Super FamiComplete #107: Street Fighter II

 

Title: Street Fighter II

Release Date: 6/10/1992

Developer: Capcom

Publisher: Capcom

We have made it to June 1992, and thank goodness we start off with an absolute banger; enjoy it too, because the rest of this month is going to be a bit of a slog with some sports games and another Shogi game. Here we have the entry of a Capcom franchise that launched a whole genre into popularity; while certainly not the first fighting game (I mean it is a sequel to one after all), but it certainly is the game that strongly cemented key points of the fighting genre. To be clear, this game is a port of the popular arcade game, but a pretty good port at that!

Background

The fighting game genre had existed for a bit before this game but was still relatively in its infancy. Games before SFII had two different characters squaring off, the diminishing lifebars, and the first Street Fighter had introduced the concept of special moves. Street Fighter II would introduce quite a bit: multiple playable characters (with different fighting styles and backgrounds), rudimentary combos, bright and aesthetically pleasing environments, and a really great soundtrack composed by Yoko Shimomura. 

The first game was released in 1987, and was a game where you controlled Ryu only (Ryu and Ken in two player). You did the typical fight around the world style gameplay, ending with a duel against the master of Muay Thai himself, Sagat. This final confrontation sets up the rivalry between the two, as Ryu gives Sagat his wicked chest scar at the end of the game. The first game is very clunky (no combos afterall), and wouldn't let you play as any of its other characters; aside from Ryu and Ken, the only other characters I recognize from later entries are Sagat and Birdie. 

This first game didn't perform very well, but they noticed that the version of the arcade cabinet that used the six button fighting game format (weak, medium, and strong punches and kicks) performed much better in sales at arcades. Capcom executives realized that there was an idea for a good game buried in here, and with the popularity of Final Fight, realized that there could be an appetite for this "fighting" genre, especially in the United States. Development for the game took about 2 years and several million dollars, with a team of 40 people working on it; that is a pretty staggering amount of time, money, and people for a product back then, but the polish and effort shows in the arcade release. I have a personal opinion that Capcom knew they were onto something big when developing this.

Quality sprites and animation was a big selling point of this game; backed by the CPS-1 hardware; there are wonderfully animated and busy background scrawls to each stage, characters with varied and clear animation to their various movements (readability is a huge part of the fighting genre), and all of this in a distinct and cohesive visual aesthetic. It is clear why these original eight characters have popped up in almost every entry past this one; their designs are iconic for a reason. 

The Roster

Ryu- The main character of the series and hailing from Japan. He is a wandering martial artist who lives on the road and seeks to improve his skills. He is practices karate and is arguably the easiest character to pick up and use. His moveset is versatile and he is great at zoning opponents and blocking air attacks. His arena is the top of a pagoda castle at twilight. 

Ken- He is a sprite swap of Ryu and has some minor differences that have become more distinct as more entries in the series have come about. He hails from the United State, and is a longtime best friend and friendly rival of Ryu, having practiced under the same master. 

E.Honda- Edmond Honda is a sumo from Japan, and my personal favorite character in the series. He is a slower character who is strongest when he can bully and push the opponent. He has a fun "thousand slap" attack and can launch himself across the screen, similar to Raiden in Mortal Kombat. His arena is a really fun Japanese bathhouse. 

Blanka- hailing from Brazil, Blanka is a green skin red haired monster man who was experimented on by Shadaloo. This has given him apeman like mobility and strength, as well as the ability to generate electricity and shock opponents. He is a fun character to pick-up, and is relatively well balanced. 

Guile- Guile is a air force soldier from the US who has an amazing flat top and a personal grudge against M.Bison for killing his compatriots. My brother was pretty amazing with Guile, who's anti-air spin kick and sonic boom attack made him pretty lethal. You fight him on an airforce base, and his theme is lowkey the best.

Chun-Li- Hailing from China, Chun-li is the only female fighter who has lethal legs for days. You fight her in a Chinese marketplace, and is arguably one of the most iconic characters aside Ken and Ryu. I am pretty terrible at fighting Chun-Li, but to be fair I am pretty terrible at this game in general.

Zangief- The Russian bear! A musclebound Russian soldier who is an expert grappler and wrestler (and who has become a gay gaming icon, though this has never been confirmed). Zangief functions as a tank who eats damage to be able to lay his meaty hands upon his opponent, whereupon he will atomic head-drop his opponent into oblivion. You fight him in a Russian spark factory. 

Dhalsim- the man who has turned Yoga into a martial art, this Indian guru has stretchable limbs, teleportation abilities, and can breath fire. He is a really fun character who is really slow. You fight him in this really cool palace interior with white elephants all around.

The game also has four CPU boss characters that you only get to play as in later entries in this series (oh yeah there are like four SNES Street Fighter IIs).

Balrog- a boxer from the US who is modeled after Mike Tyson. He hits brutally hard and is lethal if you let him get close. You fight him on the Vegas strip. 

Vega- a masked assassin with a Wolverine claw on one hand. You fight him in Spain in an underground fight club. Vega can climb on the walls, is super fast, and can unleash combos quite easily. He is a wall for many early players.

