* They had what I envisioned. A person in a seemingly boundless space, moving their body while their mech mimicked they're behavior. It was what I always dreamed.**
I wrote all this text about mech piloting to explain how good it feels to actually use the robot backpack. You crouch, and it crouches. You step, and it steps. You throw a little baby punch, and it haymakers a building into oblivion. It is lovelier than a rose. But there is so little gameplay to explore. My game design experience is pretty minimal (Game Builder Garage review incoming!), and I bet it wouldn't have been cost effective, but I wish they would have expanded the world to crush stuff as the robot. It is fun to live out my childhood dream of piloting a mech and upending a whole downtown district, but I wish there was a bit more content there. Because as is, it barely feels like a minigame. But the kernel that is there is so crunchy and good, you walk away wishing for more.
*RIP to a real one. Grandma Schluchter stocked her fridge full of Yoohoo even into my 20s because I said I liked it as a child. What a cool person.
**By the way, G Gundam is weirdly prejudicial in hindsight. Every country is represented by a mobile suit, many of which are based on stereotypes. It still holds a warm place in my heart though, and I will always love the windmill Gundam for the Netherlands.
