If you missed the game RoboCop Rogue City released in 2023, now's the time to get started. Extremely faithful to the universe of the eponymous film, the title awakened the nostalgic instinct of many players who were fans of the franchise. Two years later, the shooter is getting a paid expansion called Unfinished Business. Indeed, the cases are still not over and there is still crime to fight in the city of Detroit. But is this DLC worth it? We discovered it controller in hand in a preview organized by Nacon.
Welcome to the OmniTower
Good news: you don't need to have finished the main game to embark on this new mission. It's a full-fledged expansion, designed as a vertical interlude in a city on the verge of collapse. In Unfinished Business, the OCP, always concerned about its communication, launches the OmniTower. It is a gigantic residential complex, supposed to offer security and comfort to the citizens of Old Detroit. A utopian tower that obviously takes a very wrong turn.
Very quickly, the tower becomes the scene of a new nightmare as a group of mercenaries takes control, locks all accesses and transforms the OmniTower into a veritable fortress. RoboCop's goal is to clean the tower, floor by floor, and restore order, even if it means resorting to monumental violence.
In Unfinished Business, forget wandering the streets of Detroit or completing side quests. Everything happens inside the tower. It's a tense, closed-door setting, where each floor is a new puzzle to solve. This setting profoundly transforms the gameplay: we're not trying to escape, we're rather trying to get to the heart of the beast, like a reverse Ghostrunner.
Level design plays a key role here. Each floor becomes a violent puzzle where you have to juggle between power management, strategic positioning, and endurance in combat. Waves of enemies follow one another, often becoming increasingly dangerous, and the difficulty lies less in the number than in the layout of the locations. Everything is designed to trap you and make you think about the actions you're going to perform first.
RoboCop is full of new features
The studio hasn't forgotten that it's developing an action game, and despite this tactical aspect, you'll have plenty of time to use your elbows and empty your magazines on the enemies. In terms of arsenal, Teyon hasn't done things by halves. The DLC introduces several new weapons, such as the ice cannon, which are heavier and more experimental, but also new, much tougher enemies, such as flying drones. Some have reinforced armor, others use drones or energy shields. To counter them, you'll have to learn to exploit the environment. And that's where one of the most exciting new features comes in.
The addition of finishing moves, as the studio calls them, allows you to eliminate an enemy in a single hit, provided you surprise them near an interactive element. You can do a lot of things, like electrocute an opponent by smashing their head against an electrical panel, send them flying into a giant fan, or even take them down with a ricocheting pistol bullet. These executions are incredibly satisfying to pull off.
Finishing moves add an almost puzzle-like aspect to the gameplay. It's no longer just about shooting into the crowd, but about luring enemies into the right places, setting traps, and creating opportunities for effective kills. This diversifies the approach, especially for players who aren't usually fans of combat (we plead guilty).
ED-209, the star of an interlude
Further in the story, the studio shows us that it is possible at one point to play as the killer robot ED 209. The famous bipedal machine that has become an icon of the franchise is playable for a brief but intense segment. The player can then harness the power of this near-invincible steel monster, armed with massive cannons and immense firepower.
You then stop worrying about strategy and blow everything up without thinking. You crush enemies by the dozens, and you savor this immense power, in total contrast to the rigor of the rest of the mission. It's a nod that will certainly speak to longtime fans, although this short passage doesn't sum up the overall experience you'll have in Unfinished Business.
The DLC doesn't seek to reinvent Rogue City, but to concentrate the experience while experimenting with many new things. By confining its action to a single location, it gains coherence and rhythm.
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