Fatal Fury

Ambitious ports of games from more powerful to less powerful platforms are a long and proud tradition, and one which most people with experience of 8 and 16 bit home computers and/or consoles from the PlayStation 1 and before will be familiar with. The MegaDrive didn't escape this either, with a number of conversions of PC games (eg Dune 2: Battle for Arrakis or "Warriors of Rome") and arcade games. There's a legion of arcade conversions for MegaDrive, and while some were based on arcade machines of at least comparable power to the MegaDrive itself (eg Super Hang On), some conversions were decidedly more ambitious.

frank
You stay alive, baby. Do it for Van Gogh.

A number of Neo Geo games have been converted to the MegaDrive with varied success, including such titles as "King of the Monsters" 1 and 2, "World Heroes", "Viewpoint" and "Fatal Fury", the game in question. "Fatal Fury" is one of the surprisingly few fighting games made by SNK. You'd think throughout the years of the Neo Geo's life, more fighters would have been made. The world was screaming out for two dimensional one on one fighting games with impenetrably complex combinations to remember, but the world got so very, very few.

"Fatal Fury" is distinguishable easily from other SNK fighters in that…. so, how about those Mets? Think they'll take the Pennant this year? THEY'RE ALL THE SAME! SNK HATES YOU ALL! EVERY FIGHTING GAME IS A MASSIVE GREEN LOOGIE OF HATE SPAT INTO YOUR EYES, GAMERS! WAKE UP AND SMELL THE RECYCLING! SNK?!? NAMCO, FUCKER! MOMMY, WHAT ARE THOSE? DADDY WANTS TO FUCK!

Sorry, "Blue Velvet" flashback.

The MegaDrive conversion of "Fatal Fury" is as playable as the original. That is to say, not at fucking all. The good news, though, is that the rather rare sequel was also ported. I'd imagine you could get a MVS cart of Fatal Fury 1 or 2 for the price of a handjob from a hobo if you shop around enough, and the AES carts are probably not much more expensive either, at least from Japan. MVS is the Neo Geo arcade system and AES is the Neo Geo home system, for those wondering. They're functionally identical in most respects, but the carts aren't compatible (unless you get yourself a rather expensive Phantom-1 adaptor - currently at about $AUS300 on eBay Australia). Why would you want it, though? Get a grip already.

Did I ever tell you faithful readers out there about the time I stayed with a friend of mine in San Francisco who had an AES with "World Heroes", "King Of Fighters" and "Fatal Fury"? He set it up to show it off, since I'd never played a Neo Geo home system before, and his five year old son and I played the games. His five year old son handed me my ass at all three games. FIVE YEAR OLD SON. I may be a gimp, but that's ridiculous - I can barely remember where I live each night coming home from work, and this kid had learned some combos at five years old. I kicked his ass at "Nam 1975", though. Redemption tastes just like a cigar rolled on the thighs of a virgin, and is half as cancerous.

That embarrassing little incident taught me to give SNK fighters a wide, wide berth, and I have since retreated to the relative safety of the "Soul Blade" series. I loves me a good game of "Soul Calibur".

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