Blood Warrior (Arcade)

What bloody fighting game that come out on your mind? Not aggravatingly difficult, awfully cumbersome to play or anything like that. I mean the ones that exhibits vast bloodbath that makes dozens of leeches inflated like parade balloons. I bet your answer: Midway's Mortal Kombat. How about Kaneko's "Blood Warrior" (1994)? It must be contain huge amount of blood too, right?! As the title contains word 'blood'.   

See! There's blood spill. We off with the good start. I can guarantee the game feature  'really violent and bloody' action. So for those who have weak heart. I suggest you refrain from reading this article further. I mean it.

 

From legend that i heard from many source (E.G Detective Conan/Case Closed manga), Benkei is a mighty warrior who died on two leg. Also he master lots of melee weapons. That's pretty much reason why he is my favorite. And my first opponent is Arashi, the ninja with big shuriken tucked on his back. No way that shuriken is made of real steel. It's too heavy to carry around on ninja's back, you see. So, i suspect he's not real ninja. That toy shuriken can't makes me falter, stupid git.

 

Don't tell me that this isn't the best stand-out between two guys with mouth mask ever! Just look at those eyes! They're full of killing intent. Both of them are really serious about having deadly match. 

 

Here they're having battle which will ends in one will survive and the other will be dead. As you can see on previous screenshot: the game told us about movelist in character selection. This 'rolling the explosive spiked ball' move is executed with top move instruction. Beside the digitized style of the characters, Blood Warrior features 4 attack buttons: light punch, light kick, heavy punch and heavy kick. Proving that the game is certainly Mortal-Kombat clone. But there's no another button for blocking. Instead, hold back direction to block attacks. Street Fighter II-style.

 

Benkei won the first round then he repeatedly giving Arashi thumb down and saying "You're green". If i'm not wrong: It's common in Japan that stating someone as green mean he/she is naive fool. But when it's directly translated into English like this, foreigner barely know what that means. So, i assume you can replace 'green' with 'greenhorn' which is wild west term for quasi-smart idiot. Well related, right?  

 

Unintentionally i capture a moment where Benkei smashes Arashi right in his crotch using sledgehammer. I can feel how painful it is. Perhaps to you as well, male reader.

 

A game isn't legit Mortal-Kombat clone, if it doesn't contain fatality/finishing move. Blood Warrior features it. So it's really genuine Mortal-Kombat clone. Here Benkei throw spiked ball with chain toward Arashi...

 

...and turns him into bloody bird bath! But i don't think there's any bird that want to chill there. Blood-sucking ones, perhaps? Is that kind of bird exist? I digress. The point is: Arashi is certainly dead and Benkei can move on to next opponent.

But first he takes picture of himself being smug. Yes, we know you're the winner. No need to be arrogantly cheer like that, buster! -_-

His next opponent is Ikkyu. Someone on internet informs me that Ikkyu-san *LOL* is Ksitigarbha, Buddha statue that sets on roadside or graveyards. Why statue can suffer bleeding like this? Maybe he's Buddhist monk that cosplay as living Ksitigarbha as part of certain religion duty. Oh, okay.

 

This one become bloody bird bath too. My favorite character #10 in Touhou Project is Shikieki Yamaxanadu who once a Ksitigarbha. So i kind of feel bad to treat Ikkyu this brutal.

ARRGH! Get of me! Though Kasumi dons pair of claws that are smaller than Gen-an's. She's still vicious as hell. She may has sweet hairstyle but she can be as dangerous as Marvel's Wolverine.

 

Hus! Hus! Stay away from me or i makeover your face with this giant spiked ball! This special move is executed by tapping punch repeatedly (it's written on bottom of movelist). It's like Honda's thousand slap except Benkei spins spiked ball 'n chain instead slaps forward rapidly. 

