Custom Robo Deserves Another Chance

[@MegaManJake]

This game is such an underrated gem, and one of my absolute favorite GC game. I want this series to come back somehow.

[@corbinwarren8455]

i remember being in HS and renting this from Hollywood video on a whim...other than KOTOR this has to be one of the best impulse gaming decisions I've ever made. The story was so damn engaging. Very few games make me wish I could go in blind again, and this is definitely one of them.

[@slumcore3921]

The NDS custom robo is probably the game i sunk the most time into. I can even clearly remember the squeaky cleaning sound from de griming your robots (had to use that touchscreen somewhere 😂)

[@ATalkingSock]

My hero ❤️ I 10000% agree Custom-Robo should have been a mainstay Nintendo IP / should be more widely recognized by the wider Nintendo community. It's so versatile and serves its niche almost perfectly.

[@BatllecoreRobots]

Hey! I just stumbled upon your video and I think you may like our upcoming game Battelcore Robots. We are told to be the spiritual successor for Custom Robo and that's is such an honour. It will e available on Steam Next Fest October 9th-16th

[@anonymousmonkey9491]

suddenly feel like firing that NDS up again. Never had a gamecube, but the NDS CR arena was one of my childhood favorites

[@dranoelarios4788]

Custom Robo Arena primed me to become a mecha and Gundam fan. So glad I stumbled on that game

[@MitzyChrisp]

I was shook when you mentioned the similarities between Custom Robo and Colosseum… couldn’t agree more!

[@xxProjectJxx]

3:22 - I can't speak for the Gameboy Advance one, but the rest of the series actually does have an RPG story component, although the stories were generally more shallow. Think something similar to Pokemon where it's more like trying to be the best Custom Robo-er for bragging rights, while some evil group kind of operates in the background. I'd be down for a new Custom Robo. The gamecube one was easily one of my favorites. But, I don't really see it happening personally unless they port the Gamecube release.

[@onieni9779]

I loved this game so much growing up. Really a beloved hidden gem of a game. The DS version, though, was... passable.

[@FoolProof777]

Halfway through the video, I was really thinking that there seem to be a lot of weird similarities to Pokémon Coliseum, another RPG on the GameCube

[@Brawler_1337]

I absolutely think Custom Robo deserves another shot. The gameplay lends itself extremely well to online multiplayer, especially lobbies where you can lab builds with other players. Also, with the recent success of Armored Core VI, mecha games could come back into vogue.

[@moomoocow350]

Oh man, I LOVE this game!! Actually, I wouldn't describe it as an RPG because 1. people who reviewed this game back in the day said "it's a crappy RPG, because the story is completely linear and you don't make any choices," and 2. because it's really more of a ADV/Visual Novel, honestly. It IS linear. If you imagine it as a VN, but one with battles and walking in between the scenes, it'll make a lot more sense, and you'll see where its inspiration comes from. Also, the story of this game stands out a whole ton because it was directed and written by Keiji Okayasu who previously was assistant director on Shenmue, which was something like a precursor to the Yakuza games. This game's story was totally one-of-a-kind, and even if "Custom Robo" is brought back, I'd bet it would be a lot more like the kids' anime trope-filled DS game.

[@fulcrumflare]

Genuinely surprised you didn’t talk about the soundtrack at all. I think the music in this game was amazing and really added to the overall atmosphere and experience. Certain pieces really sold particular situations and events, establishing a proper mood along with them.

[@thecamobot]

@@fulcrumflare It's a great soundtrack for sure with some fantastic battle songs!

[@jackbravado1212]

Been watching a lot of your stuff, fun channel, and I'm extremely happy you covered Custom Robo. The story was so fun, and the gameplay was unique

[@thecamobot]

@@jackbravado1212 Thanks for watching and commenting! 🙂

[@ozmarichardson6524]

I'm so excited someone is talking about these game. omg. the story was so wild

[@nukamangaming8172]

Custom Robo Arena is one of my all time favorite games!! I still have it for my ds and I play it every once and awhile. Its bonkers that this series has been quiet for so long!!!

[@Curry8ive]

This was my favorite game as a kid, so underrated!

[@luismendez2768]

Custom Robo Arena is one of my all time favorite games! So many hours spent trying (and failing) to unlock the one last robo chassis I was missing. Maybe I should try again...

[@mostowy]

One of my favorite games ever 💜

[@jamesiewalters2360]

man, i loved the ds one, so much fun!

