An experiential and analytical look at the medium of video games in a particular order. Currently there is "Capcom A to Z," a look at the games of Capcom in alphabetical order, and "Super FamiComplete" a look at all of the games of the SNES/Super Famicom in chronological order.
So here we have our first Japanese only sequel to a Japanese only game. Wow, how far we have come in only eighty-three games. This will be a short post because there really isn't too much meat on these bones.
Background
This game was developed by Banpresto, the development company that made some, culturally, very "Japanese" games. Nowadays, they make figurines and sculptures of manga and anime figures.
If you remember from the first Great Battle, this is a super deformed take on several Japanese tokusatsu and anime franchises, and fits into its own little franchise known as the Compati Heroes series. This game includes the famous F-91 from the Gundam series, Kamen Rider, Ultraman, and an original character who ended up serving as Banpresto's mascot for the 90's, Fighter Roar (his mask is supposed to represent the mask in the Banpresto logo).
The story is a weird one to be sure: after the first game where peace had come to the world of SD Nation (remember SD means super deformed), the peace is disrupted when the weather starts to become incredibly erratic, and monsters start to appear. The heroes decide to look for the four magical Gachapon capsules (you know those little capsules you get from gumball machines with a prize inside) that can grant any wish when they are all collected. At the same time, though, the villain of this series, Dark Brain, is also on the hunt for the capsules too to enact his evil plans. Dun dun duuuuuuuuun.
Gameplay
Unlike the previous entry in the series, which was a top-down action platformer, similar to Link to the Past or Lagoon, this one is a side scrolling beat-em-up. It...is not very good to be honest. A good beat-em-up needs frenetic and fast action with set pieces, enemy variety, a varied move system. This game has none of those things. The game is barely animated, with many of your attacks using two or three frames of animation. This gives your attacks very little impact, flow, or dynamism; nothing really feels weighty or connects, so the "beat" part of the beat-em-up doesn't feel very good.
The stages overstay their welcome; each one is very long, and all every stage seems to do is just throw enemies at you. The enemies, who are all based on monsters and robots from each of the respective series, have actually very little variety. There are some stage hazards, such as sand whirlpools or ledges to fall off, but other than that you are just fighting. Finally, the moves of your character are also very basic. You have your regular punches, kicks, throws, and you can pick up weapons dropped by your enemies; instead of special moves using life, you have separate energy bars to use SOME special moves (usually a ranged attack). All in all, this game is very slow paced and boring.
There are some neat things, such as branching paths through the game. This is usually determined by the boss fights. If you can't beat the boss at the end of the stage within a certain time limit, some story contrivance will occur which will set you to one stage instead of another. This is pretty cool, but pretty much the only neat thing this game pulls off. I will also give it credit that many of the SD designs do actually look pretty darn good (plus one of the bosses is a Mummy named Chubby De David; that's amazing).
Music?
It's not bad. Not great, but not bad.
Final Verdict
While the first game was really fun, you can just tell that they rushed the sequel. It is an incredibly bare bones experience, which is a shame considering all the franchises they had at their disposal. There are THREE more main Great Battle games for the Super Famicom, so hopefully the next game will be a more enjoyable experience.
Title: Super Valis IV (NA) Super Valis: Akaki Tsuki no Otome (trans. Virgin of the Red Moon)
Release Date: 03/27/1992
Developer: Laser Soft
Publisher: Laser Soft (JP) Atlus (NA)
This is a series that I have always heard rumblings about, but had no idea really what it was. I knew it involved a female anime style protagonist, and that is really it. I usually got this confused with Aleste for Sega. Anywho, what I am saying is that this is a completely new experience for me. Let's dig in.
Background
This game ended up being the last true entrant in the Valis series, a series that, surprisingly, is not based on any existing anime/manga, but was formed off a popular manga genre: the magical girl hero genre. The series takes place on the planet of Vecantis, and the main character is a late 80s schoolgirl who is whisked from Japan, given the mystical sword Valis, and is tasked with stopping dark forces from taking over the world. Generally, the series was stretched over the PC-Engine consoles (starting on the PC-88) and the Sega Master system, with this entrant being a retelling of the PC-Engine Valis IV.
