Robot Arena
The year is 2001. There’s a burgeoning sport on the cusp of exploding in popularity: robot combat. Radio controlled menaces sporting flippers, hammers, chainsaws and more itching to destroy their opponents and leave them a smouldering wreck in the middle of an arena whose walls are made from bulletproof glass. The rise of robot combat is largely due in part to a little show named BattleBots airing on, of all things, Comedy Central in the United States. Robot Wars, the European counterpart to BattleBots, had been airing on the BBC for several years by now but it was BattleBots that arguably put the sport on the map and someone was bound to chase that rush by releasing a video game. Enter Gabriel Interactive, a brand new developer with a team of about seven people and high aspirations. Ostensibly comprised of bot fans themselves Gabriel Interactive’s first foray into game development was 2001’s Robot Arena. Fans could now live out their metal crunching fantasies on their computers by way of one of the very first robot combat games ever created. That’s what makes Robot Arena so special; there were no other games to really build upon and take inspiration from. These neophyte game developers were tasked not just with making a robot combat game but also coming up with the design conventions behind making the game work. A tall order and the end result is something that can be looked back upon fondly despite its flaws.
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