#third character is dan hibiki from street fighter

[sunkern-plus]

there are so many reasons fictional characters could and should be fat but they're drawn skinny as a rail for no other reason than people think everyone should be skinny to be loveable.

example: guy who drinks a lot of alcohol, like a whole 6 pack of beer every day, is somehow drawn thin as a rail. that guy should have a beer gut and be as wide as a house. why are you drawing him thin

example: woman who is body positive (especially about fat bodies) and is kinky and loves sex AND loves eating is somehow skinny as a rail despite there being an entire kink fixated on eating a ton of food and another kink around appreciating fat bodies. same woman was raised in an orphanage and is trans, likely had to starve herself (which a prior history of starvation can lead to weight gain) to fit the ideal mold of what a trans person "should" be to be able to transition in the first place but is now leaning into hedonism and "if you don't like me the way i am then fuck you" attitudes. why are you drawing her thin

example: person with impulse control issues who even has a quote about how they eat even when they're full. their parents are also notably fat. somehow despite obvious signs of binge eating disorder and having fat people genes is the same size as most of the average characters of their birth assignment.

EDIT: THOUGHT OF ANOTHER EXAMPLE

example: this guy doesn't do much physical activity given that he's the token non superpowered guy in a group of superpowered people, mostly uses his brain as his "superpower" (he's just really smart lmao) and has a diet consisting of instant ramen and candy. somehow is one of the thinnest characters there.

example: this guy can shapeshift into a huge tiger the size of a 6 foot tall human basically, which would logically require a lot of body fat and calories to sustain without pain, EXTREME amounts of stretch marks, or some sort of chronic fatigue. is even joked about in the manga about having "love handles". eats tons of food because of his history with starvation (another factor in weight gain and fatness is previously being starved as i stated in the second example). SOMEHOW is, according to his stated height and weight, UNDERWEIGHT.

like. do you SEE the problems i'm talking about

[mystech-master]

Death Battle Heroes Team Up

I and my friend have been talking about this idea for a while.

Imagine all of the heroes/anti-heroes that have shown up in Death Battle

The candidates for this team are anyone who can be considered a full-on hero (fight bad guys and save the world), or even an anti-hero (same but maybe with darker/more brutal methods/motivations, Red Hood, Venom became bros with Spidey later on IIRC, etc.), and they must have appeared on Death Battle, but I am willing to extend it to characters who have appeared in the animation but aren't the advertised combatants (Trish and Jeanne) or are basically confirmed (Ruby Rose and Maka Albarn + Soul Eater), just to add some variety to their franchise reps b/c DB has a shit load of Marvel and DC and many franchises have like 1-2 reps with many of them not even having their main character yet.

I imagine this crossover taking place in some weird nexus outside of space-time so we don't have to deal with the complete consequences of their settings crossing over as well as to explain how canonically dead characters are here too.

All Pokemon who appear in DB will just be a part of Red's collection. Charizard has the Mega Stone and we've seen that Mewtwo can Mega Evolve under his own power.

Imagine the chaos of having Tatsumaki, the Reds and Blues (Xeno Trunks would have an aneurysm after hearing about their time travel BS), 3 My Little Ponies, A couple of Shonen Dumbass protagonists, and more all working together.

Ben has pretty good samples of badass new DNA to scan for cool new transformations: Goku, Superman, Optimus Prime, and Glacius for example. I wonder if he would get Chozo DNA from scanning Samus?

Imagine all of the technology/science-based heroes all bringing their heads together to make something badass (Give Genos a freaking Upgrade so he isn't reduced to scraps in most of his fights).

Goku and Zoro now have plenty of new martial artists/swordsmen to learn and grow from. Yes, Goku is like 50 billion times Universal now and could wipe out all of them in one move, but he can still hold back against a weaker opponent if he thinks he can learn something new from them. Or at the very least he'd be happy to help other martial artists grow, like Ryu (Street Fighter, not Hayabusa), Po, Guy, and Lee.

We recently talked about the possibility that The Seven from The Boys, specifically Homelander, would try to muscle in and lead this team, saying that they are totally awesome heroes, but with Op people like Goku and Superman or the 4 super wizards (Fate, Zatanna, Strange, and Scarlet Witch) they are gonna be put in their place eventually.