This game was developed by Telenet Japan, a games developer who were quite prolific in games that released only in Japan. This game was specifically developed by the team that would end up becoming Wolf Team, the group who would join Namco Bandai and develop the ever popular Tales series of games. Eventually, Telenet folded, and sold off the Valis series to a low-tier developer named Eants, who made the final entrant in the series, Valis X. Valis X had the ignominy of being a new direction for the series as...a hentai game that focused on heavy tentacle and lesbian sex. Yeah...well when Telenet folded in 2007, the rights to the series were scooped up by Sunsoft, but who knows if anything will come of that.
The story of this game is relatively similar to the previous entries. The girl from the first game has disappeared, and it is up to a new red haired girl, Lena, to defeat the demon/dark emperor Gallagher with the mystical sword Valis before he can take over the planet of Vecantis. Before she can challenge the King Gallagher, she must defeat his three generals first.
Apparently in the PC-Engine version, there are fully animated cutscenes (one of the staples and claims to fame of this series overall), as well as two other playable characters, but in this revision or port, most of those cutscenes have been scrapped, and we are kept to the one playable character.
Gameplay The game is an action platformer, akin to a mix of Ys III and Castlevania. The main goal is to navigate to the end of each stage, which can span multiple rooms, and defeat the boss at the end. Lena is equipped with the eponymous Valis sword, and has a short ranged attack and, by pressing up and attack, shoot a horizontal fireball from the sword. Along the path, the player can pick up some items, which either provide an invulnerability armor, health, or a different energy blast to shoot from Valis (i.e. a homing missile, a sweeper, or one geared to take out aerial creatures). The game also features some slight RPG mechanics; for every 10000 "points" from killing enemies, your health bar will increase a small amount.
The levels themselves are very pretty and aesthetically pleasing, especially when they utilize some effective parallax scrolling. As far as design and layout, though, the levels can be rather bland. Generally, they are travel to the right, perhaps across an upper or lower level, with a series of enemies dotted along the path. Some levels are more vertically inclined, with you having to travel up and across the level, but honestly the design is very amateurish. Most of the "platforming" challenges have you jumping across gaps, but the penalty for failing these jumps is a set back in progress, as you will usually just fall to a previous section of the map. Like Mario, Lena has two speeds of movement, and many of the platforming challenges rely on her building up momentum before she can complete the jump.
The game is quite challenging. There are no "lives" systems, and you are able to take a great deal of hits before dying, but if you do die, then you must restart at the beginning of the entire stage. This includes the boss fights, many of which can be quite challenging. If you die, your "level" resets back to zero and you lose all of your power-ups. It doesn't help that your sprite is very large, but the game balances this by giving you a decently ranged attack and a high jump. Power-ups become a necessary affair to seek out and stock.
Speaking of bosses, many of them are simple "memorize the pattern" affairs, but some play with this formula. One boss, the crystal core, asks you to attack a moving core with your distance attacks while a creature attacks you and blocks it; another boss "phase shifts" between three different forms (a statue, a harpy, and a mermaid) and it serves as more of an endurance trial. The general bosses are meant to be the big "set piece" bosses, and some of them can be quite cheap. The first general, a man riding a tiger, takes a ton of damage and can be quite hard to avoid. The second generals fight, in particular, must have triggered a ton of seizures, and was setting off my motion sickness with the fight (a spinning room coupled with blinking "phantom clones" that he sends at you).
After the crystal caverns (level 5), the game cranks up the levels of shenanigans and difficulty to the nth degree. The sixth level is a true maze where enemies attack you from all angles, and the boss is quite tedious. The final level cranks this up even more, with a boss rush of all three generals, and then a final boss fight that takes around ten minutes (a very long time in an action platformer) to defeat.
How is the music? The music is surprisingly really good!
Ads, Art, Commercials
Final Verdict
I will admit, the first several levels are very fun. I enjoyed the aesthetic, I really enjoyed the music, and the gameplay was serviceable. After level five, though, the game becomes too difficult to find enjoyable. I would recommend playing this with save scumming if you want to actually beat it, unless you want to memorize a lot of patterns and enemy locations.
