Gundam Rogue Orbit Seems Like a Great Starting Point

I must confess, when I got the opportunity to go hands-on with Gundam Rogue Orbit, I was skeptical about whether I should see it. I have no history with the Gundam IP, it’s something that’s really not in my ballpark, even though I do like FromSoftware’s Armored Core. For whatever reason, I’ve never gotten around to checking out any of the Gundam titles, of which there are a lot at this point.

Fortunately, Rogue Orbit is the start of a new universe and acts as a great point to jump in for new players. After going hands-on with the game, though, I have to say, I’m glad I took a chance on this, as I was left extremely satisfied with the combat system.

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Gundam Rogue Orbit features a cinematic story.

Gundam Assemble

After watching a brief trailer of some story moments from Rogue Orbit and learning there would be heavy Gundam customization, I dove straight into the demo and found two missions I could tackle with three different Assembly options. With the way combat works in Rogue Orbit (very action-based), each setup changed the way I could approach combat, and I took the time to try out all three on offer.

Starting with the Assault Sword, I felt immediately at home as a Monster Hunter Great Sword player. Acting in a similar style, this Assembly is all about charging slow attacks to deal massive damage, and you have access to a tactical ability that acts like a hookshot, allowing you to close the gap more quickly. Despite not being my favorite loadout, I did find it was the easiest to deal with the threats of both missions (more on that later).

The next available Assembly was the Whip Sword, a loadout that I think a lot of players who may struggle with action games may warm up to. This gives you the best of both worlds, allowing you to attack close-up with a sword, or move back a little and use the whip to attack from range. You can switch between either of these modes with the press of a button, and the tactical skill for this loadout was incredibly strong.

Finally, and perhaps my favorite of the bunch, was the Sword Lance Assembly, a loadout that takes a bit more time to get used to. If you perform a sidestep and a quick follow-up attack, it will build up a gauge and, once this gauge is full, you can trigger a powerful attack that deals huge damage. Beyond your Assemblies, there is an Over-Rise gauge that fills up, and when you unleash it, it will allow you to use the AP-Unit Burst, an extremely powerful attack that deals devastating damage. We were told that there will be multiple types of Units you can equip for this system, and if the first one is anything to go by, I’m excited to learn of the others.

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There were three loadouts on offer, all of which had a distinctly different playstyle.

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The Assault Sword requires you to charge your attacks for heavy damage.

Up the Ante

As mentioned above, I had access to two missions for this demo: Rail Control Battle and Instinct. The first, Rail Control Battle, saw me follow a rather linear path toward a spaceport, taking out basic enemies while I got to grips with the combat system. This short mission culminated in a battle against Giant, an Apocalypse that packed a meaner punch than the others that came before it.

I got a good chance here to see the combat system in greater depth, as I needed to actively dodge attacks and look for the right openings. I was, however, really pleased to see that even as a newcomer, having experience with action games allowed me to jump right in and deal with the threat easily enough.

The second, and the far more enjoyable mission, was Instinct. This one featured fewer of the smaller enemies in the previous mission and instead focused on a full-on boss battle against Drake, a massive beast that had multiple weak points for me to exploit and deadly attacks to avoid. This single mission alone sold me on Gundam Rogue Orbit as an experience, as I felt right at home with each of the loadouts while I took this battle on, and it was exhilarating.

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The Sword Lance requires you to fill up a gauge to let out a special attack.

So, this was only a small slice of the full game, and we’ve been promised we’ll get full customization of our Gundam, plenty of toys to play with when it comes to the loadouts, and a cinematic story that sits right alongside it to keep you locked in. As a newcomer, this demo did enough to sell me on the idea of the game, and I’m looking forward to seeing all of the options available to me when it launches.