Virtual Console Review - Samurai Shodown (Neo-Geo)

Samurai Showdown - SNK for Neo-Geo - 7/10

Here we finally come to one of the gems of the Neo-Geo library. When SNK debuted Samurai Showdown in 1993, its innovative weapons combat stood out among a sea of mediocre Street Fighter 2 clones. Who doesn't want to be a sword-wielding samurai or ninja? The game quickly became a great success for SNK, and would even appear on Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo - the first of many ports during the era.

Does the original Samurai Shodown still hold up today? I think it does. Gameplay is tight, stripped-down and focused squarely on the essentials. Special moves are few and thankfully avoid needless flash. Each attack counts. I do appreciate the focus on smart tactics, of knowing just when to unleash the most powerful strikes, knowing when to go for the throw. You must rely on your wits instead of endless strings of combos.

In that sense, Samurai Shodown is much closer to the '80s classic Karate Champ than Street Fighter. This is a tactical fighting game, and not a button masher. Many would cite this as a weakness, but I prefer to see it as a strength. Fighting games got away from casual players rather quickly, as they drowned in increasingly complex combat systems and painfully complex combos. This genre was taken over by hardcore competitive gamers almost from the beginning.

Also, I am more than willing to feel generous when the spectacular Samurai Shodown 2 is waiting in the wings. I can appreciate the basic structure of the original, since those foundations are so solid. This was without question SNK's finest fighting title when it was released in 1993. After trudging through Fatal Fury and Art of Fighting (and ADK's mildly tolerable World Heroes), Samurai Showdown is like stylized lightning from the sky.

I really enjoy the character roster, which thankfully avoids cliches and aims for originality. There are no clones, no cheap color swaps, no Bruce Lee look-a-likes, no Street Fighter wannabees. And for once, we actually get to have women fighters who aren't pinup dolls. Do you mean women get to wear clothes, too? And they get to have normal physiques, and not just be a sex doll for horny teenage boys? Wow, what a world.

Impressive moments abound. When fighters strike their weapons in close range, there's a short shoving match, and the loser suddenly finds themselves unarmed. Sometimes finishing blows unleash an arterial spray, much like Akira Kurosawa's Sanjuro, or may split the opponent in two. During the match a passerby throws bombs which explode, or food which restores your health. And when your fighters get hit too many times, they turn red and become frustrated. Good Lord, even the characters in this game think Neo-Geo is too damned hard.

I really dig this game. Sure, the computer is a pain in the ass. Yes, SamSho 2 is the superior sequel. Whatever. Life is precious and short, kids - get your kicks however you can.

Photos - Samurai Shodown (Neo-Geo)

And, rightly on cue, here are some screenshots from Samurai Shodown on Neo-Geo.  You have no idea how many virtual quarters I spent to get these photos.  I hope you appreciate all my hard work.  This is easily the best of the early Neo-Geo fighters.  SamSho 2 is better in every way, but there's no denying the appeal of the original.  Enjoy!

Photos - Samurai Shodown 2 (Neo-Geo)

I'm working my down to the end of the Neo-Geo games currently on Virtual Console, and I'm somewhat happy to finish all the reviews.  Here are a number of screenshots I snapped from the excellent Samurai Shodown 2.  This game is fiendishly difficult, as most Neo-Geo fighers tend to be, but at least I can complete a few stages before being smacked around by the computer.  Hooray!  I actually get to win a fight!

This has been a very good day for me.  Yay!

Tinkering Around the Blog

I've spent part of my day tinkering with this blog, as part of my constant revising refining.  I've added a "Reviews" category, which should make things easier for the gamers.  I've also shuffled around the right column, and I hope that makes it easier to find those reviews.

I keep telling myself that "Videogame Classics" and "Virtual Console Review" will one day work their way into a book, and that project is ongoing.  I still don't feel that I have enough material to send to a publisher.  And, as you can guess from a website like this (and my other website, The Ghibli Blog), my attention keeps veering in different directions.  I'm doing a better job of staying focused, but there are no guarantees.

Photos - The King of Fighters '94 (Neo-Geo)

A few more screenshots from King of Fighters '94 on Neo-Geo.  You get to watch me getting myself killed on all sorts of groovy environments.  Enjoy!

Virtual Console Review - The King of Fighters '94 (Neo-Geo)

The King of Fighters '94 - SNK for Neo-Geo - 5/10

What the hell's the problem, SNK?!  This game is too $%&@#! hard!  What's the deal with all these impossible Neo-Geo fighters?  Here is yet another one where I can't get past the first stage. In fact, I can't get anywhere on any of the system's early fighters.  I'm still feeling cranky about Fatal Fury Special and Art of Fighting 2.  And World Heroes can bite me for all I care.