Title: Street Combat (NA) Ranma 1/2: Chounai Gekitou Hen
Release Date: 03/27/1992
Developer: NCS (JP)/irem (NA)
Publisher: Masaya (JP)/irem (NA)
This is going to be a very strange entry. For one, this is, in a weird way, a two-for-one post. Secondly, this is the rare case where we are covering both an original fighting game AND a licensed game. Third, this is just one of the worst put together fighting games I have ever encountered in general; it makes so many functional mistakes. Just know that the background portion of this entry is probably going to be a long one, as there is a lot of explaining to do. Before we move on I must say that the North American box art is absolutely terrible.
Background
When originally developed in Japan, this game was known as Ranma 1/2: Chounai Gekitou Ken (translated roughly as Town Fierce Battle), and was based off the popular anime, Ranma 1/2. Ranma 1/2 was a shonen manga, then anime, that was one of the earliest to gain popularity in the United States. The manga was originally written by Rumiko Takahashi, and it lasted for an impressive 38 volumes. It also spawned two anime series, three films, three OVAs, and a live action tv series. It was an immensely popular series, having sold over 50 million manga in Japan alone.
Ranma 1/2 follows the story of Ranma Saotome, an aspiring martial artist who is betrothed in an arranged engagement to Akane Tendo, the youngest daughter of Suon Tendo, master of the "Anything Goes Martial Arts" dojo. The only issue is that Ranma, who travels and trains with his father, Genma, fell into the cursed "Pool of the Drowned Girl" in China, and now turns into a red-haired girl anytime he is exposed to cold water. This curse can be temporarily reversed if he is exposed to hot water, so he constantly flips between the sexes throughout the show, and as the situation calls for it.
Ranma was an interesting show, because like changeable protagonist, it constantly hopped through anime genres: it was a melange of a martial arts anime, a harem anime (as both male and female Ranma had many suitors), a will they/won't they romance, a high school life anime, a slapstick comedy, a satire/parody of other popular anime, and sometimes a serious romance/action anime (especially the movies, which sometimes go full DBZ in its action). I also have a personal connection to this anime, as it was the first anime that I was introduced to by my sister. She worked at a video store known as Suncoast Video, one of the few video stores in the 90s that dealt in anime films. The store would demo certain movies or films from its stock, and she happened to put Ranma in and fell in love with it. She brought it home and we watched it together, and my burgeoning love of anime stemmed from that. Though I would say this series did not age well (lot of gratuitous anime boobies), it will always have a special place in my heart.
This game was developed by Nippon Computer Systems in Japan (also known as the publisher Masaya games), a short lived developer of such games as Cho Aniki, Langrisser, Cybernator, and most well known, the SNES port of Prince of Persia. The idea was to make a fighting game around the first couple of arcs of Ranma, when the show was still mainly set around the high school.
Now this is where this gets weird; the game was set to be released in the United States, where it would be published by irem. This publisher, though, wasn't confident in the game selling well due to the unfamiliarity of Ranma in Western audiences. What irem did instead was basically reskin and remake the game from the ground up. They remade it as Street Combat, a sci-fi punk fighting game that has nothing to do with the original source material.
North American Release
Original
The game itself is a typical fighting game. There are two different gameplay modes: arcade mode which features six bouts (which are settled by best of three), and player vs. player combat. In 2 player, you can choose any of the eight combatants in the game, along with the ability to unlock 2 bonus characters.
Characters: Japanese Release
In the Japanese release, you can only play as the male version of Ranma Saotome in the single player campaign, which becomes oddly troubling when he starts wailing on some of his female love interests (the gimmick with the show is that all the female antagonists are madly in love with Ranma, while they hate the red-haired alternative). In 2-player mode, oddly enough, you can play as the female version of Ranma, so I don't know why they didn't switch this up for these battles.
1st Battle: Genma Saotome, Ranma's father and trainer. In the anime, Genma is also cursed and turns into a panda bear when soaked in cold water. Sadly this does not come up in combat at all. He is a straightforward fight without special attacks.
2nd Battle: Kodachi Kuno, the gymastics martial artist. One of the charming aspects of the show is the subversion of the martial arts with this idea of "anything goes." There are characters who base a fighting style off cooking, figure skating, and, in this case, gymnastics. She has more ranged attacks as she uses a gymnastics ribbon and juggling pins in combat.