 

I almost lose 1 round but she's still the loser. You know what loser's fate in this game? Yes. He/she get fatality'd. There's 2 fatalities. Both of them are finishing version of the special moves and executed by simple button pressing like only punch button or kick button. Another Benkei's fatality move: giant version of rolling spiked ball that will make his opponent blow into smithereens of innards and bloods. And somehow leaving her head is intact. "How to determine which fatality that i want to execute?". By standing position of your character, perhaps. Or pressing different attack button. I'm unsure about it.

 

Kinshiro has sword, tattoo, samurai hairstyle, and machismo. He's badblood swordsman. Then, BHAM! He got spiked ball right in his face. He's nothing compare to the legendary armed-to-teeth, Benkei. Next opponent!

 

What the heck? No way kappa can stretch his arm like that. I blame Dhalsim for teaching this bastard his-own style of yoga.  

 

Okay, you win. No need to slap your own buttcheek to taunt me, you impudent jerk! So far my opponent are vulnerable to jumping attack. But this git can outmaneuvers me by stretching his arm upwardly.

Sometime Benkei can roll bigger spiked ball than usual ones. It occurs in the middle of battle, not only for fatality. This is related to super bar that's located below life bar. The longer super bar that you can accumulate, the stronger your attack. It's more notably for special moves. So by utilizing the super bar, your character can unleash more damaging attack. Also throw bigger projectiles or so on. To fill the super bar, you have to get hit (worst way) or block successfully (best way) your opponent attack. But keep in mind that your opponent can do the same thing.  

 

Even with that powerful knowledge, Sanpei defeats Benkei relatively easy. Did you know that in real history, the assault from throng of Kappa is the cause of Benkei's downfall? Thus explaining why i lose here. Of course, NOT. He perished by hail of arrows instead of assault of supernatural Japanese aquatic creatures. A story says that confronting Benkei in melee combat is practically suicide. So his enemies gave him arrow shower. There's bit history lesson from me.

After few attempt, i realize that turtling in Blood Warrior is really paid-off as long as you can counter your opponent successfully after blocking. That's because blocking powered special move can boost your super bar heftily. Also every special attack and normal attack will deplete it. So spamming your special moves in the beginning, is inadvisable. You have to be patient and careful for perfect opportunity to attack.

 

Finally, Benkei can kill the bastard. It's obvious he's green, Benkei-san. Someone tell Nitori Kawashiro that her crazy uncle is gone for good (means for both forever and good favor).

 

Not all powered version of special work well for my benefit. For example: Benkei rolling big spiked ball collide with Syogetho's projectile. While the original ones can passes underneath it then proceed to hit him.

 

Again, Benkei's opponent has anti-air trick to defeat him. Also Syogetho is fully armored and has two swords. So he's certainly better samurai than you, Kinshiro.

 

Achieving victory, Syogetho proceed to mock me by displaying his clenched teeth expression of seriousness (to irritate me). I'll destroy that facial expression of you along with your live and body, you annoying git.

 

The solution to defeat Syogetho: less relying on 'rolling spiked ball' move and more relying on 'chain spiked ball throwing' move. The latter is semi-projectile move that can smash projectile and hopefully its owner. The catch is: it has slightly shorter range than the former. But both of them are excellent to counter projectile shooting move, mind you!

 

Now is my sweet revenge time, bastard. Sniper_revenge01.wav

 

You can probably guess that the CPU opponent is selected in the roster from left to right and from top rows to bottom rows. There's no random selection on CPU opponent. So my next opponent: Shishimaru. Isn't that name of Hattori's pet dog (from Ninja Hattori-kun manga)? Just a thought.

The slide doors open, revealing cheering audiences and Benkei got smacked by Shishimaru's hair swipe. The crowd goes wild. What's with Kabuki actors in video game that can attack with their long hair? Is it common in Kabuki art, to strengthen your hair so you can use it as weapon?

 

Not enough with slashing me with his hair, Shishimaru can cast lightning from his hand Emperor Palpatine-style. Since when Kabuki art is included in Sith's teaching?

