by griffinmills
One of my favorite, possibly the favorite, arcade games of all time is Final Fight. Although simple enough in game play it has stood the proverbial test of time in my heart to the point where I've even got a stand-up Jamma cabinet with it in the garage!
As I make my way through the back catalog of Bombcasts I notice that the crew has, more or less, declared the side-scrolling beat-'em-up brawler a dead genre in the modern era. The prevailing wisdom being that old game play style doesn't cut it in the world of today and in order for someone to make a modern brawler they will need to re-invent or innovate game play severely. I always consider that part of the issue here is the Arcade origins were rather unforgiving game play goes hand in hand with quarter pumping profit making. Arcade games also used to be where you had to go for the best version of a game with better graphics and sound, a phenomenon that is more or less extinct in these times. With that in mind, here are some console games, ports and originals, that I thought made great home game substitutes for that arcade experience. Bear in mind that they needn't have an arcade equivalent and that I'm looking that them in their time, and through rose colored glasses perhaps a bit.
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This may be a surprise number one for some folks but this Game Boy SP variant of Final Fight is easily the best port of Final Fight. Graphics and Sound are perfect, sound being arcade quality if not exact reproduction audio, with little of that remix meddling mindset that sometimes goes overboard and unchecked in home ports. Game play is intact and also perfect from the arcade with 2 player mode supported via link cable. Options are all there from the arcade version as well and those of us in the know can appreciate how many their actually are despite how cryptic they may appear. With all these "perfects" being thrown around you might wonder what they did at all to make it any more than a simple emulated port. Well difficulty BEYOND the arcade is supported! These higher difficulties manage to cram even more enemies on screen than the most crowded arcade Final Fight moments with no additional slow down or sprite flicker. Boss fights have some fun and simple dialog story text added to them which is easily and completely skipped for purists that prefer it not exist. Options for rapid fire turbo and the SNES classic "extra joy" button config are present, huge pluses for anyone that isn't playing a brawler on a stand up arcade cabinet. Game play progress is saved in between stages and a stage select option is present which is always good for a portable system. This version even features extra playable characters in Guy and Cody wearing their Street Fighter Alpha attire and small changes to their game play styles. Really the love and attention that went in to getting Final Fight One really makes it stand out. You can tune it to be any variant you prefer, Arcade, SNES and beyond, without forcing those options down our throat.
Known as the Rushing Beat (Ran) series in Japan, this SNES only Jaleco title is a sequel to Rival Turf, also a SNES only title which will appear further on down this list. The Rushing Beat series plays a bit with the Final Fight formula a bit but doesn't stray too far beyond what Capcom themselves would eventually do in their own titles. You can dash around, small Street Fighter 2-esque inputs produce "hidden" moves, environments have hazards like bottomless pits and land mines, characters have a taunt move and a bit of an extended arsenal in throws and situational attacks like hitting foes while they are down and also an expanded list of 5 playable characters rather than the standard 2 to 3 of the day. The Rushing Beat series also features "Ikari Mode" AKA "Angry Mode" where your character will be invincible and do severely more damage via upgraded grapple throws after taking a set amount of damage which was a TON of fun and very satisfying when the CPU enemies try to cheese you in a big pile on. Like its predecessor it was also two player simultaneous co-op unlike the original SNES Final Fight, a very important factor for those of us playing SNES games with our buddies back in the day! Graphics and Sound are average-to-good, for a SNES game, with some of the soundtrack being really memorable stuff. Also of note is that a simple button code (press xyba repeatedly on the Jaleco screen) would turn the game in to the Japanese localized version which had a few differences worth losing out on the ability to read the typical tepid beat-'em-up plot cut-scenes. In the Japanese version enemies would hold their groins when you give them a shot in the jewels and a few levels had different layouts and such, for the better in my opinion. On the hardest difficulties this game is no joke and the game play supports the challenge. Likely one of the most overlooked titles that will appear on this list but also likely one of the most "of its time" games on the list as game play may be far too stale for the gamers of today.
I've been moving this up and down the list. This XBLA and PSN release is pure emulation of the arcade board for game play so it's pretty good eh? Lots of cool features including video modes that set the game in a virtual arcade cabinet and simulate that arcade CRT look. Plenty of extras like concept art and remix soundtracks. Online play so you can play two players simultaneous whenever. Unfortunately the emulation approach means they could not add functionality like Final Fight One with extra enemies and changed up difficulties or even challenge levels like in Final Fight CD. Options seem extremely limited as well, no turbo fire and no EXTRA JOY! The most arcade perfect you can get and easily available.
