Robot Alchemic Drive is a giant robot combat simulator for the PlayStation 2, it's a spiritual successor to Remote Control Dandy for the PlayStation. Both of the games are unique in their control scheme and camera positioning method. Remote Control Dandy played for the most part exactly like RAD, aside from a few key features. Being an early PlayStation game, it did not have the functionality of the dual analog sticks. Instead it would use the face buttons to simulate arm movement, it many ways it was not quite as satisfying as the analog rotation used in RAD but far more approachable to a wider audience. Sandlot the developer of these games is notable for their constant reuse of game mechanics, having roughly 4 games play mostly the same (Remote Control Dandy, Robot Alchemic Drive, Tetsujin 28-Go, and Tekkōki Mikazuki). They had gained quite a bit of notoriety with the B-Movie influenced insect third-person shooter, Earth Defense Force. A game not known for it's quality, but it's incredibly fun gameplay and split-screen co-op.

In the game Robot Alchemic Drive you will choose between three different protagonists, all three are essentially the same in backstory and gameplay. The three heroes are named Naoto (the upbeat and steedfast one), Ryo (the collected and 'cool'), and Yui (the compassionate female one). Next you will choose from three rather diverse giant robots, all of which have vastly different weapons and fighting stats. These three robots are the Vertical Fortress Vavel, Airborne Dominator Laguiole and Gllang the Castlekeep. Vavel appears to be the most balanced of the three(noted in game's lore as being the most powerful), and has a devastating Rocket-propelled fist maneuver. Laguiole lacks power and endurance, but can transform into an incredibly fast jet and has a useful lightening gun that has a wider range than most projectiles in the game. Gllang has the most hitting power, endurance, and can transform into a slightly faster tank form. Sadly mostly of Gllang's projectiles are useless in this form, but for the most part this form is just used to get the sluggish robot to the battle with haste. After choosing one these three for the story mode and using that one for 10-15 missions, you will be given the other two to use freely at some point along the way. This does somewhat eliminate the urgency to replay the story mode with a different robot, but does add quite a bit of variety to the occasionally bland missions. The only true purpose of playing the story mode twice with a different protagonist/robot, is that you will see a very slight difference in dialogue and unlock several new enemy robots for versus mode. These slight differences are mostly highlighted in the female character of Yui, as she will not have romance with one of the female side characters. These changes really don't constitute a second play-through sadly, as it is mostly cosmetic.

The mission structures are not too complex, usually involving the player running around for 2 minutes while waiting the robot to launch. Occasionally there will be missions that involve the player protecting some building or person of interest, but these missions are few and far between. You will usually find yourself facing off against the enemy in a pretty straight forward one on one. There are some special missions such as facing one enemy, then another will spawn or putting out a fire.

Controlling these robots in these missions involves pressing down the R1 and L1 buttons to move the right and left legs respectively, while using the R2 and L2 triggers to move in reverse. Combat is mostly done by rotating/flicking the analog sticks to attack, each arm being represented by the left and right analog sticks. Though additional attacks can be done by using the face buttons to shoot lasers, missiles, and special weapons exclusive to each robot. This all can feel somewhat clunky at first, but has rather a satisfying sensation when landing an uppercut on the opposing robot that sends them barrelling into a skyscraper.

All three of the robots also have special weapons hidden in each fist, one melee and one ranged on the right and left hands respectively. The melee weapon for all three of the robots are cosmetic, mainly just used to increase striking power. The Laguiole's melee weapon did overlay a electric shock effect as well though, but it does not seem to paralyze the enemy in anyway. The ranged weapons include a lightening gun, mortar, and straight laser.

There is a rather basic upgrade system for your robots, mostly just improving armor and weapon effectiveness. Several special upgrades are available for each robot as well, nothing too robust though. These include increasing the length time you hand special hand weapons can be used and upping their effectiveness. Also increasing starting capacity for the robot's missiles and lasers, but only being able to slightly boost their power.

One of the other distinct features of this game is the camera positioning when doing combat with opposing robots, you actually see from the protagonist's view. Strangely the character is not piloting the robot from within, he/she is actually standing outside and controlling the robot with a hilariously over-sized controller. Now this was done to give the fight a spectator look, like you're really remotely controlling a robot. Luckily the main character has a device that allows him to fly briefly, so perching on buildings is an option for watching the battles go down. This device was more than likely added due to the predecessor game (Remote Control Dandy) having major camera issues and complaints. This distinct way of viewing battles may take some time to get used to, but really does help build the sense of scale this game presents to you. At times though it can severally affect gameplay if you can't get a decent view of the fight, leading the enemy to pound on your robot as you awkwardly fly about looking for a spot to see the fight. The player character can also be hit by pretty much anything, sending him flying quite far no matter how slowly the object that hit him was going. The missions can be failed if the player character is killed, but this for the most part won't be a concern in earlier missions as the enemy A.I. ignores the player character for a majority of those early missions.

