I made bunch of reference from Final Fight (1989) so it feels unfair if
i don't review it. So here we are.
That's radical graffiti. It's so
radical that the wall starts to crumble because it can no longer sustain its
radicality. I don't know exactly why it's called Final Fight (unless adding word 'final' makes the title more badblood).
Maybe it's the same case with Final
Fantasy but it's less absurd as Final
Fight series only last 4 games while Final
Fantasy series encompasses freaking 15 games (excluding spin-offs or remake)
and probably still continues in the future. I kind of bitter with that fact
especially when SEGA still care enough to support the development of Streets of Rage 4 while Capcom seems
don't care anymore about Beat em Up game even though they made the pioneer the
genre: this game. I know that Final Fight
isn't exactly the first Beat em Up game but it's considered the
"draft" that many developer try to adapt its basic to create their
own Beat em Up game. Due to that, i respect Final
Fight to this day. Although i underestimated it because there's lots of
game of its genre that much friendlier and better but that was me from several
years ago and i would love to punch myself for that. Enough with my insensible
story, we moves on to the game's story...
Sometime in 1990's, there's
new-elected mayor on Metro city: Mike Haggar, who's intent to make the city
into a better place than city that's infested with crimes mainly controlled by
'Mad Gear' gang like when mayor before Haggar is in the office. The Mad Gear
gang obviously don't stand for this new mayor's good will therefore they kidnap
Haggar's daughter, Jessica.
With her daughter into their
custody (plus some monthly money bribe), Mad Gear hope that this new mayor will
let them do their criminal activity as they please like Haggar's predecessor
mayor. That seems solid plan but they miss some important detail: this mayor
Mike Haggar is former champion of Street Fighter and he doesn't hesitate
to use his own violence to other mankind! Although i believe when i played Street Fighter back then, he's nowhere
to be seen. But let's pretend he's also on it, maybe in period where Ryu
vanishes and decides to travel all around the world to hone his martial art
skill rather than sitting on his Street Fighter throne and defend his champion
title. If Mike Haggar can takes on either Birdie or Sagat, he's force to be
reckoned with and he has no qualm to fight scumbags like this Mad Gear gang.
But Mike Haggar isn't alone. He
calls Guy and Cody for their help. Calling it "call for their help"
isn't accurate (and also underestimating Haggar). It's more like he tells those
two that Jessica is kidnapped by Mad Gear gang and they volunteer to rescue
her. Haggar isn't the kind of weenie man who like to ask anything from other,
except asking phone number from Jessica's mother when they're not married yet.
Maybe. You should feel familiar with the roster of the speedy guy, the average
guy, and the powerhouse guy. I accidentally list them in appropriate order like
in the pictures (from left to right): 1) Guy, is the speedy guy because he's
ninja although i don't think that orange-colored gi is standard ninja's attire;
2) Cody, is the mediocre guy. The one who has medium speed and strength of the trio.
That's why he's on the center and also has the same fashion as Axel Stone from Streets of Rage; 3) Mike Haggar, is the
heavy hitter and -i'll be honest- the main character of the game. The problem
is centered on the new Mayor, you see. The game isn't about a boyfriend rescues
his girlfriend, right? Although Cody admits that Jessica is his friend from
childhood. Anyway, Mike Haggar is most likely the iconic of the trio. He's
wrestler with title of Street Fighter champion, for God's sake. How come he's
not grand, huh? But three of them are in Capcom's fighting game and that's why Final Fight's characters are considered
top. Do you ever see Axel Stone or Blaze Feldling in Virtua Fighter or Fighting
Vipers? Exactly.
I pick Cody first because he's
the most boring character and i reckon he needs my attention ASAP. Plus he must
makes Jessica impressive with his appearance to rescue herself. I thought
entire Mad Gear Gang are just artless brute but that big guy who carries
Jessica, has ability to moonwalk! Besides that, they are able to arrange 2 rows
with perfect arrangement! But that artwork soon destroyed by Cody's spinning
kick which looks uncomfortable to watch as he must stretch his leg to the
fullest while spinning his body around or at least it looks highly impractical.
