The most influential fighting games

Fight, K.O. ,flawless, special, desperate move, parry, QCF; These words and many others have become part of the videogames jargon since many years ago, they have permeated the culture to unknown levels and become part of our life, a sample of this is the recent transmission by ESPN of the EVO tournament, competing on rating with other sport events and more surprising  the rise of famous programers, writers , project directors to the level of rockstars.

In the middle of all this maremagnum its convenient to locate some reference points to catch the big picture and later, dive into details, for this reason we'll talk about 5 of the most significant / representative games / franchises in the fighting games genre.

I. Street Fighter

 The icon, the legend , the alpha and omega, the chosen one, yada, yada, yada;  Sure we know, before street fighter there were another fighting games but their mechanics were crude and simple, unpolished, and very limited, with the coming of SF features, such  as the addition of more action buttons (6 to be precise), varied enemies, joystick sequences that  helped to develop a more complex game.

The legend

The boom of the metagame

With the arrival of its successor (SF II) the meta-game  grow in importance, evolved to create a new level of challenge you could know the movements of your adversary's character, game style (aggressive/defensive, mixed) and use this information to feed your game plan, the meta-game provided deepness since simple aspects as the chose of the character's screen selection and the side of the arcade cabinet you preferred to use.

The roster

8 characters were something impressive , despite the fact that two of them shared the same movements repertory; their unique abilities gave them advantages/disadvantages the player should know to get the maximum of opportunities to win.  The wide selection  gave  the players the capability to express themselves through their favorite character, game style and set of moves; Even more with the personalized story endings, the battle winner quotes (some of them also personalized) added deepness to their personalities and help to strengthen the the player/character bond.

"The" fighting game.

II. Mortal Kombat

More tan the similarities, were the differences with SF  the key to engage the players, the unusual button configuration and its arrange,  instead of 6 buttons MK uses only five, high punch/kick, low punch/kick and defense, this config gave the ability to buffer inputs and execute special moves while defending and avoid cross-up attacks.

MK a healthy saga that survived dark years with awful chapters its nowadays one of the stars of the FGC, hosted on great events and with enough fans to compete with its rival SF.

The battle continues...

The roster

7 characters ignited the passion, far from the colorful SF graphics, the digitized graphics showed a realistic warriors, on a more somber palette of colors, with Athletic bodies far from the barbaric muscles of the SF warriors, the combat seemed raw and bloody very bloody , lots of red splashing everywhere and the battle cryes drilling your ears it was a fest for the eyes, sudenly you felt you where watching a martial arts movie.

Your sex is on fireeee ♫

The graphics

The election of digitized graphics was a major a risky but succesful, it enhanced the game a more serious tone, creepier and gory far from the childy vibrant colors of SF and Its clones.

The fatalities

To  accomplish the mission of shake the world and get attention  terrorize, nothing better than terrorize the censors, along with the blood the game included a finishing move , a special input command to kill your beaten opponent, cut his/her head , tear off their backbone, burn it in flames, take out the still beating heart.

Johny Cage wins... FATALITY!

III.-Tekken

Tekken 7

The leap from 2D to 3D started with virtua fighter,  later NAMCO came into scene to rise the 3D games to the next level, the master level, dividing the 3D to a new stage, not only using 3D environments and characters, but evolving the way the matches were played "thinking in 3 Dimensions".

Altough Virtua Fighter jump to the ring before, the charismatic characters and the deeper mechanics of Tekken inmediately put it on the reflectors , gaining popularity in the arcades its launch on the playstation skyrocketed it, gaining a lot of devote fans whom still play it more than 15 years later.

The big number of moves available for each character, the real 3D fight and the exclusive 3D moves such as the side step, the roll background, roll foreground  added  layers of complexity to the until now, most dificult fighting game saga in terms of learning curve.

IV. King of fighters

The pupil overpasses the master, born under the shadow of Street Fighter,KOF was far from being another clone, developed its own personality, adding new mechanics to the classical repertory of the genre, team vs team mode, chi charge, avoiding techniques, dash forward/backward and a constant evolution from one version to another.

that guy looks like you son.

KOF has one of the most meritorious achievements, beyond the creation of a great community, a robust gameplay, lovely characters (Choi lovely?), e.g;  KOF kept the alive the flame of the fighting games through the most difficult years of the genre.

KOF 98 Roaster

V. Soul Calibur/Edge

Ocasionally, in some games, one or two characters port weapons and even use them, V.G. Yoshimitsu; Using the experience acquired with Tekken the not so obvious next step for NAMCO was to experiment and wow!, what a experiment, a new sub genere had borned, starting its life as Soul Edge/blade and later Soul Calibur.