[@manoorestagon]

I only played the Nintendo DS game of the Custom Robo Series and I loved it. To me it was like Beyblade or BDaman (if anyone remembers that) but with little mechs and better. Even though I usually prefer traditional JRPGs, in which you level up, but with Custom Robo it really forced you to get gud and build your robo strategically. It's such a shame, it never really took off and became more of an underground title.

[@someguy6152]

I played the N64 one, which had a story mode, I remember picking the weapon that does the most damage and the triple blink thrusters and just blasting enemies at point blank after faking the out with the first two blinks. I didn't realize there was a sequel, on the Gamecube I played the Zoids game, which was also really underrated

[@Densoro]

This was one of the games that primed me to be obsessed with customization, and I love how the differences are _kinesthetic_ rather than statistical. It probably shaped me for life.

[@TiroDvD]

in 2010 when I went big on creating my video game library and gathering all "old" Nintendo stuff I got this an Gotcha Force. I enjoyed Custom Robo but it was Gotcha Force that hooked me more.

[@thecamobot]

@@TiroDvD Gotcha Force is cool but so insanely expensive now 😢

[@DeeDee_Nola]

Literally one of the best games of my entire life. I'm 31 and this game is still highly relevant to me since I was 11 Criminally underrated even with the strong respect CR enthusiasts have for it. It should have had sequels, should have come to Playstation and XBOX and should have evolved Glad you can get this with an emulator

[@someguy_matt]

The camo boy now in wide screen

[@timothyschwarz7950]

My wake up alarm every morning is sleepy boy at 7:54 and hearing this unexpectedly shot me awake 😭

[@eddy-fw7hv]

I miss this series too

[@BankotsuSeven]

I've played the hell out of the GC version and then when the 3DS version came out, I did the same thing! I've always loved mechs (Titanfall 2, Dynasty Warriors Gundam, LBX) but Custom Robo held a special place in my heart! It needs to come back! I think it'll do better then the latest Gundam games right now. Might even rival Gundam Breaker 4 when that releases later.

[@MithalanMithrarin]

I am actually in the process of writing a fanfic for Custom Robo due to how starved I am for content from this Nintendo series. It takes place 400 years after the Gamecube game (for obvious reasons to those who beat it), and has all new robos. (and even new robo categories)

[@arbiterlane1661]

You hit the nail on the head with most of your analysis. Custom Robo is definitely one of my favorite Gamecube games. The story mode is extremely atmospheric in a somewhat eerie way, almost in a "liminal" sense. Very chill elevator music-style. The main problem with Custom Robo is that the combat is not "crunchy" enough. The entire combat is the same homogenous schlop pudding where you're just running around doing random shit all the time. You do have to "get good" at all the button mashing, but I have never really felt the depth of strategy or engagement that I think the developers were hoping for. If I were to fix it, I'd add a lot more variety in terms of equipment, Gundam Breaker style: mech swords, buster cannons, etc. Unfortunately I don't think we're ever going to get another Custom Robo game. iirc Noise is defunct and Custom Robo's creator left Nintendo a while ago. The best we can hope for it a different new Nintendo Gunpla-style IP with Ray/Ray MK/Ray MK III as postgame easteregg parts.

[@corbinbond817]

I love this series, really wish Nintendo would try it again for us fans! Fun thing, there's a game called Synaptic Drive on Switch. It's not anywhere as charming and doesn't feel QUITE as good as this game. But it's super cheap on Switch physically usually and was a Japan exclusive. Plays fully in English and is so far, the closest thing we've gotten to a new game in the series. It was developed by a good chunk of the original Custom Robo team also!

[@Brawler_1337]

There’s another game in development called Battlecore Robots that has this same gameplay style. I’ve yet to try the demo, but the aesthetics certainly hit closer to Custom Robo than Synaptic Drive does.

[@MultiBoxingKid]

Yes is does, it most certainly does. I love the two games we got in the west, so much so that when I decided to get Custom Robo for the gamecube again, I didn't care that I had to pay a lot of money to play it again, I wanted it.

[@theodorejenkins6066]

Bro I just played through it on the dolphin emulator with an Xbox controller plugged into using an awful 2015 thinkpad didn't cost me a dime. You should learn how to emulate games it's way cheaper and honestly much easier to deal with. I have like 50 gamecube games and they're taking up 0 space in my house.