The game does boast some rather impressively scaled maps , but there are particularly few of these maps and they often lack defined textures on most buildings and terrain. The scale of the game was likely a contributing factor to the rather sub-par visuals, as most models were simple and occasionally very muddy. Human models looked less on the level of PlayStation 2, and more on the level of late PlayStation. Animations for those models were basic as well, when taking damage the human models would usually just lay on their sides whilst a sprite of blood overlayed it. Which could often give climatic scenes a comical look, with bodies flying out hilariously from under a robot's boot and sprites of red explode everywhere around them.

The main story involves trans-dimensional alien robots coming to earth after we were essentially isolated from space by some energy blanket named the "Space Nectar". The Earth's defense teams aren't able to combat these alien robots properly, so it's up to our protagonist the Chairman of now bankrupt Tsukioka Industries to stop them. He is joined by his team of a German Scientist named Dr. Herman Witz and radio operator Keiko Konan to stop them. The missions are done out as episodes, as though it was an anime TV series. The game's story is a bit sluggish and will occasionally have entire segments of non-combat related prancing about in the city. Story-line segments will turn some fans off of the game, as for the most part they come off as random plot points presented for no particular reason. The voice acting for the game varies from terrible to mildly decent, but the dialogue they come out with never seems to be fluid. Certain characters will be affected by buildings being destroyed during battles, and some can even die in later portions of the game.

In many ways the story and overall themes of the game are a homage to '60-'70s Mecha-Anime, primarly Mazinger Z and Tetsujin 28-Go. In the vain of those animes, the connectivity of each "episode" in Robot Alchemic Drive is vague at best. The game has that Power Rangers-esque villain of the week thing going on, where if the good guys are defeated they go back to the base and invent up a brand new weapon or robot to stop the enemy. But between those "big" events, the players will do what the characters in those animes would. Fight enemies they can rather easily win against for several episodes, until that inevitable tough bad guy episode comes along. It's rather formulaic, but in a way charming and nostalgic to those who enjoyed shows of that nature.

One thing that may come to a surprise for many fans is that despite having Masafumi Takada (Killer7, No More Heroes, God Hand) composing the soundtrack, it is a bit lifeless. It captures the ensence of '70s Japanese monster films, but nothing quite as iconic as say Godzilla or Gamera themes. This works with the giant robot portions of the game, but the human interaction scenes do clash with the music quite a bit. It might have served them better to stick with the '70s anime theme instead of trying to mix in the '70s Japanese monster movie theme as well.

There aren't many enemy models in the game, several are reused with arm-attachment changes and palette swaps. All of these enemies are playable in the split screen versus mode, but aren't properly balanced for competitive play. No "vs CPU" option is selectable, so the only way to play as those enemies is to go head to head with a friend.

The only other mode available to players is the challenge mode, which is for the most part just a Mission select mode. This mode is pretty useful for trying out of the other 2 robots in a mission you had already completed using your primary robot. Sadly like most other Sandlot games, this is about all there is for additional content. All the 3 robots play differently enough so that replay-ability is not a huge problem, but it does severally limit the amount of hours the player can put into the game.

Aside from lacking many additional features other games like this may have, the game does a magnificent job at giving the player truly weighted simulation like combat. The game may not be something that all will enjoy, but many gamers will find great satisfaction in destroying other giant robots in either the story mode or the competitive play. Also fans of corny of '60-'70s Mecha anime will find quite a bit of pleasure in this game's quirky storyline or awful voice acting. Maybe even fans of more mordern Mecha like Big-O, might appreciate a game that could in some way capture the feeling of the powerful punches in Big-O's fight scenes.

There really aren't too many games like Robot Alchemic Drive sadly, the only other games like this are made by Sandlot as well. Notable games by Sandlot that share similarities would be Tekkōki Mikazuki, Remote Control Dandy, and Tetsujin 28-Go. Tekkōki Mikazuki has similar controls, but slightly less refined mechanics and more of a Godzilla design to the enemies. Remote Control Dandy, it's predecessor is similar in many ways, but is far more colorful and arcade-like . Tetsujin 28-Go has essentially the same controls but less weighted combat, and like Remote Control Dandy it taps into that Astro Boy look for the characters and robots. All three of those games are not available in English, only in Japanese. If the designs intrigue you, check them out. But Robot Alchemic Drive is by far the best in the series, and really the only one worth really checking out even if it's not really in your interest.