#Aggressors Of Dark Kombat

[itsfantasticac]

Aggressors of Dark Kombat illustration, by Hirofumi Ichikawa.

[the2dstagesfg]

“King of the Monsters” from Neo Geo Battle Coliseum (SNK Playmore/2005)

[grogart]

For today's Patreon prompt, Decon is back with those deep cuts, this time with Kisarah Westfield from Aggressors of Dark Kombat. Thank you for your support!

[z2z-gaming-and-random-art-ai]

Console Fighting Games of 1994 Part 1/5 #shorts

Part 1 of 5 featuring fighting games released on console in 1994, this first video features Advanced V.G., Aggressors of Dark Kombat, Art of Fighting 2, Ballz 3D Fighting at its Ballziest, Bishōjo Senshi Sailor Moon S Jōgai Rantō!  Shuyaku Sōdatsusen, Brutal Paws of Fury, Clay Fighter Tournament Edition, Clay Fighter 2 Judgement Clay and Cosmic Carnage  #fightinggames #gaming #videogames #sailormoon #consolegaming #1994 #claymation

For the Full Length Videos of these games see the following playlist https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFJOZYl1h1CF-R5w4NujQcYo8cCcOMHYv

For other Gaming related shorts check out this playlist https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFJOZYl1h1CF5oVPNNxPlLJPambfM5BIj

[datcloudboi]

List of Video Games Turning 30 Years Old in 2024

Aggressors of Dark Kombat (what if Mortal Kombat was made by the KoF devs?)

Alone in the Dark 2

Art of Fighting 2

Beneath a Steel Sky (a highly influential point and click adventure game from the same team that would go on to make Broken Sword)

Blackthorne (a 2D platformer made by Blizzard)

Breath of Fire (the 1st one)

Bubsy 2

Bubsy in Fractured Furry Tales

Bust-a-Move (known as "Puzzle Bobble" in Japan)

Castlevania: Bloodlines

Contra: Hard Corps (the first game in the series to have multiple endings)

Cosmology of Kyoto

The Death and Return of Superman (a side scrolling beat 'em up made by Blizzard)

Demon's Crest

Donkey Kong (the Game boy version of the arcade original)

Donkey Kong Country

Doom II: Hell on Earth

Double Dragon V: The Shadow Falls (as opposed to a beat ‘em up like the other four games were, this one was a fighting game)

Dungeons & Dragons: Tower of Doom

Dynamite Headdy

Earthworm Jim (with music from Tommy Tallarico. His mother is very proud.)

Ecco: The Tides of Time

The Elder Scrolls Arena (the very 1st one)

Final Fantasy VI

Fire Emblem: Mystery of the Emblem (the 3rd one)

Ghoul Patrol (the sequel to "Zombies Ate My Neighbors")

Heretic

The Horde (a hybrid action/strategy game made by Toys for Bob, who are known nowadays for making Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time)

Illusion of Gaia

Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures

Killer Instinct

The King of Fighters '94

King's Quest VII: The Princeless Bride

Live a Live (the original version, which went unreleased in North America. We wouldn’t get this game until the HD-2D remake 28 years later)

Majin Tensei (a strategy spin-off of the greater Shin Megami Tensei franchise)

Marathon (one of the earliest games made by Bungie)

Mega Man 6

Mega Man Soccer

Mega Man V (on the Game Boy)

Mega Man X

Mortal Kombat II

The Need for Speed (the very 1st one)

Pac-Man 2: The New Adventures (as an empath, seeing Pac-Man in pain makes me feel sick)

Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure

Pocky & Rocky 2

Policenauts (a visual novel and one of the earlier works from Hideo Kojima)

Rise of the Robots (often considered one of the worst fighting games ever made)

Robotrek

Samurai Shodown II

Shadowrun (the Sega Genesis version)

Shaq Fu (also often considered one of the worst fighting games ever made)

Shin Megami Tensei II (which, to this day, has never been officially released outside of Japan)

Shin Megami Tensei If... (also never officially released outside of Japan)

Shining Force II

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (just in time for the third movie)

Sparkster

Spider-Man and Venom: Maximum Carnage

Star Wars: TIE Fighter

Streets of Rage 3

Super Adventure Island II

Super Metroid

Super Punch-Out!!