[@ToivoChess]

Pro Edit! Let's go! @Camobot 👾

[@lloyd011721]

so, i played the game cube one for a little, but i was having way more fun with the n64 eng fan translation

[@jonwooooo]

I think I picked this up used from gamestop back in the day but I wasn't too crazy about it. I much prefered Virtual-On on the Dreamcast so it was a slight let down. My friend that would stay over on the weekends got pretty far in the campaign however; I think he ended up beating it haha. I would love to see a new entry however, even if only a free to play phone app. Nintendo seems to struggle in making their B rated multiplayer games stick around, and I would have to say it's due to lack of content/continuous content.

[@Alucard1341_]

Im only here because I loved this game growing up lol

[@ChristianJDY]

I think is a huge disappointment that nintendo doesn’t understand how to make their other games successful. All they needed to do during the switch era was port hd version of custom robo and have a few trailers on maybe 2-3 directs. Have the trailer focus on the multiplayer and customize aspect. Maybe even add a few more things if they want to. Nintendo doesn’t even need to add online, if it’s too much of a cost risk. The game selling 2-5 million copies would have been successful for them.

[@seanhuff3868]

The game felt completely different if you played in first or third person view. Going from seeing everything top down view to being the robot really changed up how you played.

[@thecamobot]

Yeah that was a really cool feature! I thought about mentioning it too

[@neijiman]

I feel like the leftover pieces of custom Robo were used to make Splatoon

[@oldsk0ol]

Custom Robo was like, the game I wish Medabot was a bit more like in terms of customizations.

[@TheGeekyHusband]

This looks like LBX in 3DS!

[@casekocsk]

I played the NDS version. I agree they should make more.

[@cyman89]

Subscribed due to this video!

[@thecamobot]

Glad you liked it!

[@joniden2215]

The game to me is perfect! I loved the GCN one because it took a series mainly aimed at kids and made it for the teenage demographic. If only pokemon would have market for the teenage demographic.

[@thecamobot]

Pokemon Colosseum was the closest they got to a mature pokemon game

[@joniden2215]

@@thecamobot exactly! We need more!

[@overpoweredmeowmix]

Ya man custom robo rocks

[@DerrickJolicoeur]

Definitely go play Custom Robo: Arena on the 3DS. I loved it

[@MrMegaSuperDuperMe]

This game absolutely deserves a second chance. I played both the Gamecube and DS versions. Story and gameplay, I think the DS version is better. While the story of the DS version did seem a little childish compared to the Gamecube version, it felt appropriate, given that both games have the characters fight with tiny toy robots. For example: In the DS version, Robo fights were treated more like an after school activity with tournaments and stuff, but it felt like the right amount of seriousness, because at least the characters were competitive about it too. Compare that to the Gamecube version, where an entire police squad fought (and lost to) a group of criminals with what is essentially Rockem Sockem Robots. So the Gamecube version just felt like it was trying to take itself a little too seriously. Plus, I really like how the DS version gave us plenty of competent rivals to battle. Your rival in the Gamecube version was just a man named Evil. He was honestly just kinda lame to me. Gameplay, while I prefer to play on a tv screen, the DS version has something that the Gamecube version does not: A golden super mode for the robos. If you've ever watched G Gundam, some of the characters in that show can make their gundams turn golden into a hyper mode. In the DS version, they can basically do the same thing. One time, I even paused the game so I could turn on the Shining Finger theme song while I activated the golden form. Also, I like how in the DS version, you could keep challenging characters over and over again to your heart's content. The reason for this is because you would earn money for winning robo battles and then you could spend that money at a robo parts store to get whatever parts you want. In the Gamecube version, once you fought someone, that was it. You would just have to keep moving forward with the story, and there were no optional battles either. And if you wanted to use a specific robo part, you would have to wait until you fought the right person to unlock it. But the Gamecube version does have at least one positive over the DS version: Harry Harry is by far the best character out of both games put together. He's the source for most of the comic relief and he follows you around for the majority of the game, acting like a big bro to the hero.

[@Nytrusdeathcyde]

yes it does

[@blvck1635]

Please LORD Custom Robo on the Switch 2 amen

[@goombatroop]

if I made a custom robo it would probably be camel variety

[@beans9872]

You know, making a remake would ruin the game. Custom Robo V2 is peak, and adding shitty overly rendered graphics and modern looks to it would actually just ruin the entire game. You can always go back to the older games, remaking everything kills the game.