 

You remember when i said my opponent are getting better at anti-air? Thus i resolve with 'fierce strikes on Shishimaru's shin' plan. And it works well! Notice that Benkei never perform kick? That's because he's like Dudley from Street Fighter 3 or M.Bison/Balrog from Street Fighter II. The boxers never kick their opponent even if you pressed kick button so many time. Because kicks are replaced by different form of punches. While in Benkei's case, he use blunt weapons (such as spiked mace) for "punches" and he use sharp weapons (such as scythe or sickle) for "kicks". He's weaponmaster, afterall.

 

Darn! I always think that mirror match is always atrocious in fighting game. Especially if your clone know how to throw while you don't. Besides, having same moveset.

Okay, fine! You're better Benkei than me. I quit.

Yes, of course. I don't mean to stop playing Blood Warrior. I just want to stop being Benkei and become someone else. That mirror match was too aggravating for me, Mr. Japanese Skeleton King/ Leoric ō-sama.

Thus, i become (resurrected) Arashi. And finally i know how to throw. By pressing forward and either both punch buttons or both kick buttons, your character will initiate grabbing. This fine yet simple grab method reminds me of Street Fighter Alpha 3.

 

Arashi can conjures fire pillars that quite equivalent to Benkei's rolling spiked ball. He also can waving his knives around him that can be use to counter jumping attack. I can tell that Arashi's moveset is as good as Benkei's or even slightly better. So back there Arashi's AI is really stupid fit for beginner. So, i conclude that Kaneko really know how to set the difficulty progression. Too bad for Arashi that he will be always the easiest CPU controlled opponent.

 

Arashi also has magnificent sliding kick. But unlike ninjas from Mortal Kombat series, it's not special move. It's just simple crouching heavy kick which is more easily to execute. And i'm more than happy to spam this move.

 

Pyro_specialcompleted01.wav.

 

Thus Benkei can rest peacefully, away from this cruel tournament. God bless him.

 

But, that's the face of not giving scrap about anything anymore instead of serene death. Whatever. Onward to next opponent!

 

Hey! Don't try to imitate my slick sliding kick, you wretch! I believe Goemon here is based on Goemon Ishikawa the famous thief in ancient Japan. No wonder he doesn't mind to steal Arashi's art of sliding kick.

 

I almost beat him in consecutive rounds. But he manages to grab me and piledriver me. Yes, the old-Japan thief know modern wrestling technique. I got mixed feeling between "I regret nothing" and "Now, i've seen everything".

 

In the end, my sliding kick is the best. You can't go far with stolen technique, you thieving git.

Then Arashi chop him into fine two pieces. I may doubt him as ninja, what's with that oversized toy shuriken and he shouts like Bruce Lee when he win. But he's certainly professional on killing business like ninja. Next victim opponent, please!

No other competitor to fight, i mean no boss character? I heard the prequel features unfair difficult boss. So, thank God for this. I really love the festivity. Everyone is so cheerful. The happy guy in pink kimono keep walking from right to left. The Kabuki actor keep spinning his head and his hair in merriment, even though Benkei has killed his fellow, Shishimaru. Despite his covered mouth, i can feel that Arashi is smiling happily. Too bad Leoric isn't here. He encourage me to continue this tournament. Thus he deserve to be here along with the celebrating crowd. Staff credit displayed on the bottom of this screen and with small fonts. No need to be shy with making this video game! It's wonderful, really.

Blood Warrior is one of Mortal-Kombat clone that shows "Simplicity is the best" to the player also bunch of zaniness. The hit detections are sensible. The music aren't much memorable to me, but at least pretty good. The fatality and super move system is simple yet well practical. By the way, the super bar mechanism creates intense fighting match. The violence graphic moves toward wacky direction instead of horrible direction IMO. As i mentioned before that the AI's difficulty is well made. I barely feel that the CPU are unfair or anything like that. Maybe it's just me, i feel that Goemon is easier opponent than Sanpei or Benkei. So that's quite inconsistent difficulty curve. There's no character that's clearly faster or stronger. So the fighter are differentiate with his/her sprite and moveset. Most of them have to rely on close-range heavy attack on perfect timing as sort of anti-air attack. But there's bit adequate to decent special attack that can fill that role like: Benkei's spinning spiked ball or Shishimaru's spinning hair whip. The digitized sprite and sound are great. Most of the digitized speeches are corny/funny. The overall presentation is enjoyable. The game can be finished within an hour or so.  