Super Star Wars: Return of the Jedi

Super Street Fighter II: The New Challengers (this release saw the first playable appearances of T. Hawk, Fei Long, Dee Jay, and Cammy)

Super Street Fighter II Turbo (saw the series’ first secret character, Akuma)

System Shock (a remake came out very recently. It's quite good!)

Ultima VIII: Pagan

Warcraft: Orcs & Humans (the very 1st one)

Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3

X-COM: UFO Defense (the 1st game in the series)

Zoda's Revenge: StarTropics II (one of the last first-party releases for the NES)

Zool 2

[suzakucastle]

Protagonist Poll (Round 4)

(Note: Filia is excluded because I refuse to acknowledge what Skullgirls has become.)

~R

[mvdbutler]

NEOGEO BATTLE COLISEUM SUPER EXTRA RUMBLE

NEOGEO BATTLE COLISEUM YUKI-MICHAEL RUSSELL AI-JENNA FRANKLIN WORLD HEROES HATTORI HANZO-FREDDIE BENJI FUMA KOTARO-JASON CORE RASPUTIN-VLADIMIR.P JANNE D'ARC-AMBER HARRIS-DILLER JENGHIS-KEVIN MICHAEL RICHARDSON BROCKEN-ARNOLD MULLER KIM DRAGON-COREY.T MUSCLE POWER-PATRICK SMITH CAPTAIN KIDD-JUSTIN UNO ERICK-COREY SWANSON JOHNNY MAXIMUM-ALAN RITCHSON MUDMAN-RUSSELL LUCAS RYOKO IZUMO-MASHA CARSON SHURA-CHANG LI RYOFU-SHANG THANG JACK-KENNY RICHARDS SUN WUKONG-ERIC.GEOSKI.III AGGRESSORS OF DARK KOMBAT JOE KUSANAGI-KYOSHUA KHAN KISARAH-NAUTICA JOHNSON GOH KIDOKORO-MATTHEW MARCHAND LEONHALT DOMADOR-RICO GOMEZ SHEEN GENUS-ALVIN-DAVID.G LEE HAE GWON-PATRICK SEUNG BOBBY NELSON-MILTON BUTLER.JR VOLTAGE FIGHTER GOWCAIZER GOWCAIZER-MIKEY HARRIS HELLSTINGER-KOREY MONROE KARIN SON-ASHLEY WONG-HENDERSON KYOSUKE SHIGURE-JERMIAH MALONE SHAIA-TARA STRONG BRIDER-STEVEN BLUM FUDOHMARU-SHINSUKE.E CAPTAIN ATLANTIS-ALAN LENDALE MARION-BRENDA BROWN-COLLINS SHENG-LONG-HARRISON RANDELL THE MAIN BOSS VINCENT ALBERT-CHAEL SONNEN SAVAGE REIGN SHO HAYAYE-BRYAN DANIELSON CAROL STANZACK-TRESS MACNEILLE MAX EAGLE-VANCE RICHARDS.JR GORDON BOWMAN-BRYAN CRANSTON CHUNG PAIFU-ALBERT SHING GOZU-AARON PAUL MEZU-MATT JONES JOKER-MATT HARDY NICOLA ZAZA-MATTHEW MERCER KING LION-MARK LINDSEY KING LEO-PHIL LAMARR ROSA-BRITTANY CASTILLO KIM SUE II-STEVEN YEUN JYAZU-KEITH DAVID BREAKERS SHO KAMUI-SAMMY GUEVARA LEE DAO-LONG-BENNY SHAU TIA LANGRAY-SERENA DEEB PIELLE MONTARIO-ANDRADE.XAVIE CONDOR HEADS-TENOCH HUERTA SHEIK MAHERI-BOBBY RICKS RILA ESTANSIA-TAY MELO-GUEVARA ALSION III-RAFE SPALL HUANG BAI-HU-CARY-HIROYUKI TAGAWA SAIZO TOBIKAGENO-ROBIN SHOU

[tifalockhar7]

[fnlrndcllctv]

THE YEAR IN FIGHTING GAMES: 1994

As the original release of Street Fighter II turns 30 this year, we are taking a look at the landscape of fighting games between 1991 and 2021 on a year by year basis!