Well, that tears it.  I know it's far too late to raise a ruckus about it now, since these games are 15-20 years old.  So I'm docking King of Fighters '94 three points off the review score.  I wanted to give it a solid seven or maybe an eight...but forget it, kid.  This game earns a 5/10 on the report card for teeing off the reviewer.

This is especially frustrating for me because, during the research for this game, I've become a great fan of the King of Fighters series.  That means I've been spending my time playing all ten titles on the Neo-Geo, from KoF '94 to 2K3.  And they're excellent games, just bloody brilliant, once the series gets rolling.

Strangely enough, only KoF '94 is currently available on the Virtual Console in North America, and the '95 edition is only available in Japan.  What's the holdup?  When is SNK going to bother to get around to the rest of the series?  They were kind enough to release a a compilation disc, dubbed The Orochi Saga, which contains the first five games up to KoF '98.  Unfortunately, this retail disc was released in 2008, and may be difficult to find today.  Way to drop the ball, SNK.

Anyway, enough complaining.  The King of Fighters '94 is the first of what would become ten yearly installments on Neo-Geo, becoming the console's flagship series.  It all but invented the "team-based" fighting games, as well as the "dream match," featuring characters from SNK's vast roster of arcade hits.  Fatal Fury and Art of Fighting are represented, naturally.  But you'll also see nods to Ikari Warriors and Athena, among others.  Years later, Sega, Nintendo and Capcom would all offer their own "dream match" fighters, and it all began here, with the first King of Fighters.

Since this is the earliest title in the series, it's no surprise that KoF '94 has the smallest characters, the fewest martial-arts moves, the chunkiest graphics, and the fewest animation frames.  And this is without question the most difficult.  The 3-on-3 teams cannot be edited or customized - a feature that becomes standard immediately in KoF '95.  The ability to dodge attacks by stepping to the side is interesting, but I much prefer the ability to roll, which also appears later.

In other words, King of Fighters '94 is the foundation for the classic series.  That doesn't make it a classic by its own merits.  In fact, I think this is the worst episode of the series.  You might have better luck than I have, so don't let my frustration get in the way.  But I would strongly advise buying King of Fighters: The Orochi Saga, or simply waiting for whenever SNK bothers to get around to releasing the sequels on Virtual Console.

Decriminalize

Another key reason to end Prohibition - our overcrowded prison system.  Philadelphia takes crucial steps towards sanity and government by adults.  This useless Drug War funnels enormous profits not only to criminal syndicates, but the prison-industrial complex as well, and our justice system is overwhelmed as a result.  We need to devote resources to serious threats, not some college kid or cancer patient with cannabis in their pockets.  Good jorb, Philly:

The city's new district attorney and the state Supreme Court are moving to all but decriminalize the possession of small amounts of marijuana for personal use in an effort to unclog Philadelphia's crowded court dockets.


Under a policy to take effect later this month, prosecutors will charge such cases as summary offenses rather than as misdemeanors. People arrested with up to 30 grams of the drug - slightly more than an ounce - may have to pay a fine but face no risk of a criminal record.

Hi, Everybody! Hi, Doctor Nick!

You just can't make this stuff up.  Thank goodness this guy isn't my doctor.

Republicans Finally Admit the Iraq War was a Mistake?

Are you kidding me?  Where were these losers in 2003, when I was marching across downtown Minneapolis and shouting as passing cars to protest this stupid war?  Now, at long last, after spending a trillion dollars and killing countless thousands of lives...now they'll admit it was a mistake.

This sort of phony mea culpas from the politicians might count for something if it results in changes to the American Empire's foreign policy.  Perhaps we won't be so eager to drop bombs and rush into endless wars the next time.  Heck, maybe these slick pols could really surprise us and take a hatchet to the Military-Industrial Complex.  What are the odds of that?  Fat chance.

Virtual Console Review - King of the Monsters (Neo-Geo)

King of the Monsters - SNK for Neo-Geo - 5/10

King of the Monsters was a big hit for SNK and Neo-Geo, and was successfully ported to the Genesis and Super Nintendo.  This is essentially a wrestling game, but with monsters stomping Tokyo.  If that sort of thing appeals to you, go right ahead, have fun.  The novelty of fighting as b-movie monsters does have a certain appeal, and there's a certain undeniable thrill in smashing building and throwing trains at one another.

