Bad Street Brawler (NES) - part 2

Previously, Duke Davis former punk rocker and (probably) sunglasses aficionado, clean his hometown from gorilla, tiger, midget with iron ball n chain, thugs with sports equipment, crazed gun man, and punk lady with knife. He does the vigilant act with various move that consist of punches/"trip his enemy down" move (by pressing "B" button), kicks (by pressing "A" button), and various contact/grapple move (by pressing both "A" and "B" buttons). What kind of evil thing/person that Duke will encounter next? We shall see soon! 

But, let's take practice, first! I think the game advises specifically to me with those words. I'm the man with over-cautiousness to practically anything, for example NES game. I'm afraid to venture deeper into NES territory as i have heard many its games are very tedious, limited continues, or can't be finished without cheat. That's why i comfortable with arcade emulator that allow me to have unlimited continue. Just a bit fact about myself there.

 

I thought the enemies only have expression when hitting or getting hit. But that baseball player proves the otherwise. He look at jumping Duke as if saying "It's a bird! It's a plane! No, it's crazy vigilante jumping around to other side. The absolute madman!"

 

One of the thing that annoy me well is the skateboarder...as regular thug. Why? Because he's stubborn to leave me alone if i reach the sub-boss/boss section while other are sportive enough to let the sub-boss/boss come to beat me. I think the breakdancing punk also have same behaviour. So you need to convince them with a hit or two and hoping they will go away immediately for the sake of time limit.

 

Oh , would you look at that! The boss is two skateboarders. Lovely! I just keep kicking their head in the corner and pray they don't either charge at me or jump above me.

 

That wise words seems true. They have same relation with quote: beauty is relative but ugly is absolute. I heard the quote in Indonesia, by the way.

Oh and the trip move returns. Great! I can tickle the fat man's butt feet untill he's dead.  

 

I can also message the basketball players to the comfort zone of death. Awesome!

 

The trip move can trap any enemy over and over again but not the punk. But the screenshot prove that the move is quite effective to take him down but you still have to stay away from him everytime you succeed doing it.   

 

The stage boss is different! It's big mean boxer. He will immediately counter every move except the big Grapple move: Aeroplane spin. Just repeatedly do the move and he's K.O'ed easily. Too bad that Duke doesn't have ear biting move. I believe the boxer is very vulnerable to it.

 

You just defeated (presumably) former boxing champion that gone rogue and you called "It was nothing"? Such modesty from justice hero.

 

I don't understand the first sentence. But i understand the second ones because it's relatable to me. Back when i was in colleague, whenever i get bad score on test, i will revenge to get better score in revision. That's positive revenge, you see.   

 

As much as the basketball player hates someone shorter than him. He (reluctantly) cooperate with the midget to take down Duke Davis together. Even though, both of the are capable of shooting ball projectile. They're still no match for him especially when he can do "Body Fling" move.  

 

The boss fight for this stage: the deadly combination of the midget and the punk. Actually the most dangerous one is the punk as you have to keep on eye very closely on him to get clean hit. But if you're only focused only to him, the midget will throws his iron ball at the back of your head. So it's trickier than it seems.  

I just realized that "High Kick" move is similar to "Drop Kick" move only higher. I think this is my another significant complaint about the game: Duke doesn't have middle kick or any standing kick that is fast enough to execute and deals decent damage.

 

Either high kick or drop kick, it's appropriate to deal with the racing biker. Everytime he's defeated, he will crash outside of the screen and leaving these tires bounce here. The tires is -of, course- lethal to touch so you have to avoid them everytime you have successfully dispatch the biker. By the way, in this sub-boss section there's 2 bikers that come at you one after the other instead come all at once. Thank God!

 

The stage boss this time: the pair of gun and knife, Attila and Sgt. Crazy. Both of them have underbite so i assume them as married couple. Also, both of them ranged attacker but in different range. The assassin will throw knives rapidly in short range while the crazed gunman will shoot a bullet in long period from afar. The combination is pretty deadly. If you get careless for a moment, you will done for.

[Insert joke about Avengers: Infinity War's ending meme here]

The sub-boss this time: double Attila. I headbutted one of them. Right in her jaw! That's gonna hurt really bad. Remember the time when you're still in school  and have sport activity with your fellow? There's a chance that a ball flies to your face. That's hurt, right? Multiply that pain by 10 or so and you know the pain inflicted by Duke there. 

