Mega City Police review – What is this PD’s budget?!

Mega City Police is a very exaggerated 1980s-style action game clearly inspired by Robocop, but a lot has changed since the days of the cyborg patrolman. The title seeks to bring back the nostalgia of the time while also trying to be an engaging and challenging Rogue-like with elements similar to other popular games.

It’s also inspired by the recent hit Vampire Survivors, with each level being somewhat procedurally generated. Each round offers unique challenges in enemy types and projectiles in a way that can leave you trapped and quickly decimated by your opponents. It’s shorter than most Rogue-likes but brings a considerable gameplay challenge that genuinely frustrated me in a good way.

Mega City Police has a pretty singular focus and that works in its favor for the first few hours of gameplay as players learn the characters and try to beat the game. However, it will be interesting to see if the title is able to keep players for longer than that.

A one-person army without a cause

As previously stated, Mega City Police is pretty one-note in its execution. Players will start in a police station in a giant city where crime seems to stem from the Mega Corporation where the city gets its name. This is just a guess because there’s no text or images that give any idea as to why you’re shooting up each new group of enemies, just transitioning from boss fights to new areas.

The gameplay feels similar to Hotline Miami, and as such, it kind of feels like a missed opportunity to expand the world a little bit. This would likely be excusable if there were a lot of levels to play through, as watching or reading text could get annoying. Still, there are only a handful of areas and the first few largely blend together due to design and enemy types.

That being said, each unique area did allow me to fight different types of enemies like construction robots or heavily armed guards. This kept me on my toes and forced me to change up my loadout to better suit certain situations, such as having a rocket launcher for larger enemies and a heavy laser to vaporize the others. This allowed me to plan ahead, with each weapon providing a different playstyle.

Each of the characters includes characters from classic 1980s and 1990s action heroes from the typical Robocop design to a hardline detective. I enjoyed playing many of the characters and their different abilities allowed me to plan around shortcomings in my weapons, like using a shield if I needed to get out of a tight situation at the cost of not being able to attack.

Shooting at the bad guys indiscriminately

As stated previously, the gameplay of Mega City Police is very reminiscent of the Hotline Miami series if it were a little more forgiving. That comes at the cost of the enemies being a little stronger too, with later levels requiring you to shoot all enemies multiple times. This is fine and it all plays pretty well, but it is a very challenging game and one that often had me frustrated due to my own shortcomings.

Players can enjoy the title in two different modes, offered at the beginning of the game and then via the donut box in the police office at the start of each of your runs. The Classic mode is much harder than Casual, making players restart from the beginning of the five-segment run every time they die, which will be a test for players who are masochists. Beating Mega City Police with one character on Casual is a feat.

The range of upgrades and weapons are pretty fun too and in the several hours it took me to beat the game the first time, I largely kept encountering new weapons. Players will have the opportunity to choose purchasable upgrades and weapons between levels and they largely kept me full on cash. However, I don’t feel the same joy of unlocking them all in the Archive that I do when playing Vampire Survivors.

There’s not much more to Mega City Police outside of that and it largely feels like a pretty standard arena shooter, with less than standard arenas, that’s genuinely a challenge to play. It feels pretty flat though and there’s not much more to it outside of struggling to dodge projectiles and take down the more challenging bosses. If that’s your type of game, you’ll likely enjoy this title for hours.

Try Hard Guides was provided with a PC review copy of this game. Find more detailed looks at popular and upcoming titles in the Game Reviews section of our website!