The main problem with some of the options for heroes is that they are a bit too dark/brutal. Like we have Guts as a possible hero, but the world of Berserk is super hardcore compared to a lot of these franchises. It feels like if you have the setting or something from Berserk, someone would basically need to have all sorts of horrible shit happen to them (Killed, Eaten, that third thing that Boomstick mentioned in Guts vs Nightmare, or all 3 at once). The tonal clash really messes with this.

This is just a fun idea my friend and I have been talking about that I thought I'd share. It'd be interesting to see if anyone else has any interesting possible interactions between the heroes.

I'll try to list who I have as options (see after read more)

Starwars: Luke, Obi-Wan, Yoda

Metroid: Samus Aran

Street Fighter/Final Fight: Mike Haggar, Zangief, Chun-Li, Blanka, Ryu, Dan Hibiki, Cammy, Ken Masters

Mortal Kombat: Raiden, Scorpion, Sonya Blade, Sub-Zero, Johnny Cage

Marvel: Rogue, Thor, Spider-Man, Captain America, Deadpool, Iron Man, Beast, Wolverine, Hawkeye, Quicksilver, Hulk, Venom, Captain Marvel, Spider-Man 2099, Black Panther, Doctor Strange, Daredevil, Namor, Black Widow, Ghost Rider, Miles Morales, War Machine, Cable, Winter Soldier, Spider-Gwen, Iron Fist, Storm, Scarlet Witch, Magneto

DC: Wonder Woman, Batman, Superman, Green Arrow, Barry Alan, Batman Beyond, Raven, Doctor Fate, Nightwing, Aquaman, Shazam, Green Lantern, Static, Black Canary, Booster Gold, Wally West, Red Hood, Batgirl, Harley Quinn, Zatanna

Mario Bros: Yoshi, Mario, Peach, Luigi, Donkey Kong

TMNT (either the 2003 4Kids version or Rise): Leonardo, Donatello, Raphael, Michelangelo

Battletoads: Zitz

Killer Instinct: Black Orchid, Fulgore (the version who is starting to gain Eagle's mind), Glacius, TJ Combo, Sabrewulf (if they can get him help w his Lycanthropy)

Darkstalkers: Felicia, Jon Talbain

Blazblue: Taokaka, Ragna the Bloodedge

God of War: Kratos

Spawn

Dragon Ball: Vegeta, Son Goku, Majin Buu, Hercule Satan, Android 18, Master Roshi, Beerus, Broly, Trunks (not Xeno version so he'll match and Xenoverse is its own complicated BS). Since Gogeta and Vegito are the same guys they'll just have a pair of Potara so other characters can fuse even though they lack DBZ powers

Sonic the Hedgehog: Shadow, Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy, Silver (similar deal to Trunks)

Harry Potter

Fatal Fury: Mai Shiranui, Terry Bogard

Transformers: Optimus Prime

MLP: Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Twilight Sparkle

Halo/Red vs Blue (It's implied that they share a universe right?): Master Chief, Carolina, Sarge, Simmons, Griff, Donut, Lopez, Church, Tucker, Caboose, Tex (this one is subject to change with how they reference a lot of other media but it would mostly involve ignoring a joke or 3)

DOOM: Doomguy

Mega Man: Mega Man, Zero, Megaman X, Mega Man Trigger/Volnutt, Lan Hikari & MegaMan.EXE, Geo Stellar and Omega-Xis

Final Fantasy VII: Cloud Strife, Tifa Lockhart

Pokemon: Red (all pokemon are in his arsenal): Charizard, Blastoise, Venusaur, Pikachu, Mewtwo, Lucario, Machamp

He-Man and She-Ra

Thundercats: Lion-O

Ninja Gaiden: Ryu Hayabusa

Strider: Strider Hiryu

Fox MCloud, Bucky O'hare, Terminator, RoboCop, Godzilla (iteration where he is more of an ally), MechaGodzilla (with or without Akane), Gamera

Power Rangers: Tommy Oliver (Tigerzord and Dragonzord), Jason, Billy, Trini, Tack, Kimberly

Gundam: Zechs in the Epyon, Amuro in the RX-78-2

Kirby: Kirby, King Dedede

Guilty Gear: Sol Badguy

Naruto: Gaara, Naruto Uzumaki, Jiraiya, Sasuke Uchiha, Might Guy, Kakashi Hatake, Rock Lee