This week, Shaun Eddleston takes a look at 1994…

1994 was an eventful year for video games.

Nintendo was starting to wind down on its production of NES games, while celebrating the success of games such as Super Metroid and Donkey Kong Country on the Super Nintendo. SEGA’s Sonic The Hedgehog series was going strong with Sonic The Hedgehog 3, and games such as DOOM II and Warcraft were making their way onto computers all across the world.

It was also a year where Germany placed Mortal Kombat II on its index of media works deemed harmful to young people by Germany's Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons effectively banning the game from sale in the country (and remained that way all the way up to 2005!).

Let’s take a look at 1994 in fighting games...

One of the more obscure Neo Geo titles, Aggressors Of Dark Kombat (known as Tsuukai GANGAN Koushinkyoku in Japan) was an interesting title that felt like a bit of an experiment in the genre. The game’s movement feels more like it would fit into your standard beat ‘em up game such as Final Fight and Streets Of Rage, and even drops weapons into the stage for fighters to use. 

The game also includes a fun comeback mechanic, the “GAN GAN attack”, which kicks in once a player’s health bar drops below a certain point, and their power bar is full. Once one of these mega attacks connects with an opponent, the player automatically wins the round.

Art of Fighting 2 continues the story that kicked off in the previous year’s entry, as we immediately learn that the identity of Yuri’s kidnapper, the tengu masked Mr Karate, is none other than Takuma Sakazaki, Yuri and Ryo’s father. This is all part of a much bigger criminal plot that ends up being spearheaded by a certain young crime lord from another popular SNK fighting title…

As for the game itself, almost every aspect of the Art Of Fighting experience was rebuilt and polished. The character sprites and stage art looked better, and a new “Rage” gauge mechanic was introduced into the mix. All of the game’s characters are immediately playable in arcade mode, and each have their own specific dialogue when interacting with other fighters.

The first 3D weapons-based fighting game was also one of the earlier releases on the Sony PlayStation, and was poised to be the game that would “outshine” the impressiveness of Virtua Fighter’s groundbreaking graphics.

While it didn’t quite beat out SEGA’s franchise, Battle Arena Toshinden still had a couple of interesting aspects to it that are still worth mentioning today. 

First of all, it is arguably the first “true” 3D fighting game, as it included the ability to side-step or dodge roll during a fight. This meant that the act of avoiding projectiles now had more options outside of blocking the hit or jumping over it, giving the game a little more depth (both mechanically and visually).

Thanks to the newly opened up 3D movement, ring outs are also possible in the game, where players can lose a round by simply falling off the side of the stage. This is an element that many gamers see as a bit of a cop out during a fight, but I personally see it as a fun way to humiliate opponents and even bring overly confident fighters back down to earth.

Capcom’s massive success with Street Fighter II was one of the most important moments in video game history, and the game was still going incredibly strong since its release 3 years prior (including this year, which we’ll touch on later in the article). There was a big question that lingered though; what non-Street Fighter fighting game would Capcom bring to the table next?

That game was Darkstalkers: The Night Warriors.

Darkstalkers wasn’t a million miles away from Street Fighter II in terms of gameplay. It utilised the same six-button L/M/H attack layout, and even used a Super Gauge that would be shared with the series.

The main strength of Darkstalkers that set it apart from its more famous older cousin, and that was its characters and theme. Instead of a tournament of worldwide fighters that many 2D fighting games utilised, Darkstalkers took inspiration from classic horror movies from the Universal era and offered a cast of 10 fighters that range from werewolves, sasquatches and vampires to Egyptian mummies, zombies and a Frankenstein’s monster for good measure. 

A spooky cult favourite!

1993’s Fighters History was a controversial entry in the fighting game genre. Not necessarily because of any violent content or especially iffy storyline, but for just how similar the game was to Street Fighter II. It was so similar, in fact, that Capcom attempted to sue Data East for just how much of a shameless ripoff the game was.