Overall, i can heartily recommend playing Blood Warrior in one-player mode or two-player mode. Especially if you want to play fighting game with digitized character and fatality but not as frustrating or difficult as Mortal Kombat. Just keep in mind about Sanpei, he's nefarious Yoga-practitioner unlike Dhalsim. Moreover he's supernatural aquatic being who like to seek and eat imaginary ball that's inside of human's anus.

Devil World (NES)

Finally, Team Fortress 2 got updated (it takes half year from Meat Your Match). And Pyro got new weapon (which last-time happens on several years ago) and Jetpack (that can surpasses rocket jump and sticky-bomb jump). So that means Pyro won the vote! Thank God and all incineration-loving Pyros (including me) for that. I kind of want to celebrate it with playing game where you can be a fire-breathing dragon. Because what else that excel at burning something/someone other than dragon? Here's one in Nintendo's Devil World (1984).

  

The 'w' on the title have wings because it stands for wing, you see. It must be belong to the devil who has the said world. Isn't devil's world hell? So this game supposed to be in hell? That sounds way too grim for Nintendo's game. Let's just get started, anyway!     

 

Why would you attack the devil's world? I know he's source of all evil or what have you. But there's no need to do that far to make world better place. You can simply help each other in kindness, and prevent other do despotism. No? Ok. Making misery toward Devil will work too. Maybe. 

 

First thing the devil do is showing his genitalia area. Thank you for your dick-ish act, wicked ones! -_-

 

In case you're still doubting me, that green lump creature in center is green dragon, the player. His name is Tamagon. Right now he brandishes a big cross toward that one-eyed pink demon. He has it whenever he walks into that crosses that are scattered a lot here. By having cross, Tamagon can eat those dots. Eat all of those dots and soon you clear the stage. Sounds like Pac-man, huh?!   

 

Another benefit of having the cross: Tamagon can blow fireball forward by pressing 'A' or 'B'. That's something that the Namco's mascot can't do: burning the ghosts crisply, he only know how to eat drugs dots and his foe. The glutton git. Anyway, once the pink demon get fired (literally), he turns into sunny-side up egg and can be eaten by Tamagon (otherwise he got respawn quicker). What's the reason behind that transformation? Maybe something related to the dragon's name. 'Tamago' means egg in Japanese. And i recall a mute violent little dinosaurs called 'Gon' in manga or Tekken 3. You got the idea. Or not.

By the way, the devil isn't exactly standing idle there. He orders the demons on the outside of the screen to move the frame into direction that he desires occasionally. You can see the direction on top left or top right. The maze is within said frame. Tamagon can get squished between maze's wall and frame's border, which makes him lose his life. The maze alone is looping and standstill. It's the frame that's moving. But my brain keep suggesting me that the maze is moving. If the demons move the frame up, as if the maze will "move" down and so on. It's kind of confusing. Perhaps its concept is like realtime screen panning in ACAD or whatever. You hold the cursor and drag it down to see the drawing on upper direction and so on. I hope you understand.  Another thing worth to mention: the frame moves smoothly in horizontal direction and moves jerky in vertical direction. So it's easier to anticipate maze that "moves" vertically than horizontally.

 

After finish eating all the dots, Tamagon move to next section of his assault. He must collects all 4 floating holy books and puts them on 4 slots in skull symbol box that located in the center of the maze. The holy book work like cross: Tamagon can unleash fire breath if he possesses it. Unlike cross that can be obtained infinitely. The holy books only exist 4 on this stage and if you put one of them on the slot, Tamagon will be defenseless. So, careful forward planning is quite mandatory here. Holy book's position is fixed on screen not within the maze unlike crosses. Though the holy books is waving diagonally.