Avatar: Toph, Aang, Zuko, Korra

Guts, Goliath

Metal Gear, Solid Snake, Otacon (remember if they show up in the animation they count), Raiden

Splinter Cell: Sam Fisher, Grimm

RWBY: Yang, Weiss, Blake, you could possibly count Ruby since Ben Singer did say that that matchup WILL happen as it was Monty's Request

Astro Boy

Tai and Agumon, Renamon

Devil May Cry: Dante, Trish, Vergil

Bayonetta, Jeanne

Ratchet & Clank

Jak and Daxter

Tracer

One Piece: Zoro, Ace, Sanji

Fairy Tail: Erza, Natsu, Gray

Lara Croft, Nathan Drake, Scrooge McDuck (reboot version), Shovel Knight

Voltron: Keith, Lance, Hunk, Alura, Pidge

Ichigo Kurosaki

JJBA: Jotaro Kujo, Jonathan Joestar

Kenshiro, Crash Bandicoot + Aku Aku, Spyro the Dragon + Sparx

Sora, Donald, Goofy, and King Mickey

Pit, Leon Kennedy, Frank West (the last 2 were almost ignored but Marvel vs Capcom made me rethink it), Jin Kazama, Samurai Jack, Afro Samurai

MAYBE Lucy from Elfen Lied if some of the more paragon heroes manage to help get through to her, but she'd be a challenge

Ben Tennyson, Mitsuru Kirijo, Captain Falcon, Edward Elric, Hiei, Mob

One-Punch Man: Tatsumaki, Genos, Saitama

My Hero Academia: All Might, Shoto Todoroki, Deku

Danny Phantom, Jake Long

Like I said the Seven would try to join and take over but the super powerful characters can put them in their place: Homelander, Black Noir, Queen Maeve, A-Train, The Deep, and Starlight. Butcher might be brought in as well.

Soul Eater: Crona, and Maka + Soul Eater (similar logic to Ruby Rose up in the RWBy section)

Kill la Kill: Ryuko and Senketsu

Mikasa Ackerman, Po, Steven Universe, Star Butterfly, Alucard (the 4 super wizards putting a leash on him, some of the heroes' honorable nature, and DIO + Dracula being evil vampires might allow him to play nice for a time), Tanjiro and Nezuko Kamado, Omni-Man, Excalibur

Bond and Wick are a bit too down to Earth to fit among all this fiction so either they'd be cut or they'd have to be handled very carefully

Spongebob and Asta

That is the total list of heroes that we've considered for this crossover.

[glapplebloom]

A look at the relationship between Strength and Durability.

Newton's third law: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. You punch something? That force is reflected back on you. Which is why you break your hand punching a wall because you heard Cody from Final Fight could. So usually, when someone has the strength to do something, they most likely have the strength to be affected by said something without being hurt.

For example: Dragon Ball. When we get to Z we got planet busters coming out the wazoo. I’m pretty sure outside Hercule and the non-combatants the majority of the cast can destroy a planet at minimum. And since that is the case, they are most likely able to survive a Planet Busting attack if hit by it. They can’t breathe in space, but in the initial explosion they can likely survive. 

Superman, the Hulk, John Cena; if there’s a fictional character with Super Strength, 99% of the time they have the durability to take whatever they can dish out. After all, their opponents are usually on their level of strength so of course they’re more inclined to take a beating as much as dish it out. Of course, there are exceptions to the rules.

Sometimes there are characters who only have one extreme. These are called Glass Cannons (Powerful Attackers but Fragile) and Stone Walls (Immovable force, but not a dangerous threat). Thing is these are like that because of either two reasons: story or balance. I bet you can already figure out one such Glass Canon: Deku from My Hero Academia. His story in the beginning was trying to make All Might’s power his own, because if he doesn’t it will break his bones every time he uses them.

Other Glass Cannons: Akuma from Street Fighter and Tifa from Final Fantasy 7. They’re Glass Cannons because of gameplay. They have high damaging moves, but can’t take a lot of damage themselves. That’s because of gameplay balance. Akuma can split a mountain in half and kick a Submarine from undersea to the ocean with a kick. Tifa can lift Weapons over her head when using Limit Breaks. Do you think Dan Hibiki or Scarlet realistically stand a chance against these two?