I believe you know the basic but
i will tell you anyway. There's joystick to move your character around, one
button to attack in the direction your character facing, and another button to
make your character to jump. Pressing both attack and jump button at the same
time will make your character unleash life-draining special attack that useful
to knock away enemies surround your character. Attacking the enemies
consecutively will produces combo. Pressing attack button will make player pick
up nearby weapon, score item, or food item. Because i played a lot of Streets
of Rage 1 in my childhood, i thought these mohawk punks with stance that
showing you their back, are imitation of yellow signal from SoR 1 but the fact is the otherwise.
Also, i suspect them to slide kick me at anytime even though they can't do
that. Instead they like to step a bit to swiftly deliver a punch preferably at
the back of my head.
Then i get Cody killed by these
fat chaps that like to charge with their head. There's nothing you can do once
you're headbutted once and you will most likely get another one immediately
before you're recovered from previous strike. This is what i mean by the game
is relentlessly unfriendly.
Then i pick the famous sword
Muramasa from nearby garbage bin. If i remember correctly there's also sword
with the same name in Warriors of Fate.
That's the moonwalking giant but
Jessica is nowhere to be seen. We might be too late but we still have time to
beat this big bastard. It goes without saying that we can't continue on our way
to rescue Jessica if Damnd here still unbeaten so we have a fight. But he
doesn't like manly one-on-one fight. No. He will summon his underling by
whistling while he take a bit rest from severe beating that he had and he's
invincible while he's at it. His way of whistling there reminds me of Captain
Brineybeard from Cuphead.
While i'm busy with his
underlings, Damnd leave his rest and immediately jump kicks me. I try to
counter his jump kick with mine but for some reason he has higher priority over
me even though his jump kick there looks lame.
Next stage takes place in Subway
next to slum where i went. The train looks uncomfortable due to broken glasses
but the floor is very clean, thankfully. Axl here like to block any of my
attack, not often but block on many occasion. So you have to throw him around
like a basketball. There's the usual "sticky" grabbing system: if i
approach my enemies really close, i will automatically grab them. I can follow
it up with grabbed attack (by pressing attack button) or throw them away (by
pressing attack button + left/right direction). Or you can use throw combo
finisher by holding up/down direction while you do combination attacks. The
difference is the throw finisher always throw your enemies on the
opposite direction of your facing. I find this trick from playing Warriors of
Fate in PS 1 so many times.
On to the train that happens to
have no machinist on controls, i play as the ex-street fighter mayor: Haggar
himself. I don't think any of these thugs is the machinist because they appear
on previous car and no one stationed at the control panel. As you expect from a
wrestler, Haggar is adept at back drop his enemies and it deals lots of damage
too. Hey, i notice an apple as health refill item! Suck it, Streets of Rage/Bare Knuckle!
Mike Haggar stops the train for
some reason. By operating the machine and not pushing it into dead stop,
mind you. Bred, Dug, and their clone are just mindless mooks. But if they're
provided with oil drum, they will kick it as The most Beat em Up-ish makeshift
projectile and that's where their talent on. I'm impressed with that, on the
other hand Haggar's expression there is not so impressive.
At the end of the railroad track,
there's underground fighting ring and Sodom here uses dual sword that can deal
devastating damage within quite long reach! I know that underground fight known
to not have strict rules but in my opinion you supposed to have unarmed combat
in this kind of ring, like wrestling. So i finish him with jumping powerbomb
here. That's what the audience like to see, i believe.
Oh, look! There's car-smashing
bonus stage like in Street Fighter. Mayor
Mike Haggar doesn't have ability to throw soul projectile from his hand or blow
fire from his mouth, but he has high fondness to beat anything/anyone with
metal pipe and that's close enough. Anyway, who can believe that a mayor dressed
only with suspender trouser beat the hell out of a car with metal pipe? No
commoner will believe that witness. Such a cunning scheme!