Unfortunately, this is really nothing more than a button-mashing game.  Like most wresting games or the era, there is very little technique, and nowhere near the nuanced precision of martial-arts fighting games like Street Figther 2 or Tekken or Virtua Fighter.  You just mash buttons, punch, kick, and grapple.  I've never been a fan of these sort of games, and I don't see any reason to bother now.  The flashy graphics will not impress in the year 2010, and the typically clunky animation and slow pacing will not win over the tournament fighters.

King of the Monsters was mildly impressive at the time, but in out century it remains decidedly average.  Pass.

Virtual Console Review - Art of Fighting 2 (Neo-Geo)

Art of Fighting 2 - SNK for Neo-Geo - 5/10

You know, I am trying to like Art of Fighting 2.  I really am trying.  On my better days, I can convince myself that a quality fighting game lurks here somewhere, just under the surface, waiting to be discovered.  Most of the time, I find it to be a frustrating mess.

This game is impossibly hard.  I mean impossible.  Neo-Geo fighters are known for being difficult, but AoF2 takes the crown.  Either I just don't have the pacing down, or I can't figure out the special moves, or the computer just has a sixth sense and responds faster than I can.  Whatever the case, consider yourselves lucky to even clear the first stage.

The graphics on Aof2 are spectacular.  This is probably the best-looking game from the early Neo-Geo years.  Colors are vibrant, detailed, luxurious.  Fighters are immensely large, standing at 2/3 screen size in close-up.  SNK knew how to pull off flashy graphics, and you can see it every moment.  All of us kids with Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo were duly impressed.

The animation, however, continues to be choppy, clunky, almost half-finished.  There needs to be more frames of animation to these fighters.  Compared to Street Fighter 2's smooth movements, Aof2 is just stiff.  It's deeply frustrating because this affects the gameplay, and makes things more difficult than necessary.  And have I mentioned that this game is impossibly difficult?

The fighting roster is hit-or-miss.  Half the characters are excellent, and you'll see them reappear in the King of Fighter series again and again.  The other half are forgettable.  SNK doesn't seem to know what to do with the really big guys.  I've still yet to find one large brawler who can equal Zangief or E. Honda on SF2, or Wolf and Jeffrey on Virtua Fighter.  Why can't SNK's big guys have more throws, or, heck, more than one?  Why can't anybody have more than one throw?  And would it kill anyone to come up with some original fighting moves?  Fireball?  Dragon Punch?  Are you kidding me?

Ugh!  Frustrating!  I really want to like this series, I really do.  It seems SNK never quite clicked with their fighting games until Samurai Showdown and King of Fighters, and they never really mastered the genre until later titles like The Last Blade and Garou: Mark of the Wolves.  It's like they needed to break a dozen eggs before figuring out how to cook an omelette.

Virtual Console Review - Blue's Journey (Neo-Geo)

Blue's Journey - ADK for Neo-Geo - 7/10

Now this one is a real surprise.  The Neo-Geo is famous for its shooters and sports games and about a million fighters, but not side-scrolling platformers.  Perhaps ADK felt the need to fill a void when they conjured Blue's Journey, and they very largely succeeded.  This is a very fun and very entertaining game.

I think it's a bit unfair to compare Blue's Journey to Super Mario or Sonic the Hedgehog; this game is far closer in spirit to Hudson Soft's platformers like Adventure Island and Bonk's Adventure.  The level designs are relatively straightforward, left to right, with some impressive dips and turns and surprises.  One impressive feature is that your hero can shrink down to a tiny size, where he can slip through cracks into secret areas.  The ability to switch sizes on the fly is nice, real nice.

This game is very cartoon-like in its graphics, and I'm sure that didn't win any fans among the SNK crowd, which was becoming increasingly "hardcore" on Neo-Geo.  I think the graphics are very nice - bold, confident sense of color, well balanced, not garish or loud.  The artists knew what they were doing, and this is much easier on the eyes than ADK's earlier Neo-Geo titles like Ninja Combat.  I really like the look of this game.

After being subjected to so many awful Neo-Geo games, Blue's Journey feels like a breath of fresh air.  It's definitely an anomaly in the system's library, and I'm a bit curious why that is so.  I think there should be more - more levels, more variety, more surprises.  But that's really a hallmark of quality, don't ya think?  I'm spinning Paranoid, side two, on my stereo as I'm writing this, and I'm secretly wishing for just a few more songs.  I'm pleading with the sunset for just a little more time.

