The credits describe Malco as a "power room watcher". So I sense his only immediate purpose he was built for was to watch over the power room, and make explosives when needed to. And of course, he did appear to have some protocol for fending off intruders. I'm thinking that he'd normally be pretty good at distinguishing between threats and allies under most circumstances, but he probably initially interpreted Quote as an intruder since he was quite suddenly woken up and faced with another being.
Dunc2403 said:
...he did get shut off by someone or something. My guesses are either Misery, under instruction from a crown bearer, or by a sqaud of Killer Robots, to shut off power to what could have been a critical location in the war. Either of those could easily have overcome MALCO.
I do agree with the premise that something of that nature shut him off, but I'm not so sure that a small squad of killer robots could have shut him off. If it weren't for Balrog, I think Malco would have put up a fairly decent fight against Quote. Sure that was quite easy how quickly Balrog took him out by unexpectedly pouncing on him, but Quote was subdued as well when Balrog did the same in the Sand Zone. I think Malco had a decent combat mechanism that could have been put to good use. I suppose I can't prove this true any more than you can prove your belief right, but that's a slightly opposing view of mine.
I like to base one's combat skill on how advanced they are, and I suppose one indicator of how advanced said robot is is based on how synthetically they talk. Curly is the closest to human robot there is in the game, and is almost as good as Quote. The barely still alive robot in the Core room had a synthetic voice like Malco's (as indicated by that all caps text), but did not come across as the very conversational sort, unlike Malco. Therefore I am led to believe that Malco is more advanced than a lot of surface robots, and would thus be able to hold them off. Then again, there are those blue robots that talk more conversationally and with a more real sounding voice (indicated by the lack of caps) and looking more advanced, but they don't look like they're bred for combat, judging by how they don't fight at all, and that one of them was very quickly killed by a Gaudi.
I'm not necessarily saying that a squad of killer robots couldn't have shut Malco down, but I think he would have put up a fight. But for all we know, the power room and Malco could have been built by the people who sent the robots to the island (like SpiritHunterElite said), in which case Malco would have had no quarrel with the killer robots. But then that leads you to ask why he's so kind. Perhaps he was originally unfriendly but then someone changed his heart...
EnlightenedOne said:
Another theory I have is that when balrog crushed his head, the section that made him aggressive was malfunctioning. Making him be a overly good person instead of "COMMENCE DESTRUCTION!"
You know what? That's a very interesting theory, I never thought of that. That is entirely plausible.