 

And then i meet the pair of The Skinny and The Fat. You can probably guess that the fatman can clobber you with his portly belly. But turns out he can also swipe a handgun and shoot you. So that's the mystery of him carries gun answered. But unlike the mad soldier, you can duck fatman's bullet harmlessly.  

 

At the end of this stage, a punk boss appears! He's keen on hopping kick. That's him retracted his leg after extending it for a while to do his hopping kick. He's not attacking me by doing "cannonball" move, mind you! It's not hard to defeat him. Wait till he lands then grabs him. Simple and easy.

Forget about Rocky! I'm very eager to see movie about this most stylish vigilant to beat criminals and rogue sport athletes, especially by twist their ears off. It will be the most remarkable action-comedy film of the year!

 

I think those words are true especially in job seeking reality.     

 

The boss is just another combination of common enemy: The Sgt Gun and The bald shorty.

 

Plot twist! There's another enemy in this boss section and she manages to throw knife at my back, the un-sportive sod.

 

You hold your own hand? That's quite awkward. If i'm in this scenario, i will clench my fists really hard instead hold my own hand.

 

As you can see from my health bar, this sub-boss section really gives me trouble. Basically any team-up with the punk is deadly.

Oh, look! Pair of the bastard as Boss stage. Great! Actually this is bit easier than last team because none of them here can shoot my face or back.

This is it, ladies and gentlemen! The final stage. The moveset is same with the first level but the "Ear Twister" move with "Pile Driver" move. Both of them deal 3 bars damage. Here's the difference: Ear Twister has fast execution on first part, you can hold the buttons to increase the damage up to 3 bars or you can release them to inflict less damage but to avoid getting interrupted by other enemy. Also the overall move takes longer time than Pile Driver. While "Pile Driver" inflicts flat 3 bars of damage, is slightly faster than "Ear Twister" with maximum damage output, and nails enemy down to the ground. Overall, i like "Pile Driver" move more

 

Before reach the Final boss i have to fight the mohawk cousin: the assassin and the breakdancer. I really hate the latter ones so he deserve to be pinned down to the ground like this.

 

You probably expecting something different then another pairs of common enemy as Final Boss and you're right. Who's the fool who put once-encountered foes as final boss, anyway?  The final boss is most likely cartoonish and evil version of Rambo judging by his headband and bazzooka that he's carrying. Beside able to shoot rockets, he has some of Duke's moves like drop kick and bull ram. But he's not so difficult to deal with.

 

After the enemy is pinned down to the ground, Duke pisses on his face. No, that's not happening. Nintendo won't approves this game on NES if that happened, even though the fake Rambo probably deserves that treatment. Real hero mustn't shows obnoxious behavior like that, you see. It's Bad Street Brawler not the infamous Postal 2.

 

For liberating his hometown from any evil men (and animals), Duke Davis is being paraded. With luxury car, dozens of confetti, and such. His mother must be proud of him. Happy end! I like to point out that he's way different than in manual's cover. He looks more handsome like Ken from Barbie's. Here's the picture.

 

That's it for Beam Software's Bad Street Brawler (1989). Is it bad? Surprisingly (to me): no. It's decent and fun 2D Beat 'em up. Although the game has such cruelty like tight time limit, only 3 live to finish the game with no password of save/load point, no in-game pause! Even though you can get extra live by collecting enough score, that's still not nice design. I only manage to get one in my playthrough there. For game with limited live/continue, it feels too long to have 15 levels. Luckily you can run away from unnecessary battle relatively easy and fast. The variety of moveset and enemy pads the game's longevity well. But i wonder why tiger only appears once. Maybe because the devs know that there's flaw on its design that they decide it only appear once. The musics are fairly good for NES chip. The graphics is very good for its time. Duke's moves are well-varied in esthetic and functionality although some of them have loose hit-detection.

Bad Street Brawler ain't Capcom's Final Fight but it's fairly well designed 2D brawler game and it's quite fun to play. But should you want to finish it, i suggest you do so via emulation for save/load state and pause. The game will be more fairer although it's not very difficult to beat originally. Also mind those breakdancing and skateboarding bastards.