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After that, Guy goes to a bar and
of course have a bar fight with Mad Gear gang. It's common that a fight happens
in a bar but these guys are way too lazy with that. It's not often you see
orange ninja fight members of most renowned gang in town for God's sake! The
bartender silently judges Guy on how ninja should fight, like king's portrait
on Freecell card game, observes your card arranging skill with cynical
expression.
Suddenly, (an) Andore Jr. grab my
head and take me away from that exit door. Take your sweaty hands off my nose,
big jerk!
And then i'm thrown into another
underground fight ring. But this time my opponents are unarmed and i have
privilege to pick a weapon around here! I must confess that i don't like guy's
sprite here especially compared to him in Street Fighter Alpha in which he
looks anime-ish and that's pretty natural of him. In here, he looks like Al
Pacino back when he's on Scarface (1983) movie that wears funny orange ninja(?)
attire.
At the end of stage, i fight a
police along with Mad Gear Gang and i assume he's corrupted because he takes
sides with the evil gang and his name is Edi. E. He lies on left corner not to
avoid my tornado kick. He's there after i knock him down first, that's why. It's
funny to think that back when i first time play Street Fighter Alpha 3 and i play as Ryu. Then when it comes the
time when i face Guy, i thought "Who's this cheeky git that can do cheap
Tatsumaki Senpukyaku that only travel vertical as anti air move only? He must
be two-bit Ryu wanna be.". Although it's solid fact that Ryu has the move
first in first Street Fighter before
Guy.
I was going to make "Say
hello to my little friend!" joke here but it will only be relevant if i
had gun and not him. Once his health is low enough, Edi E will not smack you
with baton anymore and start to use his handgun instead. He doesn't need to
reload after finish unloading his gun which is: 1) Unrealistic; 2) Cheating.
But you can dodge his gunning quite easily by not standing at the same plane as
him. He will walks to the other corner each time he finish his gunning and
that's the perfect time to fight him back. Guy is exceptionally good to catch
him while doing so or at least walk near him within punching distance before he
arrives at the corner and start shooting again.
While i'm focused on taking down
his goons, he's killed by stray fire Molotov from one of them. Karma is bad if
you're bad, indeed.
Speaking of fire, welcome to the
most dangerous factory in the world! Where fire jet is practically everywhere
in worker's platform. No fire extinguisher or not even safety rails here!
Health and Safety inspectors will most likely be agitated with this
below-standard safety equipment.
See! They can't even write
"Danger" properly there! With Muramasa sword at my hand, i can
mitigate the denger err i mean danger of rolling drums by strike them before
being rolled by Dug and Co, and the extra range of the sword really helps. No.
I can't be fooled! I know you're there waiting off-screen to catch the player
off guard by suddenly kicking the drums. Also there's chicken in a plate. Suck
it again, Streets of Rage/Bare Knuckle!
The boss in this factory stage is
Rolento, the militaristic maniac who -i can assume- is the supervisor of the
factory. He's there climbing ladder and throw hand grenade at me who's busily
dealing his henchmen. By the way, this is the usual elevator where enemies drop
on you.
On top of the level, Rolento
finally deals with me directly. Guy Vs Rolento, huh? That can happens if
you play Street Fighters Alpha 2 or 3. On top of that, both characters are
the speedy/agile type. Anyway, he runs
around and throws grenades with the occasion of hitting you with his longer
baton than Edi's. Most of the time while his running and leaves blue shadows,
he's invincible but i find rather easy way to defeat him. Guy is fast enough to
grab and later throw him, again. Rolento can also throws you but maybe i just got
lucky.
Rolento doesn't want Guy take the
glory of finishing him so he explodes himself with grenades.
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There's another bonus stage where
i have to break glasses that's probably the product of the factory. You have
hit them in the center otherwise, they take less damage than it should be and
spin around that can knock you out. As why i have to break them, i have no
clue. At least, it's almost the same motive with breaking ice blocks in Mug Smasher.