 

Here's my 1st death, i got crushed because i'm wading the maze relatively careless. The holy book that once i posses will be in the position where i die instead of returning to its initial position. Which can be helpful. Or probably not.   

 

Once i place the last of holy books, the maze is blinking and the devil cower in fear or pain. You're doomed, goddamn devil!

 

Or he turns into adorable blue-colored bat and flies away. I forgot that this is Nintendo's game. I half-expected Devil's grisly death like he blows away into tiny pieces. But that's way too grim in Nintendo's judgment. "Got to flourish everything in cute way, you know?!" said Nintendo. Whatever. 

Next phase is collecting mystery box for extra points within limited time. I kind of hoping that each of them will contain free Nintendo 3DS along with some games. Now that the devil's gone, the demons obey Tamagon's direction. Or to be more accurate: the arrow symbol that he stepped on. The mechanism and the demons have to keep working. What a professionalism.

 

Next round takes place on harder maze with different color than the previous. And you have to follow the same routines: eating all dots, putting all holy books, and finally collecting the boxes. On this occasion, there's ice creams fly around the screen. I begin to suspect that this isn't hell. No way there is sweet icy mixture of milk and cream around hell like this. And with edible cone on top of that. Maybe Devil's world is amusement park's game. And Tamagon is just participant of said game. Way to go, Nintendo.

 

On next collecting-the-holy-books section, there's new enemy type: little devil. Not Koakuma, though. He is on top-left, has same skin color with the devil but has one eye and one horn. Why all Devil's vassal have one eye only? Labor union must know about this. Unlike the pink cyclops, mini devil is immune to fireball but it gives him incentive to turn around. So to him, fireball is just blocking gust.

 

After round 3, the game start to reuse the maze layout albeit with more enemies. On round 1, there are 2 pink Cyclops. Now on round 4, there are 3 pink Cyclops. That's 50% increment. Yay! [in mild tone]

 

I wasn't fast enough to turn and shoot fireball at the little devil, so Tamagon fly to heaven for his divine deed. God bless him. As for the devil. Of course, he is happy that he doesn't have to deal with the green chubby lizard...

 

...and he looks really cocky about it. Now that the troublemaker is gone. He can continue to whisper any human to do evil thing like: put thumbtack in his/her friend's shoe or use raisins instead of chocolate chips when making cookie. He do it via whisper- o-phone while putting his one leg on the desk. The vile wretch.

Devil world is definitely Nintendo's homage of Namco's Pac-man. Just like Sinistar to Asteroid. But Sinistar is bastardly hard. While Devil world is certainly more fair. My impatience and lack of forward planning are the main factor of death on my playthrough. If i play this game more carefully, i can go far in it. And can provide you with more screenshot. But that work for no-one favor. The music are sparse but fairly good. There's one in the opening that just sounds like excerpt from Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker. Most of the sound effect come from the frame machine. Implying how noisy it is. Which can be related with industrial machine. That's reasonable. The graphic is certainly retro with distinct color and shape. Maybe, the only problem with the gameplay: if Tamagon doesn't have any cross or holy book, he can only venture defenselessly the maze carefully avoiding enemy or getting squashed. But that adds the tension of the game. You probably know that Nintendo's America prohibit game that religious icon. So Devil World wasn't released in North America. Although it's designed by Takashi Tezuka and Shigeru Miyamoto. Yes, that Miyamoto-san who later designs Mario Bros. I call that irony. On the other side, it proves that Nintendo's America is admirable emphatic.

You can play the game for fun. As its gameplay is simple yet engaging. Or, if someone gives you problem. Play this game to take revenge on Devil who make him/her doing that bad deed. Not bad, for stress/anger management.

By the way, Congratulation for Pyro who got heftily updated!