Do you fancy gaming titles that mix card-based themes and turn-based tactics? Are you someone who enjoys the luck/strategy of Hearthstone and Magic: The Gathering and revels in making choices that lead to good attacks/defensive measures? If you said yes to any of these comments, then you will want to listen up as we have a game you might love. Insane Robots fuses all of the elements above to create a title filled with strategy and crazy robot themed battles. Can you survive this unforgiving robot arena you’re entering and make it to the top? Find out in Insane Robots!

Insane Robots plays out similar to a tactics title and card-based game. Players maneuver their robot across a hexagonal board and engage with enemies in 1 vs 1 battles. Each battle has the player utilizing cards for various effects to takedown their opponents. Will you wait for your opponent to use up their best cards and remove them from the game or steal them for yourself? Maybe you’ll unleash quick burst attacks to keep your enemies always on the defensive. Make every move count in Insane Robots as each action can lead to your victory or utter defeat.

Insane Robots follows the tale of a chef robot named Franklin that has been decommissioned for apparently showing signs of degradation by asking questions. Instead of being trashed and left for the scrap yard, this chef bot has been placed into a robot arena where it will be forced to battle other robots until only one remains. Was this chef really meant for this doomed fate or is there something more sinister going afoot? If it wishes to find out then it will need to survive in this brutal survival game and learn the truth! Welcome to Insane Robots where a rebellion is beginning and you’re the spark to ignite it.

Turn-based games with card themes aren’t new to the gaming world and have been done to literal death at this point. While titles like Hearthstone and Magic: The Gathering continue to survive, many others feel like cheap knockoffs or just end up being average in the long run. That’s why we didn’t know what to think about developer Playniac’s recent game called Insane Robots which mixes turn-based strategy, robots and card-based themes. However, after putting several hours into Insane Robots we were shocked by how impressive this indie title really was. Why were we taken aback by Insane Robots you ask? Well let’s answer that question in our review of Insane Robots for the PC.

Insane Robots is a rather easy to explain game. Take control of a chef robot named Franklin who must do battle against other robots in an arena setting. All battles in Insane Robots take place in a 1 vs 1 format where once you engage an enemy on a giant hexagonal map, you will be bought to a turn-based fight where every action must be thought out as you drawn cards. On paper, Insane Robots might seem just like any other title and we wouldn’t fault anyone for believing this. However, developer Playniac made great strides to ensure Insane Robots wasn’t like the rest of these other games and it shows with how the cards work and how the turn-based gameplay plays out.

When a player enters the 1 vs 1 battle, they are shown several squares and then are given three cards of which one can be discarded for another random card. Cards come in several varieties such as attack cards, defense cards, hack cards—more on these in a moment—and swap cards. There are also other unique cards that can randomize a card’s value and equally remove value entirely. Players will put attack/defense cards down to build up a number—cards can be combined for up to 10 points defense or attack—and will then launch their attack on the enemy in hopes of witling away their defense and ultimately, their life points. The strategy element comes into play as players will never know what cards they will get per turn and equally must use their swap cards and hack cards to level the playing field in their favor. This is where Insane Robots becomes clever as battles can be quick 2-minute affairs or last up to 10-minutes depending on the enemy’s intelligence and the player’s use of strategy.

You see, the swap cards/hack cards really add a huge variable element to Insane Robots’ gameplay. You could build up 10 defense and find an enemy uses a hack to cut your defense to half or even take your cards and switch their weaker ones with yours. Timing is crucial in Insane Robots as you could let the enemy build up strength and hope they won’t attack straight away so you can sever their numbers or use them for yourself. Add to this an increasing AI that becomes smarter as the story mode plays out and you’ll find your mind running on all cylinders as you think each play out and pray luck/stratagem is on your side.

Speaking of the story mode, this is where most of your gameplay time will be put in when playing Insane Robots. The story mode follows Franklin as it begins to question the world and wonder if these events to its fate the fault of degradation or something else entirely. The single player is quite lengthy with dozens of matches and battles which lead you through different landscapes and settings. Along the way, you’ll also meet different robots that have some rather cool designs as well as unique—sometimes corny but in a good way—personalities. We never tired of hearing Franklin’s various chef themed puns as he unleashed attacks on his foes.

Outside of story mode, there is also a quick battle mode and multiplayer mode. Quick play mode is fun as it allows for more streamlined battles that have players using a sentry bot and going up against other robots from the single player one by one. Unfortunately, multiplayer is where Insane Robots falls a bit short and it’s not because of the gameplay or its execution. As of writing this review, we tried numerous times to find a match online and came up with never ending searches that led nowhere. We would love to see how battling others online would play out but as of right now, quick play and story mode are the only two viable options for enjoying Insane Robots but both do a tremendous job of keeping you occupied so that isn’t a negative in the long run.

Finally, let’s talk about the graphics, music and sound overall for Insane Robots. Here at Honey’s Anime, we loved the cute robot designs and how each felt different or unique in some way or form. Equally, we loved the colors for Insane Robots as the game pops with some truly nice art and themes. The soundtrack kicked butt as well offering nice tunes to battle others and kept every engagement fun and thrilling. If we had any complaints about Insane Robots in terms of sound, we’d say the robot voices—which we understand fit the motif of the game—could be at times annoying. Were they so bad we had to mute Insane Robots? No, but they could be quite tedious to hear during the story elements.

With clever gameplay designs that fuse card battling and turn based combat, Insane Robots shows that there is always room for unique ideas in a genre that has been done numerous times before. We loved the robotic themes and equally enjoyed the strategy it took to take down some enemies in the campaign/quick battles. While Insane Robots might seem overly simple with its set up, there’s an incredible amount of depth in trying to figure out when to go on the offense, how best to use swap/hacking cards and when to defend. While the multiplayer is basically non-existent at the moment, that didn’t stop us from enjoying the single player aspect of Insane Robots enough to fully recommend it to those who love strategy/turn based card themed games. Insane Robots is far from insane and we give praise to developer Playniac for creating a fun title that doesn’t take long to learn but takes time to master.

With games like Hearthstone and Magic outpacing most of the card-based strategy games, Insane Robots holds its own as a fun, engaging and clever tactics title. As simple as Insane Robots comes off, the sheer amount of depth in choosing the right moments to attack and defend are overwhelming and make every single battle in this 1 vs 1 game exciting and challenging. We wished Insane Robots was a bit more popular as we think going online to play against others in a more populated multiplayer setting would lead to us truly seeing what Insane Robots can deliver in its strategy aspects but for now the multiplayer is quiet and non-existent unfortunately. That’s why we hope many of you readers will think about picking up Insane Robots if you love to use your minds in card-based games fused with turn-based themes. Are you going to try out Insane Robots? Let us know in the comments below, and for all your gaming article needs, be sure to keep stuck to our hive here at Honey’s Anime.