On to Bay Area, where i found foods inside of barrels but i already at full health so they only serve as score
item instead. Maybe it's just me but i don't think eating pineapple along with
the skin, is healthy diet.
Come on, guys! We have rolling
drum for everyone, villains and hero alike! Soldier_cheers01.wav
This section is probably the most
disgusting one in history of Beat em Up gaming history although there's bit
section of toilets in Streets of Rage 4
but still. I freaking hate dirty public toilets especially when there's
graffiti on them. What's so sexy about fighting in this God-forsaken
place, you sick freak?
This is so much better. I believe
this is the parking lots for Axl's or Slash's motorcycle. They have fashion
like biker what's with their leather jacket and such. On the other hand this
blokes in red, are probably the first hit-and-run mook in Beat em Up games.
They don't take much damage but they run swiftly after they had thrown their
makeshift bomb. You can either stay away from their bomb or hit it and thus
disarm it for some reason.
I forget to tell you that Cody's
specialty is ability to use knife to stab enemies instead just throw it like
others. It's conducive in situation where there's lots of Hollywood and El Gado
like here. They like to throw knife. They drop knife when knocked. There will
be tons of knives and they will fit into a dozen of kitchen set or two. Knife
stabbing can provide Cody with attack that just a bit longer than his punch and
knock away enemies instantly like iron pipe and sword but i don't think it's
worth the trouble. Thus i prefer to throw it at the enemies right away. Also
hello, Snowy!
This stage's boss is Abigail
who's the base of Abadede of Streets of Rage because he like to run at me and
punch. That means he's also susceptible to jumping kick. But he has more
moveset than the giant from SoR.
Abigail can delivers regular punch or throw you really high like a janitor
throws garbage bin at dump truck's tailgate.
Then i finish him by jumping
powerbomb into the crowd. It's more glorious sight than that crownless bootleg
Liberty statue over there.
On to the final stage where i
barge into the Mad Gear HQ. Funny thing is the building doesn't have gate and
instead there's pillar with topless lady statue on it. You can tell that Mad
Gear gang are evil because they really obsessed with half-naked lady statue.
They're immoral afterall.
But they have cozy swimming pool
completes with chairs and tall diving board. Plus exotic palm trees.
I find another way to deal with
those charging fat men: jumping powerbomb. With that, you can deal hefty damage
to one fat man while also avoiding his friend's running headbutt.
Very good, Andore! Finally there's
someone who listen to my advice.
There's more pillar with
breast-naked statue and did you know that there's precious stone such as ruby
or emerald, hides behind each pillar? Not so useful secret unless you want to
rake more score in this game.
This mansion only security device is chandelier that automatically fall
if you walk past them. It's fine if only one or two. But when there's like
dozen of them, it gets old really fast. But i appreciate this last two as they
contain last cartoon meat in this game.
Here it is the leader of Mad Gear
Gang, Belger himself. At first, he walk around in fast wheelchair while holding
Jessica as hostage. In this hostage situation, you need to grab Belger and
throw him away. If you try to punch him, you will hit Jessica instead. Ups!
Where's Jessica? She's behind that ruined wheelchair but i reckon she's pretty
fine.
Belger wield some kind of
automatic crossbow. He's probably cheaper than Edi E. but what annoy me the
most is he like to jump around like mega-sized fleaman and everytime i try to
unleash combo, he just knocked away by the simple jab. Fine! I will just jump
kick him to death.
Just like this! You can't blame
me for kicking him out of window like this. He's the one who deliberately stand
still near the window while chucking arrows at me. If only he stand near
Jessica, he's much safer.
With Belger falls to his death,
his underlings vanish for some reason. Guy and Cody wonder at the broken glass
and think who will going to pay for that window and how much it will cost.
Meanwhile Mayor Mike Haggar approaches his daughter and comforts her.
