Bot Patrol

Review

"There is something odd here; where are my bots' mates?" you thought to yourself. It’s pretty impressive for a bot to have a thought; nonetheless, you have one, and you notice something is wrong with your workplace, the asteroid station you are assigned to. Yesterday, you were bot-botting each time you saw another bot passing by, a bit like the gondolier in Venice who announces they are coming through with a big HOY HOY.  But today, all the bots have vanished. Maybe it’s the right time to escape the station, but for that, you must reach the launching platform on the other side of the asteroid and take off with the giant orange rocket! Then, no more bot-botting! Little bot, it is your last bot patrol.

Bot Patrol is a casual Sobokan puzzle game developed and self-published by a.mighty.dish on the Steam platform on the 28^th of March 2024.

The game consists of 36 levels divided into three stages and environmental themes: the station, the rock and the jungle. The goal is to place all the cargo containers into their assigned spots on the floor to beat the level. And, of course, you can only move forward up, down, left and right to push the containers to their spots. If you place a container into corners or a space formed as a U, you'll be stuffed. Thankfully, the developer has included a rewind moves option to track all the moves back to your first one, which is good. However, on some significantly larger levels, it might take a while to do so. But again, you might find where you went wrong.

I like the difficulty progression in Bot Patrol with the introduction of electric fields, which you need to turn off or on depending on how the level is set. For example, you might need to place a container on the square with the circle icon to turn off the field so you can access that specific area or place your bot on the circle to activate the field to destroy the guard bot when it passes through. The cracks in the floor create a hole after moving over them, restricting passage from there onwards. With or without activation switches, the conveyor belt will make you think harder. The mechanical arms can take your bot from one area to another, adding difficulty to the level. But my favourite levels were with the Destroy Bots, when you have to clean the area or create a path with them to move your containers to their places. I was there for quite a while, trying to make that path. The laser obstacles were interesting, but unfortunately, there were only a couple of levels with the laser obstacles. 

I was slightly disappointed after the level where you had to clean the bots in the room before moving the containers to their respective places. From the start to that particular level, the difficulty progression was excellent, but from then on, it stagnated for several levels and possibly regressed. With the utmost respect for the developer, if you want to create a bit of a reprieve for a few levels, as I felt it, it's okay, but at least add more levels; 50 or so would have been better. Having said that, all the levels are well-designed and more challenging to solve from the jungle stage. It will take you around four to five hours to complete.

The graphics are good, and I enjoyed the techno-style music. Unfortunately, it is only one track on a loop. The controls are excellent and fast, especially when using a gamepad. The game runs well, and I didn’t experience any crashes whatsoever. The only bug I can see so far is that I didn't receive the freedom achievement, which is the last one.

Review written by THE CPT FROGGY for Zeepond.com

Bot Patrol Steam Store Page