Unfortunately I don't see a way to individually list many of the SNES releases of this game to various platforms so I'll have to put a catch all entry here for the SNES release and hit a few highlights. If I could put a variant at #3 it would be the SNES Final Fight and then a tie with SNES Final Fight Guy. SNES Final Fight was visually nigh-arcade perfect and the sound was an excellent reproduction as well. It was only single player and had a hard limit of only 3 enemies on-screen at a time with Andore or Boss enemies counting double towards that. When you consider that level 1 of Metro City ends with you fighting 4+ enemies simultaneously you may start to see a bit of a problem here. Sound Effects were hit a bit hard, most of them are there but the character specific samples for Haggar and Cody are not, replaced with a generic pitch-modulated roar although this game does have the crowd pleasing "Oh my CAR!" rather than the arcade "Oh my GOD!" Another famous change would be the female enemies Poison and Roxy getting their sex changed and becoming Billy and Sid... and no I don't want to get into the whole Poison transvestite thing. Also, Final Fight SNES was missing an entire stage from the arcade port and Guy himself was not present until the, originally Japan only, Final Fight Guy was released. Thankfully Blockbuster Video eventually snagged a license to rent copies of this version for the US. Final Fight Guy was, appropriately enough, missing Cody from the mix. Although they put in a truncated set of the audio for Guy from the Arcade and a small amount of changes here and there it was essentially identical its brother release. Let me leave no doubt though, this version was mind blowing at the time and is as game play faithful a port as you'll see on SNES of a CPS1 arcade game but in this day and age of emulation and myriad ports to newer hardware there is really no reason to go back to SNES. IF YOU DO go and try out this version be sure use the code (L shoulder button + Start at the title screen) that allows you to open up all the options and check out the awesomeness that is Extra Joy (it maps the special move of Attack+Jump to its own button!)!
A completely superior port to the SNES versions for Sega CD that gets ranked below said versions? Arcade perfect visuals, superior to even the SNES versions with only a small complaint to be had about the animation being a tad loose. All audio samples completely intact for all characters including some honest to god voice acting for Cody, Guy, Haggar, Jessica and Thrasher/Damnd. All I have to say about that is, "Hee Hee Hee, MISTER Haggar!" Music is Red Book audio remixes of the arcade tunes and are a fun novelty but sometimes stray just a bit too far from the originals. Game play is arcade faithful, even more so than the SNES versions in that you can have quite a few more enemies on screen at once, up to 5 (typically 4) with few limits on whether they are big bosses or Andores, etc. Two Player simultaneous also seals the deal here vs. the single player only SNES. Also featured a time attack mode with 3 different stages which throw a player into new areas created specifically for this version and ask them to kill as many enemies as they can in 60, very slow, seconds on a limited number of lives. The only real reason this gets knocked down to #4 is it came out way too late and on friggin' Sega CD, for $299 bucks plus the cost of the game itself it is just hard to rank this any higher than the SNES variants. Historically this game is worth a play through for the Voice and Music! (This should be the last of Final Fight cluttering up the list for a while as well.)
For the purposes of this list we are discussing the NES version. The NES version is one of the better NES games ever made, to be honest. Even when we had a SNES we would still pop this bad boy in and play. Amazingly faithful to the Double Dragon II arcade game for a NES game. Graphics are top notch for NES as is the Sound and Music. Two Player simultaneous with a variety of modes, essentially rules for being able to hit each other, this game had it all over the NES Double Dragon. There is even a bit of story telling in between levels! This game is worth a whirl to see 8-bit brawling done right.
One of the first games that could make a boast of being better than arcade perfect. Graphics and sound were on par with the original arcade game and it even had an additional boss after Death Adder (jr.) was killed! Having the arcade experience in your home was the epitome of bad ass for video game dorkery in the 90's. Play this or the Arcade game if you call yourself a Beat 'em Up aficionado.
The fourth home game of Double Dragon continues the up and down motion of quality with an upswing of quality. The graphics and sound are strictly early SNES quality stuff but they are serviceable. Gameplay has all the Double Dragon tropes you've come to expect and some fun new stuff. A meter you manually charge up to unleash spin kicks and such and a counter attack stance button that lets you catch enemy punches and kicks and then return them with brutality. The game played slowly, not painfully so but... methodical. It was also very LONG. Reserve an evening for a two player wade through Double Dragon IV, it might surprise you a bit.
Essentially a fully fleshed out and NES specific version of Renegade. This game, like Double Dragon II for NES, shows what you can really do even on an 8-bit system. For some reason never really as popular as it deserved this franchise has maintained a cult(?) following that has seen it slowly get sequels on nearly ever platform in one way or another. Gameplay is a mix of Double Dragon and RPG elements where you literally beat up kids for their lunch money and spend it for power ups. There is ongoing dialog commentary along the bottom of the screen at all times and a bit of story cut-scenes here and there. There have been a lot of ports and improved versions of this over the years so grab whatever variant is easiest for you to get a hold of and try it out, totally worth it.
Essentially a 2010 remake of River City Ransom. Seriously! Different enough to be worth checking out but the game play is firmly rooted in a bygone era. The soundtrack is amazing and obviously the graphics of today tend to smash those of a 1980's NES game. Available on PSN, XBLA and likely the newest game you'll see on this list hence its lower placement.