Robotron 2084
87K plays 1985 #Shooter
Robotron: 2084 (also referred to simply as Robotron) is a twin-stick shooter video game developed by Eugene Jarvis and Larry DeMar of Vid Kidz and released by Williams Electronics for arcades in 1982. The game is set in the year 2084 in a dystopian future where robots have turned against humans in a cybernetic revolt. The player's goals are to defeat endless waves of robots, rescue surviving humans, and earn as many points as possible.
Jarvis and DeMar drew inspiration from Nineteen Eighty-Four, Berzerk and Space Invaders when designing Robotron: 2084. The pair designed the game to instill panic in players by presenting them with conflicting goals and having many on-screen projectiles coming from multiple directions. A two-joystick control scheme was implemented to provide the player with more precise controls, and enemies with different behaviors were added to make the game challenging. Following its release in arcades, Atari ported the game to several home platforms in the 1980s. It was later included in many retro gaming collections.
From Wikipedia's article Robotron: 2084, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0
Controls
This is a PC game: it uses the keyboard the way it did under MS-DOS, and the mouse where the game supports it. Click the game screen first so it gets your key presses.
Many DOS games start with a menu or ask a question first — read the screen and answer with the keyboard. Arrow keys, Enter, Space, Ctrl and Alt are the usual game keys.
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Controls
This is a PC game: it uses the keyboard the way it did under MS-DOS, and the mouse where the game supports it. Click the game screen first so it gets your key presses.
Many DOS games start with a menu or ask a question first — read the screen and answer with the keyboard. Arrow keys, Enter, Space, Ctrl and Alt are the usual game keys.
2.5 Could be better
Players 61 · 182 votes
No critic scores found for this game: this is the players' rating.
Review scorecard
- Graphics 2.5 out of 5 Overall fallback
- Sound 2.5 out of 5 Overall fallback
- Control 2.5 out of 5 Overall fallback
- Fun Factor 2.5 out of 5 Overall fallback
Overall fallback: Players 61 · 182 votes. The same 61/100 overall rating fills missing categories using the face scale; these are not separate category scores. Player rating; no critic scores available.
What the reviews talk about
Key wordsdifficultcreativegroundbreakingaddictivestrategicstunning
What the critics said
Kunkel lauded the game for its "easy to play, difficult to master" gameplay in a review for Electronic Games.
— Electronic Games
He called out the visual effect when completing a wave as "worth the price of admission."
— Play Meter, 1982
Next Generation magazine staff praised the "arcade-perfect" conversion of the PC and Macintosh releases and noted the historical importance, calling it one of the "greatest arcade classics".
— Next Generation, 1996
Chris Wilkins of Eurogamer called Robotron the "epitome of organised chaos" and the "ultimate in twitch gaming".
— Eurogamer (Chris Wilkins)
He summarized the game as "one of the best examples of game play design and execution."
— Gamasutra, 2005
From the Reception section of Wikipedia's Robotron: 2084 article, under CC BY-SA 4.0. The words are the critics'; their full reviews are on the publishers' pages.
Scores
- ACE Lynx: 837/1000 (other versions)
- Tilt 1982 Arcade: 2/6 (other versions)
- Play Meter 1982 4/4
- AllGame Arcade: 5/5 ; 7800: 2.5/5
- Eurogamer 2007 Arcade: 10/10 (other versions)
From the review table of Wikipedia's article. The face takes, first that applies: the Metascore for this platform, GameRankings' average, our average of the critics (one number per publication, a panel averaged), one review alone, the players' rating. Critics and players are never mixed.
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