That's quite touching scene but i
don't think pressing your daughter against your sweaty muscular body, is a good
idea. Good thing, Jessica is broad-minded enough to still love his father after
the kidnapping and also her mother lost. Happy end!
Wait! There's more! After credit
roll. Jessica call Cody but he ignores her. Thus Guy beat his awareness to come
out and later Cody's willing to speak with Jessica.
And now's the real ending. It
looks like Cody and Jessica will be together happily ever after but no. He
breaks up with her and become fugitive but that's another story (in Street Fighter Alpha 3).
Capcom's Final Fight (1989) is Beat em Up game that define the genre in more
practical way but i warn you that it's not easy game yet doable. You can and
will get surrounded by enemies relentlessly. Not to mention if enemies manage
to get a hit on you, you will get another one again and again to the point you
will lose a life. It happens thanks to significantly slower recovery of your
character when get hit than the enemy's. You can cancel your flinched status
with the special move but it will cost your health otherwise you can't do
nothing about the flinch. There's lots of case where you initiate combo on
enemies that more than 3, one of them slip a hit on you and that relentless
disaster happens. But there's some way to mitigate that beside with the special
move: 1) Jumping kick is basically the good method for all around situation
although it deals so-so damage but Haggar's drop kick can deal considerably
large damage; 2) Using iron pipe and sword also a good idea if you can get the
hand of it. Much like in Warriors of Fate,
you have split-second decision on the combo finisher. The heavy strike finisher
is generally good to deal damage on group of enemy on same side. While throwing
finisher deal the most damage on one specific enemy and also useful to swiftly
deal with enemies stalk behind you. The enemy variation is distinctive but less
compared to Streets of Rage/Bare Knuckle
2. As i have mentioned before Dug and his friends mainly adept at rolling the
drum. Andore family (which is based on Andre the Giant) have big health and
able to body block you or execute piledriver move on you. Poison and Roxy able
to do back flip, making them invincible for a while. Also they like to jump
high and kick at you. Hollywood and El Gado which are Rolento's soldiers, are
more annoying than Poison and Roxy. They can either sliding kick or jump and
puncture your head from above. And it goes without saying that they love to
utilize knife in either melee or throwing method. The music may feel gritty but
it's appropriate with the atmosphere. The 1st level BGM is later remixed for
Capcom VS. SNK - Millennium Fight 2000 PRO own BGM. While the first part of Bay
Area stage BGM later become Rolento's stage BGM in Street Fighter Alpha 2. The
sound effects are fantastic i particularly like the "Whuud!" sound of
the jab. The graphic is kind of good but also dirty in some places especially
the public toilets.
Some of you may disagree to me
that Final Fight (1989) isn't
enduring classic of Beat em Up game. There's lots of better and friendlier game
of the same genre like Warriors of Fate
that i keep saying or my personal recommendation Battle Circuit. But i also saw worse one like Burning Fight. Nevertheless, i still hold Final Fight with high regard. It's the first Capcom's
side-scrolling Beat em Up game, afterall. By the way, here's some character's
stats analysis!
Guy is Bushin style ninja. That's
the fact that i know from Street Fighter
Alpha 3, by the way. I'm sorry that i can't still get over with it but damn
that orange gi is so funny. Maybe Bushin style ninjutsu teaching dictates that
its practitioner must wears orange gi. His fiancée's sister Maki Genryusai also
wear orange gi like that (but minus trouser) and it all comes together. Just
like Blaze Fieldling or Zhao Yun/Subutai (Warriors
of Fate), he's not so fast but
certainly the fastest in the roster and i estimate that his main stats is Agility
at 3.5/5. He can throw his enemy pretty far that clearly shows just a bit extra
on his strength thus his strength is 2.5/5. He has ability to wall jump but
sadly not much section in the game that has wall on it. If only he has ability
to double jump, i can believe that he's ninja. His jab is the fastest so he's
the best at interrupting enemy's attack.
