A Robot Named Fight! is a Metroidvania-style action-platformer made by Matt Bitner. Due to the game’s success, Morningstar Game Studio decided to do a special physical collector’s edition of the game and include a bunch of extra items for its diehard fans. What wasn’t announced but secretly included with those games was a unique Pocket Paragons duel pack featuring Fight and Tutorial Smith! – Brian McKay
Fight!
When designing the titular character of Fight, I faced a few challenges. This duel pack would be the first time almost everyone receiving it would even hear of Pocket Paragons, so the characters couldn’t be too complex, but I wanted to show off some of the cool stuff the game system could do, which made me want to go fancy. I leaned into the collecting power-ups style of Metroidvania-type games, and gave Fight the ability to collect more and more weapons as the game went on.
In A Robot Named Fight, due to its roguelike gameplay, you die early and often, and each time you start over, you’re playing as a brand new Fight trying to take on the Megabeast and its horrifying meat-infested world. Each Fight is numbered based on how many Fights have come before it, so as a special bonus easter egg, each copy of Fight that was printed was given with a unique four-digit number! You play as the latest in a long line of thousands of Fights who are trying to save the world. Will you be the successful one?
Fight can craft new Orbs each time he visits the Orb Smith using his passive ability. Each 2 energy, you add another Orb to your collection which triggers when first obtained, when you counter an enemy ability, and when you play your Weapon.
Because Fight’s Orb Smith passive system is on the higher complexity side, the rest of Fight’s weapons keep it simple but powerful. The Buzzsaw Gun hits hard, Kaboomerang can let you double dip on Weapon, Defend, or whatever else you need, and Zurvan’s Pentangle (the greatest name of any weapon ever) helps keep you alive a little longer so you can accumulate more Orbs.
Tutorial Smith
Tutorial Smith is an incredibly helpful broken robot that you encounter at the start of each new run in A Robot Named Fight. He passes along important clues such as “Avoid spikes”, “Shoot at bosses to kill them”, and “Use items to find out how they work”. You really wouldn’t get very far without this advice, so train against Tutorial Smith and bask in the wisdom of his attacks as they pulverize you into the ground.
“Feeling Drained?” is a very mean card under the right circumstances. While it’s not quite as good as just winning the game with an Execute, having a second Rest punish up your robotic sleeve can really shut down Fight’s ability to accumulate energy to craft Orbs. “A Pox Upon You” lays into the punishment, even more, taking away more cards and forcing them towards another Rest that you have multiple ways to punish. And when you feel like just killing your enemy, remember to “Shoot At Meat To Destroy It.”
Fight! (Chris Solis) vs. Tutorial Smith (John Brieger)
These cards are available in the Deluxe Edition of A Robot Named Fight, available from various online retailers. It’s a fantastic game and definitely worth checking out if you haven’t already. Otherwise, a few extra copies of just the promo pack is available in the Solis Game Studio Web Store while supplies last.