Fighting Masters (Genesis)

Let's do another fighting game! How about Treco's Fighting Masters (1992)? The title seems assuring, right?

Few lightning bolts lit the title then it's fully lit like this. The eagle's stare is empty. But that's what you get after become stuffed bird. The letter "T" looks like sword without handle. But don't be fooled there's no sword in this game. This isn't Asura Blade, mind you. If you leave the title alone, there's some demo and...

 

... the background story of Fighting Master, which is duel for the survival of alien race from giant sun that soon become gigantic nuclear blast. It's quite grim, i say. This is the US version story, by the way. The Japan version is more typical heroic story: you're the fighting master that want to free entire galaxy by defeating Evil Lord and other fighting masters that's currently brainwashed by said Evil Lord. To be honest, i like latter story because i'm idealistic git. 

 

I start the 1 player game. There's 12 characters you can choose. I know this game since i was elementary schooler, so i know exactly what/who i choose and that is: Zygrunt. Look at his mean eye, sharp pincers, and tough-looking carapace. He's clearly up for the fight. You may consider him as space lobster thus his meat could be top-class delicacy on whole universe. That's certainly negative impression for fierce warrior but at least it could be his charm point for you to choose as, right?

 

My first fight is against Morin who's blonde lass with metal bikini because she's prideful Amazon, i think. The fighting masters are dropped to fighting arena via tractor beam. It's like the opening of Mr. Bean!

 

You can see from the health bar i got bad starter. That's because my memory keep mis-informs me that 'C' button does nothing while in fact it's 'A' button is the useless ones. There's 2 action buttons: 'B' button to attack and 'C' to jump. You can press any button to perform grapple if you're very close to your opponent. For example: this driver is performed by  pressing attack button in close-up.

 

The indication of fighting master get real damage is they turn yellow and emit loud noise like someone slams metal garbage bin to the pavement really hard. To constantly damage your opponent you have to rely on grapple/contact/throw. While normal attacks only to either knockback or stun your opponent. Well, sometime they can harm your opponent especially when he/she/it attack you. I called that outmaneuver hit. 

 

If you think that yellow flash is unpleasant. I got bad news for you. Everything except the winner will turn flashy yellow on decisive hit. Also there's will be loud sound of iron sheeting being hit by hammer from low-grade electronic recorder. It's spectacular but can be considered irritating, i mean ear-ritating.

 

Jumping kick of Victory! There's no standard victory pose. Your fighting master moves on its own. You can only hope for cool move like this.    

 

Next fight is against Grinder, the alien who wear armor that looks like belong to skateboarder. It attacks by using breakdancing move. Not 100 % Capoeira. More like 50% Capoeira and 50% shoot-fighting. It's my older brother's champion, by the way. It's quite easy to beat or at least not as hard as when my older brother controls it.

 

Next opponent: Goldrock, sentient rock with Pharaoh's headwear who's my other favorite. With kick that low, he's hardly formidable, right?  

 

Nice Tomoe Nage there, Goldrock. I salute you. There's way to reap extra damage from throw/grapple/contact move and that is: throw your opponent to side wall so he/she/it will receive at least 2 impacts from that move: wall impact and ground impact. Each impact of throw/grapple/contact move worth 2 - 3 health bars. So positioning is critical.  

 

Death Pincers Attack! I'm sorry if you feel nausea with this glorious yet horrid visual image. Do note that in motion, the final moment of the fight may induces epileptic seizure. Do mind that!  

 

Phoenix isn't the mythical fire bird that able to resurrect itself like we all know. It's more like birdman. But if you look closely on its wings, they're not what birds have. They more like what gargoyles have. Thing for sure is Phoenix can flies around and it won't hesitate to do so. Probably, to mock/taunt at you. The annoying sod. 

 

And he can do German Suplex. I believe the game on my previous article has this kind of move. Only fairly jankier than this.

 

Even with extra hitpoints that i get from previous win, i can't win against this bastard. Other reason why i lose beside he can fly: he can grab after i'm being thrown! Rule of thumb on this game: if you succesfully throw your opponent, you have to make distance otherwise he can grab you back. Probably Treco's implement that so you can't get totally cornered and give you chance to fight back. But somehow this bastard defies that system. Maybe he's faster than me. But still that's clearly unfair! Fine! I'll use savestate in this fight.

 

There you go! I assume Zygrunt standing punch here in victory move, is equal to flipping the bird. I normally hesitate to approve impolite behavior. But this time, i'm satisfied with that.

