The bones of my knuckles protrude through the dilapidated tatters of my crimson-stained skin. A cool evening breeze carries away the reeking scent of my singed hair and charred clothes. My thoughts are a jumbled mess, floating around inside my concussed cranium. A mile-long trail of unconscious thugs chronicles our path through the city, but at long last, our mission has reached its conclusion. The mayor’s daughter is safe again.
“I won’t let anything bad happen to you again” Mike Haggar promises his young blonde daughter as he clenches her close to his massive, muscled chest. You said it, big buddy; you said it. No way could this ever happen again.
I didn’t play much of Final Fight growing up, but I played enough games like it to know what to expect. Like any good beat em up, the object is to endlessly beat up an army of thugs who never seem to get dismayed when all their buddies are lying on the ground in a pool of blood. I sometimes ponder where they get their unending confidence from. “Well, these two guys just beat the tar out of all my buddies but they can’t be that tough.”
Some swear Final Fight is the greatest beat ‘em up, but it doesn’t really do anything special. You can punch, jump kick, grapple, throw and do a life-draining special attack, but it lacks the depth of Streets of Rage 2 and Aliens vs. Predator. Still, it features a quirky cast of colorful characters and is still a lot of fun to play. There are three characters to choose from: Cody, Guy and Haggar.
Cody is the jeans-wearing pretty boy who’d break your nose if you ever called him that to his face. He’s the most balanced of the group and probably the best all-around character.
Guy rocks an orange jumpsuit and is the speed demon of the bunch. If there were a female character in this game, she’d be Guy.
Haggar is a lumbering oaf of testosterone and beef jerky. He finds shirts too restrictive and prefers to keep his pants in check with a suspender belt. His pecs are so massive he keeps his arms extended at his side like wings. At any moment he could clap his monstrous hands together and reduce a man’s head to brain pudding. He’s the offspring of a lumberjack and a grizzly bear and he punched his way out of that bear’s womb. He’s also the mayor of this messed-up town.
Speaking of which, remind me to steer clear of this bloodbath of a city, which exists in the same universe as the Street Fighter series. Street Fighter vets should see a few familiar faces such as Sodom, Rolento and Hugo.
All of the characters are big and colorful and they still look great. This version has a few different graphical options, but as long as you steer clear of the washed-out “smooth” mode you’ll be fine. One of the modes simulates an arcade cabinet by showing artwork on the side and using a curved screen. Starting a new game is like plunking a coin in the arcade and anyone else on Xbox Live can join the action; there is also a mode for private offline games. You can choose to break faces to the original tunes or an awesome remixed soundtrack.
Being an arcade game, the action is intense and punishingly difficult. It’s a quarter muncher and sometimes it is impossible to avoid getting hit several times before you can attack an enemy. Mercifully, the game provides unlimited continues.
The baddies have some hilarious names such as “Dug” and “Bred.” Others clearly rip off late-80’s pop culture as “Slash” and “Poison.” And who can forget “Abigail,” the hulking boss of the first level, “Holly Wood” and “Wong Who.”
The second game in this double dose of arcade nostalgia is Magic Sword. It is a pure 2D side-scroller where you and a buddy fight through fifty levels of a tower in order to destroy a mystical talisman to save the world. Along the way you collect keys to rescue imprisoned helpers such as wizards and ninjas who provide assistance.
The levels are short and sweet and the game is colorful, but with 4 characters all operating on the same 2D plane, it can be difficult to discern who you are controlling. There’s not a whole lot else to say about Magic Sword. It’s not a bad game, but there’s no wonder the package is called Final Fight: Double Impact and not Magic Sword: Double Impact.
For ten bucks, anyone with even a miniscule amount of nostalgia for beat ‘em ups should pick up Final Fight: Double Impact. With online play, remixed music and a bonus game, this is a perfect example of how to release classic arcade games.