Capcom wasn’t successful with the lawsuit, and Data East went forward with a sequel, Fighters History Dynamite.

The game, perhaps more commonly known in some places as “Karnov’s Revenge”, added more characters (including the game’s boss fighters, Karnov and Clown) to the playable roster and spruced up the game's stage backgrounds.

Other than the slightly expanded range of fighters, and a hilarious hidden character to discover, not a lot else has changed from the first title, and still feels like it can’t shake off the original comparison that it got into trouble for.

Many 2D games up to this point were trying to mimic Street Fighter and Fatal Fury’s cartoonish graphics, there wasn’t really anything outside of Mortal Kombat’s digitised graphics that truly felt “next-gen” going into the middle of the decade.

Enter Killer Instinct.

While Rare as a developer was having a fantastic year already, with the success of Battletoads and Donkey Kong Country leaving long lasting impressions on the industry, their fighting game was a revelation in arcades, bringing a mix of 2D gameplay on 3D stages, strong bloody violence and a ridiculous new combo system to the table.

The characters were memorable, the animated FMV sequences were jawdropping to watch, and witnessing the game announce blare out “ULTRA COMBO!” whenever someone nailed a particularly savage sequence of hits just felt right.

Why not check out our thoughts on the game’s “killer” soundtrack?

Inspired by the popularity of Ryo Sakazaki (Art Of Fighting’s main protagonist) and his appearance as a guest character in Fatal Fury Special in 1993, SNK decided to go all out and start a crossover fighting series that brought together characters from their library of past games.

The game, named after the fighting tournament in Art Of Fighting and Fatal Fury, allows players to choose from a selection of 3-member teams that have been designated to different countries of the world, and matches revolve around an elimination system. In addition to a selection of original new characters, KOF ‘94 mixed together the Ikari Warriors, Psycho Soldier, Art Of Fighting and Fatal Fury franchises to fill out one of the largest fighting game rosters around at this point.

The game’s music is the subject of our very first entry in the Soundtrack Sunday series, so check it out!

Of the slew of games that took direct inspiration from Mortal Kombat, very few actually left a lasting impression.

One of the exceptions to this was Primal Rage, which saw stop motion dinosaurs and prehistoric apes duke it out for supremacy in the new “Urth”.

The game, which also took inspiration from Taito’s Dino Rex from 1992, caused its own controversy with one of its fatalities. In 1996, a woman from Arizona said that her 11 year old son had bought the game, and used a strategy guide to execute the “Golden Shower” fatality (in which, as the title suggests, the character Chaos urinates all over the corpse of an opponent). She flipped out and started a grass-roots campaign against Primal Rage, which resulted in some US stores withdrawing copies of the game, including the already-censored SNES version, which didn’t even contain the offending move.

The game was also successful with its merchandise, and saw a line of toys and a board game to accompany it.

The first Samurai Shodown game was, and still is, one of the finest fighting games of the early 90’s, so SNK had a huge task on their hands when it came to creating a sequel.

With Samurai Shodown 2, they absolutely knocked it out of the park in pretty much every aspect. All of the sprites of the characters who reappeared from the first game had been completely remade, a bunch of new characters had been added in, everyone got amazing new moves and a number of new game mechanics were also introduced to make the game feel much more balanced and fun to play.

One of these new mechanics was the “Weapon break” system, which meant that if a player got hit with a particularly powerful attack, there was now a chance that it would knock their weapon clean out of their hands, leaving them unarmed until it was recovered. The sheer panic of scrambling to pick up your sword while the opponent is slashing away at you is a thrill that still feels as effective today as it did back then.

Street Fighter II’s reign as king of the arcade fighting games was starting to wind down by 1994, so the game saw a final upgrade in the form of Super Street Fighter II Turbo, which added more game speeds, new animations and moves for all of the characters, a new “SUPER” gauge system and the introduction of  a hidden character that would quickly become one of the franchise’s most recognisable fighters; Akuma!