 

Next opponent is Rotundo, a fat alien that has strange capelet like what clowns wear. And he got rolling jump which is great aerial move. In this case what you going to do? Throw projectile? Do anti-air uppercut? You can't do any of that because there's no special move like that. All the fighting masters can do is grapple, jump, and attack. Yes, this isn't Street Fighter 2-clone. Think of this game as Tekken 2D with simple move, grapple as main damaging move, and alien characters, instead.

 

Basically, every fighting masters can do standing attack, crouching attack, jumping attack, jumping downward attack, and 2 grapple moves. Some of fighting masters have additional move like Phoenix can fly, Rotundo can do spinning jumping attack, Goldrock can do diving headbutt, or Zygrunt has this extra grapple: it do small backbreaking move before throw its opponent behind it by smaller distance. To activate this move, you press up button + "B" button. No full circle motion needed it here.  

 

Next fighting master that i confront next is Xenon, who is a dragon that bears name of a noble gas. His standard attack is fire breathing that has longest range than other and more consistency on damaging. But he's slow and his grapple isn't so damaging. So he's easy to defeat. Next opponent!

 

Dio (insert your own joke about JoJo series here because i don't either watch or read them) here is an evolution of piranha plant that we don't ask for. I mean it's walking and has developed teethed arms. You can guess that it likes to bite any of its opponent. Isn't it just....awesome? That's why Dio is another of my favorite character.

 

Here comes strong opponent: Uppecut, the boxing blue Cyclops. He wears same color trouser as Revenant from Doom 2, i see. That's quite explain why he's so aggresive.

Next fight is against Dirk, the blonde male in swimming trunk like pant. He's almost like normal human. I mean he has funny long feet there. That's clearly what not normal human posses.

 

Hey! I can see Goldrock's house from here. No way Goldrock not live in that gorgeous pyramid. Well, it's no longer live there because -you know- i killed it.

 

Dirk is another weak opponent. I can easily throw him around and all he can do is curling in fetal position.

 

My next opponent is Mastodon. He has name from prehistoric elephant but looks more like Ganesha minus 1 pair of arm and more into wrestling than intellect stuffs. He's quite interesting character in both visual and moveset.

 

Another fighting master with funny long feet: Equus, the kickboxing horseman. Luckily he has hair that looks like fire. That should help him to balance his appearance's quality.

 

Note to self: don't make fun of someone's funny long feet! Even though it's true fact.

 

Now it's boss time: He has mean eyes and horns that befits to demon lord or what have you. Also he has buff like Hulk. Is he Space Hulk? Not really.

Apparently, Valgasu live alone in this deserted moon. Hey that's same planet view on backstory. Yes, i digress. What else i can say about Valgasu except he has highest hitpoints, and highly damaging move befitting final boss, huh? He has long limbs so his attack reach longer than me, too.

 

HULK VALGASU SMASH!!!  

 

Valgasu also has shorter distance when he got knocked back which can be utilized to my advantage and everyone has same recovery time from stun. That means i can more easily grab him than everyone else. Also, his grapples only makes me stay in place (although still inflict tremendous damage) so the advantage of wall's impact is only belong to me.

 

And The mighty Valgasu has been finished by Zygrunt's driver. Crowd goes wild. Not really. It's this entire place that goes wild.  

 

With that *dead* Valgasu and other aliens got destroyed by upcoming Nova. At least i don't need to give him proper burial, good for me. The game start with naration and end with naration too. No further ending of Zygrunt's men live happily ever after. Not even one still image.

 

Then credit rolls along with group of Grinder dance in void. They're really into it. You will get this ending in every difficulty level.    

My biggest issue with fighting games (especially Street Fighter 2 clone) that whenever i start, i have obligation to know the movelist. So often, i have to search internet for it. While in Fighting Masters (1992), i don't meet that problem because of its simple gameplay. I aware that such simplistic gameplay may throws off both common player or professional gamer. But at least, it's something that kid can enjoy (i know, i did). With simple move, you have to rely on positioning/maneuver heavily. Also grapple is your main method of damaging, you have to get used to that. The difference between character is fairly shallow but if you see them thoroughly you can feel it well. For example: Zygrunt standing attack has bit-elevated angle while Goldrock's is straight and low. There's only 3 fighting place: Chinatown, Coliseum, Barren Moon (where you fight Valgasu), and Riverside with weird trees. The last ones has the most fantastic look. The musics are not so good except the one in Chinatown. The graphic is quite good for bit gritty fighting game in Sega Megadrive/Genesis.

To put it simply, i can recommend you to play Fighting Masters (1992) in two-player mode. Playing in one-player mode is inadvisable but commendable because Phoenix that cheat and uniform ending. Or you don't bother at all. It's not like there will be huge Nova that marks universe's doomsday, comes soon if you don't play this game at all. :p 

By the way, you can see other review made by someone else that has deeper character's commentary here.