Don't Die, Mr. Robot DX is super dope, currently $1.34 on Switch

I was just scrolling through this week's sale items on Switch, and I saw that the super-awesome arcade title Don't Die, Mr. Robot is on sale through the 19th for $1.34.

This is an amazing deal, and it prompted me to dig into my document archive to dig out and republish a column that I wrote for a now-defunct site about the glories of this fantastic game. Obviously, the talk about chasing Vita trophies in this column will not be relevant to the Switch version, but the general awesomeness of this game should carry over to Nintendo's system intact.

Without further delay, here is the column:

A couple of weeks ago, I determined that I was going to finally finish playing Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel before leaving on vacation.  I had been playing through it on my Vita for well over a year, and I felt the desire for something fresh to play on my trip.  I finally finished LOH:TFTS the night before I was to leave, with an accumulated hour count of 97 hours.

I had picked up two new games for my vacation:  Ever Oasis for my 3DS, and Tearaway for my Vita.  After giving the each a fair chunk of time, I realized that neither game was really clicking for me, and I was left trapped on a family vacation without a game to distract me.  This situation obviously could not stand.

After a few panicky hours where I actually considered starting LOH:TFTS 2, I decided to scroll through my Vita download list for stuff that I registered through PS Plus and hadn’t yet given a fair shake.  There were easily 20 games that I had either never downloaded, or had downloaded and never tried.

After trying a few indie titles (including a 5 or 6-hour dalliance with Steamworld: Dig), I decided to check out the most recent offerings.  I never got around to downloading Element4l, because I discovered Don’t Die, Mr. Robot.   For the next 6 days, Don’t Die, Mr. Robot blistered my fingers, enraged my emotions, and occupied my every thought.  Don’t Die, Mr. Robot ate my face, devoured my soul, and soured my mood.  Don’t Die Mr. Robot is glorious.

On the surface, Don’t Die, Mr. Robot is a very simple game.  The player is Mr. Robot, who looks more than anything like an expressive piece of bread.  The player starts in the middle of a blank, static screen.  Various bad guys emerge – slowly at first, and then at a faster rate – to kill Mr. Robot.  Mr. Robot must avoid the bad guys.  Pieces of fruit start appearing, scattered around the screen.  If Mr. Robot comes into contact with a piece of fruit, the fruit explodes, taking out any bad guys caught within the radius of the explosion.  If any other pieces of fruit are in the explosion range, they also explode, allowing the player to string combos.  Killing bad guys earns you coins that you can use to buy minor powerups, new avatars, and hats.

That’s it.  That’s the basic layout of Don’t Die, Mr. Robot.  Bread, bad guys, fruit.  And from that simple, 80’s-arcade-like set up, absolute brilliance arises.   Under the surface lies the most addictive, insidious game I have played since the time I went on a three day Galaga binge in 1995.  Graphics don’t matter.  Sound doesn’t matter.  This game could have been developed on the Atari 5200 and it would have been just as great as it is today.

There are several modes in Mr. Robot.  There is an “Arcade Mode”, which allows the player to simply play for as long as they can, seeking a high score.  There is a “Time Trial Mode”, which allows the player to see how high they can rack up a score in a limited amount of time.  There is a “Chill Mode”, which allows the player to zip around the screen at regular speed while all the bad guys move at a glacial pace (this presents its own set of challenges).  But the meat of the game comes in the form of the deep and varied “Remix Mode”.

Remix Mode consists of a series of 50 challenges.  For each challenge, the player can try as many times as their blood pressure will allow, attempting to earn a series of trophies (not to be confused with PlayStation Trophies, which I will get to in a bit).  By hitting various benchmarks for each challenge, the player earns Bronze, Silver, Gold or Platinum trophies.  Earn the Platinum trophy and the challenge ends, indicating that the player has officially “beat” it.

Remix challenges are wildly varied.  Some change the size or damage range of the fruit.  Some focus on specific types of bad guys.  Some require a specific score, while others ask the player to simply survive for a given amount of time.  Depending on how successfully the player executes on the challenge, an attempt can be over in as quick as 2-3 seconds.  A quick press of the restart button, and another in an endless chain of attempts begins.  It is quite easy to burn through several hours simply trying the same challenge over and over again.

Saying that some of the challenges are blisteringly difficult is similar to saying that Star Wars is mildly popular.  Blisteringly difficult is a wild understatement.  Upon first glance, many of the challenges seem to be flat out impossible.  Only through repeated attempts will a path to success slowly become apparent, and when the realization finally locks in as to how to beat a particular challenge, the feeling of triumph is indescribable.

My family was forced to spend our downtime on vacation with me moaning and seizing endlessly on the sofa, suffering through death after miserable-Mr. Robot-death in a manner that was almost physically painful.  My writhing was only occasionally punctuated by a wild outburst of celebration.  “I AM A GOLDEN GOD!  I AM BILLY-GOD-DAMN-MITCHELL!!!” I would scream, before quickly crawling back down into my Mr. Robot hole to tackle the next challenge and wallow in further delightful misery.

Eventually I gained enough competence that I was willing to attempt to tackle some of the PlayStation trophies available for the title.  I have never been a trophy hunter, but for whatever reason, I felt some overwhelming compulsion to attempt the seemingly super-human feats required for trophy acquisition. 

As usual, some trophies are silly and simple.  Buy a hat.  I can buy a hat.  No problem.  Handled.

But some of the trophies are sick and brutal, and reveal the true masochistic nature of the diabolical development team behind Mr. Robot. 

Survive for 5 minutes in Chill Mode.  Done. 

Complete the Time Trial without dying.  Done. 

Chain together a 30-fruit combo.  Done. 

Complete every Platinum challenge.  EVERY.  PLATINUM.  CHALLENGE.  Because Mr. Robot wants me to pry my own eyes out of my skull with the jagged edges of my shattered Vita.  Super not done.

Obviously, I have not Platinumed this game.  For the sake of my own sanity and for the well-being of my family, I have set Mr. Robot aside upon our return from vacation, opting instead for the soothing comforts of Chrono Trigger.  But I know in my heart that someday very soon, in the dead of night, I will hear the siren call of Mr. Robot.  I will rise from my bed, seeking out the blinking green light of my Vita, and I will once again descend into the eldritch depths of Mr. Robot madness.

And once again, it will be glorious.