While many more casual players may not have felt the real impact of these changes (this was the third update in as many years since the original release), it remains as the “definitive” version of Street Fighter II, and is still used in tournaments to this day.

Developed by Namco (and ported to PlayStation in 1995), Tekken took the 3D fighting style that was pioneered by 1993’s Virtua Fighter, and added its own spin on things in regards to the control system.

Instead of using the traditional fighting game inputs that corresponded to the strength of the attacks, Tekken utilised a system that dedicates a button to each individual limb of the fighter. In doing this, the game became more of a learning process for players that wanted to do special moves and combos. This departure was so innovative, that experienced players could now figure out special moves by studying the fighters limb movements during their animations.

Known briefly as “RAVE WAR” during its beta test stage, Tekken quickly found itself as one of the most popular PlayStation games in history, and became the first game to sell over a million copies for the console.

Take a look at our thoughts about the game’s soundtrack!

Virtua Fighter was an incredibly important moment in gaming, so following up with a sequel that lived up to its predecessor was absolutely vital for SEGA.

Luckily, with Virtua Fighter 2, they managed to not only surpass the first game in the way it looked, but how it played too. Improved movesets ramped up how authentic each individual martial arts/fighting style felt, and with things running at 60FPS in the arcade version, the game felt like it was miles ahead of its competition.

The third entry in the World Heroes series was yet another improvement on the games that preceded it, but considering the sheer amount of solid competition it was facing in 1994, it still fell to the wayside.

The game added two new fighters and added a brand new boss to face off against, but things were starting to feel somewhat dated with the series now, and it suffered as a result.

While there were many action-adventure and side-scrolling beat-’em-ups based on characters from the Marvel universe, it wasn’t until the early 90’s until we got a fully fledged fighting game. It only made sense that Capcom, one of the heaviest hitters in the genre at the time stepped forward to fix this.

Released in arcades in late 1994, X-Men: Children of the Atom established what would become a beloved and fruitful relationship between Capcom and Marvel, and laid the foundations for the successful “Vs.” series that fighting game fans have played for nearly 25 years now.

The game is loosely based on 1993’s “Fatal Attractions” storyline, in which Magneto and his Acolytes return to confront the X-Men, tempting Professor Xavier to cross a moral line to stop them. It’s a pretty insane storyline with some fairly gnarly imagery (one such example sees Wolverine getting the adamantium ripped out of his skeleton!), and the good vs. evil dynamic lends itself perfectly to the setting of an arcade fighting game.

1994’s entries in the genre saw developers starting to take full advantage of the new 3D graphics that SEGA introduced with Virtua Fighter in the wake of a new console generation, while 2D fighting games kept on coming hard and fast to try and best Street Fighter II and Mortal Kombat’s popularity.

Join us next week as we take a look at the games of 1995!

Did we miss anything from 1994 that’s worth mentioning?

Let us know in the comments below!

[fallenparty]

Neo Geo Battle Coliseum

[itsfantasticac]

ADK fanart, submitted to Arcadia magazine in 2000.

Arcadia magazine no. 7 (Dec. 1, '00), pg. 170

[the2dstagesfg]

“Leonhalt’s Stage” from Aggressors of Dark Kombat (ADK/SNK/1994)

[ironfist-clown-factory]

Hey everyone, Eric here!

First and first mostly I have to apologize for the near radio silence as of late. College really does that to ya. That being said I will try to get out a new Clown by week’s end!

In the meantime, here’s a fighting game mock-up I made for a fun li’l side project me and some friends are working on! I might actually be able to talk about it more later this week, so stay tuned and thank you for your patience!

[z2z-gaming-and-random-art-ai]

Console Fighting Games of 1994 - Aggressors of Dark Kombat

Developed by ADK Corporation and released in Arcades in Japan and on the Neo Geo in the US in 1994, Aggressors of Dark Kombat is a street fighting beat 'em up, with 8 fighters battling it out to find out which one is the toughest street fighter on the streets of Tokyo.

[vgadvisor]

[bison2winquote]

“I can’t breathe. But I’m happy.” - Sheen Genus, Aggressors of Dark Kombat (ADK/ Alpha Denshi)