Sagat- Ryu's rival returns! A Muay Thai master whom you fight in Thailand. He is super tall, hits hard, and has incredible reach. A pretty fun design and a tough fight.

M.Bison- a bulky man in a military outfit, and the head of Shadaloo. You fight him in a temple. He has some mystical power known as the "psycho power" which allows him to shoot across the stage and fire energy. He is really fast and unrelenting in his attacks, appropriate for a final boss. 

Gameplay

The game starts with you picking your fighter. Your fighter then globe trots around the world to fight with the other characters in the roster; the presentation it must be noted, is really top-notch with your plane flying from your character's homeland to their opponents. Once you have defeated the other seven characters, you then fight the four boss characters. Once you beat them, you get your character's short but sweet ending. 

The battles themselves are stock standard for what we know now as a fighting game: you have to win two out of three rounds by wiping out your opponents lifebar, and must do this in 99 seconds. The fights are on a 2D plane, where your fighters can only move forward and back. You can attack with a weak punch, hard punch, weak kick, hard kick, and grab attacks, as well as special moves that require combinations of movement and button presses. While it wasn't intentional in the original design of the game, these attacks can be linked together in order to make combos, or uninterrupted strings of attacks that deal heavy amounts of damage. Now you can also block attacks, so the balance of finding openings in your opponents guard, as well as timing your blocks, is key to winning battles. 

The game has the car busting mini-game where you must demolish the car in a set amount of time from Final Fight about halfway through the campaign. A welcome diversion halfway through the game. 

Even now, the game is really playable, if much slower than what most fighting games, even Street Fighter games, are nowadays. Further iterations of this game do add to the roster of characters, as well as make the game much faster to play. I would say the biggest drawback of this game is that it is missing some of these fun bells and whistles: no rage mode, counters, super attacks, tag team, or really anything to spice it up. This was before all of those fighting game innovations. Still, it's pretty darn fun, and the presentation is gorgeous for an SNES game. 

Music

The music in this game is quite awesome. 

Art, Ads

Final Verdict

I mean, was there any chance that this game wouldn't be a strong recommendation? Are there better versions of this same game? Yes, but it is still pretty darn good. I highly recommend picking this one up!

Super FamiComplete #106: Zan II: Spirits

 

Title: Zan II: Spirits

Release Date: 05/29/1992

Developer: Wolf Team

Publisher: Telenet 

Here I was about to wrap up another month of games, and knowing nothing about this game previously, was hoping it was something like another mahjong or Japanese only platformer. Something that wouldn't take too much time.  But of course, the Super Famicom instead throws another Sengoku era 4X game in the style of Nobunaga's Ambition, and unlike Nobunaga's Ambition it is only in Japanese.

Background

This game was developed by Wolf Team, the same studio that would eventually become the studio behind the incredibly popular Tales action RPG series. At the time, though, Wolf Team was a subsidiary at Telenet, and actually about a year away from a major restructuring that would see most of the original staff leaving Telenet and forming their own studio, which would in turn lead to a partnership with Namco. Telenet was a publisher known for working with three main developers: the aforementioned Wolf Team, Laser Soft, and Riot, and would be known for such series as the Valis and Cosmic Fantasy series.

 This is actually the third game in what would be a seven game Zan series. The key distinguishing feature that differentiates this from Nobunaga's Ambition is cutting out a great deal of the diplomacy aspects of those games, and instead focusing purely on military conquest. Some titles in this series do seem to have supernatural elements, but this certainly isn't one of them, though it does show a Hannya mask in the opening title video. I kind of wish those elements were kept as this is too similar to Nobunaga's Ambition without it. 

Gameplay

Much like Nobunaga's Ambition, the game plops you into a preselected location on a map of Japan, split into the realms of the many prefectures and realms of the various daimyo of the Sengoku period. The map of each "state" is dotted with Japanese style pagoda castles, temples, and forts, each with different values associated to defense of the fortifications themselves, number of soldiers manning the building, types of soldiers, etc. The goal is to consolidate your territory, build a sizable military, and then start expanding your area until you unite all of Japan under your banner. 

With no translation there is not an easy way to navigate this game or understand what is going on. For this blog post, I watched Batista_Harpu's "SNES Side Quest" series and a good bit of his successful 10 hour playthrough. Here is what I gleaned from watching his campaign.

• Battles are done in an isometric hexagonal grid view with units displayed on the field in a similar way to a Fire Emblem or Shining Force game. The animations are nothing special, but it is certainly a distinguishing feature vs. the Ambition series. 
• This game is incredibly menu heavy: each base has to be micromanaged, and soldiers continually produced in order to stand a chance of success. The production style reminds me of Civilization II or Advance Wars where each location can be assigned to produce units. 
• Random events do seem to pop up throughout the game, such as a castle rebelling or sneak attacks from the enemy on certain locations. 
• Each state has a main castle that serves as the location you want to overtake. Take that castle then the rest of the state falls. 
• At the end of the game, each of the daimyos gather together to tell you how cool you are. 