For some reason, Cody's mouth
expression reminds me of Sylvester Stallone and he uses punch a lot like Rocky
Balboa. As he's the average guy with medium strength and speed, he's clearly
the Dexterity type guy but i reckon his fighting technique is still rough. It's
shown in his special move: that wild spinning kick. Nevertheless his primary
stats is Dexterity (3.5/5). His attacking power is slightly stronger than Guy
thus his strength is 2.5/5. He may has specialty with knife but he's the least
favorite character in my opinion. But i finish the game with him. Funny that.
The last but not the least, the
most iconic of the trio: Mayor Mike Haggar! Now i know why, Miles from Mug Smasher really wants to wear
suspender trouser: because he idolize the Metro City's ex-street fighter Mayor!
And i now i feel bad of making funny of Mile's fashion. As you expect from the
powerhouse type guy, he can deal the most damage among the trio so his main
stats is undoubtedly Strength (4/5). As you expect from wrestler type of guy, Haggar
can perform wrestling throw with quite good finesse. Therefore his dexterity is
2.5/5.
If you excuse me, i will like to
analyze deeper on Mike Haggar's prowess thus become insight for you, reader. What
i like to discuss is: his jab. Jab or the first strike is the basic yet also
the important part of the character's moveset as it allows them to initiate
combo which is the main method of damage dealing. Note that: 1) Outer
arm, means their left arm when the characters face right or their
right arm when the characters face left; 2) Inner arm, means their
right arm when the characters face right or their left arm
when the character face left. Okay, here we go:
I put M. Haggar's picture on
left-top corner because he's the main topic. As you can see his gut punch where
he uses inner arm but he twists his torso while bend a bit, resulting in
pretty long reach.
While Pimple from Battletoads
(arcade) in right top picture, also uses inner arm but he doesn't twist
his torso as much as Haggar. Resulting in roughly 60% reach of Haggar's gut
punch.
On the other hand Max from Streets
of Rage 2 in left-bottom picture, use outer arm which is sensible
but he only utilize half of his arm because his jab is overhead chop, you see.
Due to resizing, both Haggar and Max may have the same reach. But if you take a
count of the playfield size of Streets of
Rage 2 (which is significantly larger than in Final Fight), Max has harder time to get the first hit on enemies
because they can move more freely. Not to mention he's much much slower than
Mike Haggar. I summarize that SEGA may adapt the essence of Mike Haggar:
heavy-hitter yet slow wrestler guy, but they don't design Max's attack reach/move
speed proportion well. Thus he's forced to rely on his sliding kick to get the
first hit on enemies. He's pain in the teeth to play as but don't get me wrong,
i like him because he can execute wrestler's grapples that deal destructive
damage.
Meanwhile, Skullbyule from Guardians/Denjin Makai II (arcade) in
right-bottom picture, is truly enigma because he use his tongue as jab move
which is very unusual. The tongue attack is roughly located from his center so
the attack reach supposed to be medium. But luckily his tongue is long enough
for appropriate jab. Plus, it's fast too. Skullbyule has the fastest jab among
these 4 power character.
For better or fairer comparison, let's
compare Haggar with other heavy-hitter from other Capcom Beat em Up games. Major
D. Schaefer from Aliens versus Predator
(arcade) in left-bottom picture has more or less same gut punch with the Mayor
albeit his move is slower and feels more robotic. Consider he equips cyborg arm
that double as his personal smart gun, that makes sense.
Meanwhile Alien Green
from aforementioned Battle Circuit (arcade) in right-top picture, utilize outer
arm for simple jab. He leans a bit to provide some extra range too so he also has
appropriate reach.
Meanwhile Kassar/Guan Yu from Warriors of Fate (arcade) in right-bottom picture, deploys some
pankration technique where he put his hand together and swing them downward. Because
he can't reach the maximum range because he has to bind both of his hands which
limits his reach. He has rather short range, is what i want to say but as you
can see in the picture where he's able to hit those 2 blokes together. Considering
he can hits the farthest enemy like that, i can assume he also has suitable reach.
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