Virtual Console Review - Ninja Combat (Neo-Geo)

Ninja Combat - Alpha Denshi for SNK - 3/10

Augh....Most of the earliest game for the Neo-Geo were terrible.  I'm a bit embarrassed, and wondering to myself just why I am devoting a warm and (partially) sunny Sunday writing about this subject.  Why am I recording this brief moment of early-'90s pop culture for posterity?  Will future generations really be that concerned?  Will my brief paragraphs about terrible arcade video games appear in some post-graduate dissertation in the year 2050?  One can never outguess the future, but I highly doubt it.

So here's the lowdown, kids: Ninja Combat was an early game for SNK's Neo-Geo aracade system, developed by Alpha Denshi, who were responsible for other titles as Ninja Commando, Magician Lord, and the World Heroes series.  Eventually, they created the excellent puzzle-shooter hybrid Twinkle Star Sprites, which considerably salvaged their reputation.

Ninja Combat is a side-scrolling beat-em-up at heart.  The angled playfield, the layouts and level designs, the power-ups and bosses, all point to Double Dragon and Final Fight as inspiration.  The only break is that your character throws ninja stars instead of punching or kicking.  When you pick up a weapon, however, that's when you revert to pure fighting.

So we see that ADK tried to mix up styles for this game.  The idea is interesting, but in execution, it just doesn't work at all.  You can see that this is a second-tier developer, from the stodgy graphics and clunky, limited animation, the rather frustrating sense of collision detection (a long line of ninja can wipe out your health bar almost instantly).  This is a game goes from mindless to frustrating and back again.

The graphics are just terrible.  Why are all the characters so squashed and square-ish?  Why are their upper bodies so much bigger than their legs?  Why does everyone have the same facial features?  Does it seem like the entire game works from a single character template?  That was a cheap gimmick in arcade games of the late 1980s.

Ninja Combat becomes very frustrating very quickly, and the boss battles are especially unfair.  You will be killed with a couple hits, with no real chance to evade or escape.  In fact, you will burn through your credits in no time at all.  Bam-Bam-Bam and you're dead.  Then Pow-Bam-Oof and it's game over.  I don't know if the Virtual Console release offers unlimited continues.  If there are only a set number of continues, then forget it.  At least I can add endless credits on MAME; even then, it's a chore for me to continue.

Now that I think about it, Magicial Lord was impossibly hard, too.  What's the deal with these guys?  Count me out.  I want to go play outside and enjoy the warm sunshine.

Virtual Console Review - Burning Fight (Neo-Geo)

Burning Fight - SNK for Neo-Geo - 2/10

I cannot believe they are charging nine dollars for this train wreck.  Who's in charge of pricing for Virtual Console titles?

Burning Fight was one of the original launch games for Neo-Geo, and arguably the worst.  None of the early titles were especially good, but at least Magician Lord and Nam'75 had flashy graphics that tempted us to drop a few quarters.  What does Burning Fight have to attract the kids?  Absolutely nothing, except maybe pity.

This is a scrolling beat-em-up in the style of Double Dragon and Final Fight.  You march a chiseled steroid freak through city streets, kicking and punching hapless goons, smashing signs and phone booths for points and power-ups, and fighting large bosses at the end of the stage.  You've seen the formula a million times; these sort of games were as common in arcades as space shooters.

Burning Fight is a crude, simple game, certainly nowhere near as compelling or interesting as Double Dragon.  And Final Fight just smashes it to pieces.  The large character graphics and sprite scaling is an early Neo-Geo trademark, but the chunky, stiff animation, simplistic moves, and cheesy voice samples are just hideous.  This is rank amateurism, and there were any number of beat-em-ups in the arcades that were far, far better.

Burning Fight is arguably the worst game in the Neo-Geo library.  Ninja Combat comes pretty close, but when push comes to shove, I think this clunker takes the crown.

Bankrupt the Drug Cartels and Make Cannibis Legal

Two key reasons to support California's ballot initiative to legalize Marijuana:

Drug Cartels Are Terrified of Marijuana Legalization

Illegal Growers Are Terrified of Marijuana Legalization

Do you know how much money the Mexican Drug Trade comes from marijuana?  1/2 to 3/4 of the total income.  Make cannabis legal and you will smash these criminal syndicates into dust.  Make it legal and you will take that money away, out of their hands forever.

Prohibition is nothing more than a government-guaranteed bailout for criminal syndicates and paramilitary groups.  Do you really want to bankrupt the Mexican and Colombian drug cartels?  Do you really want to see terrorist groups like FARC smashed?  Where do you think the FARC gets their money?  This is all about one thing: money.  It was exactly the same with Prohibition of alcohol in the 1920s, exactly the same.

The black market is terrified of legalization because the price of the drugs will crash.  The price of cannabis will collapse, and the cartels will become crippled overnight.  It's as simple as that.