Music

The OST is pretty good actually. Check it out! Sounds very Final Fantasy IV at times. 

Final Verdict

This game is really not up my alley. I am not a big lover of 4X strategy games or "conquer the map" games in the first place, and one in a language I can't read that is so menu heavy makes it a tough sell. Thanks to Batista for the incredibly useful playthrough. 

Super FamiComplete #105: Magic Sword

 

Title: Magic Sword

Release Date: 05/29/1992

Developer: Capcom

Publisher: Capcom

Now this is more like it. First off, look at the art on the Super Famicom box. It's amazingly weird and goofy. This is a port of a Capcom arcade game that is actually pretty darn faithful to the arcade version; it's like we are doing a Capcom A to Z crossover special. 

Background

This game was developed for the CP1 arcade system originally, releasing in July 1990. The game is very similar to the previous Capcom title known as Black Tiger, which was also an arcade hack-n-slash platformer. In this game, you play as a beef boy Conan style warrior who is assaulting a tower that belongs to an evil lord named Drokmar. Drokmar receives his power from the Dark Orb, a fantasy MacGuffin that grants unlimited power to its owner. That's pretty much it as far as set up. 

There are some differences between the Arcade and SNES versions. For one, the SNES version gives you a few starting points throughout the tower (which is 50 levels tall), with the last starting point at floor 33. This is to make up for the fact that the game follows the strict "two lives per three continues" format, while the arcade version is a quarter muncher that you can just eventually pay to win. As well, similar to the SNES port of Final Fight, the SNES port of Magic Sword eschews any two player functionality. While this isn't a game that is necessarily rendered unplayable by losing a second player (two player can make even the most mediocre beat-em-up pretty fun), I can attest that the 2player of the arcade version was still a lot of fun and a shame to be missed. You even had a Double Dragon fight over the Black Orb at the end with the second player if you chose the evil ending. 

Gameplay

The game has 51 stages, starting in the village around Drokmar's tower, and then 50 levels of tower to work through until you get to Drokmar himself at the top. For being a giant dungeon tower, the biomes are quite diverse; you will travel through oubliettes, interiors of pyramids, sewers, cathedrals, parapets, and libraries.  Most stages have one or two exits (some of which are hidden and let you skip floors), and usually last only a minute or so, with some floors being as short as 20 seconds. Usually every eight floors or so is a boss fight, with a wizard transforming into either a chimera or a multiheaded dragon. Usually when you beat a boss, you will get an upgrade to your weapon or shield, which improves your attack, defense, and magic attack. 

Now as far as an offensive vocabulary, your little Conan can run, jump, and swing his sword. He has a magic meter which fills after swinging your sword, and if you wait until it's topped out, you will fire a projectile from your sword (similar to Link with the Master Sword). With the best weapon in the game, you shoot a red lightning bolt which does a tremendous amount of damage. 

But are you alone on this journey at all? Not quite, to exit the floors, you collect keys to open the doors to the staircase to the next floor, but there are also cells that need keys to unlock too. These cells can sometimes contain enemies, but most times they contain companions. These companions, of which you can only have one at a time, basically function like options in a shooter. They have a stock attack, which they will spam at regular intervals, and have their own little healthbars that have to be managed. The companions include a Amazon who shoots arrows, a "Big Man" who throws a boomerang age, Wizard who shoots fireballs, Thief who throws daggers and bombs, Priest who has a shield and homing energy balls (my fav), a flying Lizardman, a Ninja who throws shurikens, and a fellow swordsman knight. 

Overall, the game is not too tough, and was able to beat it on my own quite easily. Enemies go down quickly, and the game has a very fun "score attack" arcade style feel to it. Much of the key to this game is moving slowly but deliberately and quickly reacting to threats as they appear. As your party climbs higher in the tower, many enemies become unavoidable if not taken out immediately. Boss fights aside from being samey (I mean they repeat the same two boss fights three times), are kind of cheap. The dragons, in particular, tend to chase you until they hit you; very much a holdover from arcade difficulty and cheapness. You do have a screen wipe magic attack which does make bosses a lot easier, but it does cost a bar of health if you use it too quickly. 

The atmosphere of the game is pretty darn fun too, having a classic DnD dungeon run feel to it. You fight a menagerie of fun monsters from Orcs, mummies, skeletons, wizards, golems, and ghouls, and you have to do some simple platforming over pits, traps, and hazards. My favorite part is the interstitial scenes of your party climbing between the floors of the tower where they give each other little pep talks and advice for the coming floors. 

Ads and Art

As usual with Capcom, there is a surfeit of advertisements and concept art, most of which is pretty well done.

Music

As with a lot of Capcom works, the music is pretty good. The OST was composed by Manami Matsumae, who is best known for composing the early Mega Man titles, so there is a definite mark of quality. 

Final Verdict

Overall this is a pretty slight but fun diversion! The game is pretty simple with fun if repetitive gameplay. It makes a nice addition to an SNES collection and is relatively the experience you would get from the arcade version. This gets a certified recommendation.