The game incorporated some new mechanics, broke the limits of the human body thanks to the varied weapons used, some traditional as nunchuks, katanas and bo and  some other barely known , sudenly the martial arts movies from the 70-80s came alive with outstanding music and memorable scenarios, NAMCO did it again , get the pole position in a growing subgenre.

Soul Edge

To say that SC its a nice game its saying nothing , the SC beauty goes farther, the sum of its parts was a holistic product, a perfect game despite its fails, the game offered hours of fun , discovering constantly new ways to improve your game, the high replay value of the game in console put SC on a high niche, hard but not impossible to surpass.

Soul Edge

The home version of Soul Calibur II, was a enhanced version, even better tan a pixel by pixel game, more complex wire frames and richer textures, keeping the essential but using the full power of Dreamcast, it was a port beyond perfection.

Soul Calibur for DC, the perfect game.

The wonder years

When I was a kid, I couldn't imagine that a lot of years later l'd be playing video games, even more, collecting them, worshiping them, writing about them and now in the XXI century I say Damn!, why did I sell my old console?!, with all the games, booklets and related paraphernalia.

Too late for regrets, but perfect time to remember the love I feel for videogames, we are watching in first person the golden era of video games being reborn through the emulators, a growing interest for the hobby, and even more, a renewed love for old games from the hand of indie studios creating nostalgic and beautifully hand crafted retro style games. For some people this is just a fashion, a thing that won't be here in 5 years, but for us is... I ll say it... A DREAM COME TRUE, not everybody can do what we do, relive the wonderful years (What would you think if I sang out of tune?) everyday! we can play video games. In the last months we have seen the rising fame of many indie developers with games like Slain, Cursed Castilla, Axiom Verge and Cuphead and many others, some of these studios only have a few people on board, a programmer, a musician and a graphic artist, whom most of the time do different roles at the same time.

Cursed Castilla and Ghosts and Goblins compare

The oldest of them is the internationally known Spanish programmer “Locomalito” who incarnates the definition of a retro programmer, he conceives the games on a notebook and with a "little" big help from his teammate “Gryzor87” the musician, they have created more than 5 games in a pure retro style that immediately evokes the 8-16 bit era.

Cursed Castilla is one of these jewels, a platformer ambiented in the medieval period where the hero is a knight whose mission is to free the kingdom from the horde of demons that stalks the “Tolomera del Rey” region, sounds familiar?, right! It’s inspired in the Ghosts and Goblins/Ghouls saga, it's a tribute that has all the look and feel of the Capcom´s game.

Slain: Back from Hell

Following in the supernatural platform games, Slain from Wolf Brew Games studio is another platform game that feels like a child between Castlevania and Rastan saga, a barbarian fencer/axe wielder that slashes everything that interferes with his mission, the dark but colorful scenarios remindful of some of Conan the barbarian and the aforementioned games, imagine terrifying enemies with vivid sound effects and metal background music to enjoy a good game session.

Cuphead

The Cuphead storm took everybody by surprise, a run ´n gun game flavored with a graphic style that’s reminiscent of  the old cartoons coming alive in front of your eyes, this game is the opera prima of two brothers who wanted to combine the best of two worlds, the vintage style of these cartoons with the frenetic mix of sound and color of the video games in a unique mix that tastes like a rush of nostalgia right to the heart, mind and soul, hard to resist... I became instantly an addict.

Axiom Verge

And last but no least, Axiom verge , another indie treasure of the genre known as Metroidvania or side scroller action adventure game, this title inspired (obviously) in Castlevania and Metroid for its game mode/style, but also takes elements of games such as Contra, Turrican and Bionic Commando, a very special mix that tastes like something new but with twists of the mentioned games. The color palette is more on the side of the 8 bits and at times, like the early SEGA Genesis titles.

That's the current panorama, and it's not a fashion, but now lets meet the actors; In the middle of all these events, changes and a growing scene, a community has given the indies full support, it has become stronger than ever, a group of video game lovers who like to keep the console and games alive, playing them, hunting them on garage sales, Internet and fan conventions.

Collecting video games and consoles is one of the most challenging hobbies, and one of the most rewarding, it's not a just accumulate, is keeping safe both,  history and stories, every console and game generally has shared part of our lives, and even more, gives us the opportunity to relive some of the funniest moments of our lives.

London Gaming Market

Call me corny, but every time I insert a game into the console I hear in my mind the intro song from “the wonder years” I hear Kevin Arnold´s adult voice and the Joe Cocker song, and in that instant when I start to play, feeling the control pad in my hands, the world spins around, only me and the game. Thats the magic of playing a game on its original hardware, the controller´s weight, the texture, the ritual, everything combined to travel in time.

But as I said it's not an easy task not everybody shares the love for console and games, many of this material is damaged and dirty, if it's hard to find this stuff in good shape, is almost impossible to find functional booklet or boxes, most of them end its life in the trash.