Robocop: Rogue City - Unfinished Business Preview: I'd buy that for a dollar!

I have a couple of confessions to make before beginning this preview in full: I have not seen the Robocop movies, nor have I played Teyon's action shooter Robocop: Rogue City. However, as I was present at BigBen Week last week, I was somehow positioned as the best person to check out the upcoming, standalone expansion Unfinished Business.

Unfinished Business comes from developer Teyon dreaming up a DLC and then realising their dreams better suited an expansion. Set after the events of the base game, Unfinished Business sees Alex Murphy head to the Omni Tower - a structure set up by the OCP to control all of the robotic enforcement units in Detroit - after it is invaded by a hostile, mercenary force.

With this enemy force being able to potentially take control of all the robots in the surrounding area, the stakes are sufficiently high in Unfinished Business. The expansion largely takes the form of an action movie, with a tighter, leaner structure than the base game. There are just missions to complete here, and while side objectives can give you some extra things to do, there aren't any real open areas to explore. It's a cycle of stomping from one environment to another, blasting anyone and everyone who stands in your way.

The time I got to spend with Robocop: Rogue City - Unfinished Business was therefore a whirlwind of brilliantly gory action. Gunplay is super fun and refreshing as you essentially play as a walking turret, not quite indestructible but strong enough to feel like an 80s action hero. New enemies like flying drones and troopers wielding shields keep you from feeling like you can just take out everyone with a simple headshot, and the new takedowns are a comedically violent diversion whenever you find an enemy waiting by a yellow object.

Besides takedowns, Robocop also has a handful of new tools up his armoured sleeve. His basic gun - the Auto-9 - can be given a series of upgrades to make it feel even more like the best weapon in the game. You also get access to some new weapons like the Cryo Gun, which can interact with the environment as well as the enemies.

While these additions are fairly innovative, the biggest things players new and old will notice come in the expansion's story. As part of the story, which sees figures from Robocop's past like villain Cassius Graves remerge, we get to play as different characters. In the preview, I experienced one of the best power fantasies in recent years when playing as an ED-209 unit. Well, the power fantasy lasted until I decided to try and walk down some stairs. Also, as part of the expansion, you'll be able to play as Alex Murphy before he became Robocop. It does seem like the narrative has a stronger focus this time around. There's still plenty of action, but as it'll take players around 8 hours to complete Unfinished Business, the more linear structure allows for a concise story, again more akin to a playable action film.

Whether this adds enough for Robocop: Rogue City players to get excited currently appears to be up in the air. As far as I could tell from speaking with fellow journalists at the event, it seems like on the whole Unfinished Business adds more Robocop but doesn't make any substantial changes. Largely, it seems that the formula of Robocop: Rogue City was a winning one, but if you're going into this expansion expecting there to be heaps of additional features, the main talking points appear to be a few new enemies, weapons, and the new narrative campaign.

If, like me, you're completely new to Rogue City, then Unfinished Business is so far looking like a great introduction, even if it's set after the events of the main game. Characters like Robocop can be thrown into any scenario and you'll be able to pick up what's going on pretty quickly. The linear structure to Unfinished Business allows you to just throw yourself into the action. The expansion isn't too easy, I noticed. While I didn't die on the Normal difficulty, things did get dicey quickly, so shooter players who want a challenge will definitely find one with the higher difficulty options. Otherwise, it's difficult to find additional things to say for this expansion. It's more Robocop, without much additional polish, but a strong enough core to make it a consistent blast.