Devolver Digital announces physics-based party game BOTSU

For a long time now, local split-screen multiplayer games have been something of a dying breed. Be it because of the internet being almost all-encompassing now or people just hanging out in person less often, these sorts of games, at least
in the AAA space
, aren’t made as much. However, as Devolver Digital
and Peculiar Pixels have shown today in revealing BOTSU, the genre, thankfully, isn’t dead yet.

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Offering both online team play and up to four-player local split-screen multiplayer, BOTSU offers fans of cartoonish mayhem and hijinks the chance to challenge their friends in physics-based robo-sports. Physics-based games usually tend to have a
slow pace,
but, as the reveal trailer below shows, BOTSU is anything but slow.
Once it releases later this year, BOTSU will offer players three distinct battle sports to compete in with their friends. The objective is different in each mode, but they all require players to make the best possible use of their bot’s full suite of moves, like sprinting, jumping, flipping, climbing and more, in order to secure victory. More might come later on, but at first it will just be “Box-Ball,” “Stockpile” and “Sumo Survival” that players will be choosing from.
The objective is different in each mode, but they all require players to make the best possible use of their bot’s full suite of moves.
Box-Ball: Several Sports in One
Can’t decide on a sport? No problem!
Players form up into teams of two and compete to score goals, baskets and just plain points in BOTSU’s enhanced versions of soccer, basketball, beachball and something that looks an awful lot like a certain broom-based sport from a certain
magical universe.
Oh, and the ball is also a bomb, so players should try their best to score quickly.
Stockpile: A Chaotic Game of Avarice
Greed is good, hoarding is better.
If this is anything at all like similar modes in other games, then scoring in this one is likely based on hoarding the most resources for as long as possible. The only way to get ahead in BOTSU’s version, though, is to steal from the opposing team (fall guys link). So, players will need to figure out how best to rob their opponents blind while simultaneously preventing the same from happening to them.
Sumo Survival: Trust No One
Improvise. Adapt. Overcome. Stay out of the Lava.
The last of BOTSU’s opening game modes will likely be its most popular since it’s also the simplest. It’s every android for itself survival with only one objective: be the last bot standing. All one needs to do is stay in the safe zone and do their best to ensure that everyone else falls into the scalding lava below. There’s no such thing as a dirty move in this mode, so do whatever it takes to eliminate the competition and seize the title of BOTSU Champion!
For all of these modes, players have the option of partying up and fighting it out locally with up to four players, or they can all team up and compete against other teams of four in online matches.
Android superiority is on the line after all, so doing a mix of both will likely be the best training strategy once BOTSU goes live.
Players will also have some sort of social space to chill in between rounds. In it, they’ll be able to customize their android, upgrade their gear, play casual games or even just hang out with their fellow robotic athletes. Those interested don’t even have to wait until release to give BOTSU a try either, since there’s already a free demo available to try via its Steam page.
BOTSU is currently set to release on PC later this year.

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