Bonus Level: Happosai the panty thief, who is also the master of Ranma and Genma. He is a tiny gremlin of an old man who fits into the anime stock character of the perverted old man. You have to stop him by knocking panties out of his bag before he escapes.
3rd Battle: Tatewaki Kuno the swordsman who uses a bokken (wooden katana). He is a romantic rival to Ranma, who seeks the hand of Akane. His battle is probably the best handled out of all of the battles; they even add his ability from the manga to exude shockwaves do the the speed of which he can swing his bokken.
4th Battle: Principal Kuno, the literally insane principal of the high school from the anime, and parent of Kodachi and Tatewaki. He is the joke character, but arguably the toughest fight in the game. He has a series of "wacky" gag gifts to attack you with, and rides around on a skateboard. When you defeat him, he screams "OH MY GOD" and explodes. Priceless.
Bonus Level 2: Cologne the head of the Chinese Amazons. She bounces around on her staff and throws rocks and soup bowls at you. It is an incredibly tough bonus stage, but it fits with her character of the show. She is the main antagonist of an arc, and the arc revolves round Ranma trying to strike her once, which he is incapable of doing until the very end. Honestly she should have been the final boss.
5th Battle: Shampoo the Chinese Amazon princess. She is Ranma's fiance via Amazonian law (Ranma bested her in combat). She uses hidden weapons, but is a hilariously easy fight. In the anime she turns into a cat, of which Ranma has a phobia.
Final Battle: Ryogah the wandering warrior, who is Ranma's childhood nemesis and rival paramour of Akane. He is known for having a terrible sense of direction, and turns into a teacup pig when doused in cold water (which Akane keeps as a pet, having no knowledge that it is Ryogah). For a final boss, he is ridiculously easy.
Characters: US Release
In the American release, you play as Steve...yup. He is a "badass" punk with a pompadour and a rebel attitude. He wears some mean shades, he breakdances, and busts out some quippy one liners. This was a game during the age of "don't have a cow dude" Bart Simpson, and your video game protagonists have to have a good bit of 'tude in order to remain relevant (just kidding this idea sucked then and sucks now). He apparently is wearing power armor, and the "female" variant is just Steve without this armor on.
1st Battle: Tyrone the racist stereotype of an African American...Yup.
2nd Battle: Dozo, one of the most terrifying clowns in gaming.
3rd Battle: GI Jim, a weird army guy with a sword who vomits when you defeat him.
4th Battle: Helmut the skateboarding Nazi robot? Still the toughest battle in the game.
Bonus Stage: Happy the old man who smiles like a Gremlin at the end of the bonus round.
5th Battle: Lita, who is basically Shampoo with a mask on her face.
6th Battle: The evil demon lord...CJ. Who looks, in his character mock-up, like a demon lord, but in actuality is just a tiny man in red spandex. Still a super easy battle.
Gameplay
This is as rudimentary a fighting game as it gets. There is no time limit to any battle, and once you expend your foe's lifebar, they are defeated. If you win two rounds of three, then you win! Your character then delivers a pithy quote to your defeated enemy, and you move on to the next combatant.
The fighting itself is incredibly simple. You can get through most fights, even on normal, by just mashing buttons and playing aggressively. You seem to also have a very high defense, so it is really easy to just tank through most battles. Weirdly enough, there is no block ability outside of special moves. As well, the jump command is mapped to a button rather than just by pressing up. Really you only have three types of attacks: punches, kicks, and a "clear" energy attack that creates distance between you and your opponent. There are some special moves, but there are only a few per character.
The game is simple enough that it can be beaten in about 15 minutes. I beat the game on easy, normal, and hard without much difficulty. Gameplay wise, this game is incredibly forgettable.
Music: Japanese Version
The music is MUCH better on the Japanese version.
Music: North American version
This version's music is awful. Truly just bad.
Ads, Art, and Commercials
Final Verdict
This game, aside from its very strange provenance, was absolutely awful. The play is slow, the game offers no challenge, and the North American version especially is devoid of personality, charm, or really anything redeeming. The design, in fact, is almost amateurish. If you are interested in this as a collector, I would recommend grabbing the Japanese version at least.