A Stone Wall example ironically comes from Dragon Ball. Botamo, the Anime Winnie the Pooh, is a guy who can take any attack thrown at him (so far). That includes the likes of Base Goku or actually trained Gohan. If given the benefit of the doubt, he could possibly survive attacks that could destroy universes and remain intact. But the two times we do see him in action, he doesn’t really seem like a threat to those who can take his blows.

So when researching, always remember that while they could have feats in one end that seems impressive compared to the other, 99% of the time the two are parallel with each other. So unless the story made sure to state such a thing, even if the games do it for balance, always assume that strength = durability.

[epiceneandroid]

for my belated day three of my dan hibiki coining extravaganza, here’s a coining post for a -thing gender that dan would DEFINITELY not identify as (as he does not CONCEIVE of himself as a joke, thank you very much) but i think would fit him: jokething!

jokething: a gender connected to being both a joke and a thing; a jokething.

tbh, the colors were just colors i associated with joke characters and jovial characters, like dan hibiki himself, pinkie pie, and rufus from street fighter iv, among others.

image description for the flag under the cut!

[image description: a flag created by teddy jean epiceneandroid for the gender “jokething”. it is a seven striped flag with six even small stripes, and one large odd stripe in the middle. the top and bottom stripes are in light yellow, the second from the top and second from the bottom stripes are lemon yellow, the third from the top and third from the bottom stripes are peach pink, and the middle stripe is pink lemonade/salmon yellow. end image description.]

[smashmusicideas]

November 2: Fighter 60ᵋ - Ken

I was going to start this - and I suppose I am, anyway - by discussing Ken’s history as the “first” Echo Fighter. Truthfully, clone characters and their equivalents of all sorts have been in video games forever, even if Ken is their most iconic representation in the world of fighting games (Luigi is, as Sakurai insinuated, the most overall). It’s all true. Ken seems more than fun, but he also does carry not just history of his own, but history of a concept Sakurai wanted to explicitly highlight. In many ways, he’s is just as important to Street Fighter as Ryu, a position of relevance in the cast which only Chun-Li also hits. The former two are an indirect martial arts twist on Mario and Luigi; they’re as stylistically different as they are mechanically similar and represent the genre as both hardcore and affable. Ken’s always been friendly, jokey, the part of Street Fighter that has stretchy yoga masters and obese mustachioed acrobats and a powerful sense of humor. I don’t think many Smash fans unfamiliar with his series were as cognizant of that, and it’s an element that deserves representation.

But that led me to thinking about Smash and Street Fighter. Sakurai’s put in a good number of references to Capcom’s arcade classic in his own games: Mario’s specials noticeably mimic Ryu’s, a plethora of other characters have grand and fiery uppercuts, Incineroar is pretty clearly at least partially a take on Zangief, and that emphasis on accessibility is a big part of why SFII had the power it did. Sakurai’s often betrayed a dear love of fighting game many sorts: King of Fighters (though that led to his greatest personal shame), Virtua Fighter, Marvel vs Capcom, and Tekken have all been explicitly referenced, and I’m certain there are dozens of others my lack of fighting game knowledge has missed. As much as Smash posits itself as distinct from traditional fighting games - and it absolutely is - I don’t think it’s ever been a denouncement of them. It’s more an attempt to explore the values of fun, competition, and pleasing violence in a different way. The truth is that by the late Nineties, there was a need for something new, untethered to the dug-in mechanical tropes was needed. It took a while for Smash to cement itself as the light alternative, but it’s set, to the point where there’ve been multiple Smash clones of varying quality. Disappointingly, none of them seem to have a low-rent take on the Mario Brothers in the way SNK had “Ryo” and “Robert” in Art of Fighting (which led to the recursive “shotaclone” pastiche Dan Hibiki. Fighting games are...odd).

Because of that, Ryu and Ken’s presence isn’t just as an explicit incorporation of fighting game history, it’s an odd sort of torch passing between the older way of doing things and the newer. I don’t really think Sakurai had that particular part in mind, but it does just by design acknowledge how far Smash has come in the genre of “fighting games.” Many of the other third party characters have that in a way - Sonic represented the end of the Nintendo / SEGA rivalry (even if Mario & Sonic came out a year before Brawl), Snake showed how far this "guest fighter” thing could go - but with Ken and Ryu it’s different. It’s a relationship specifically within the realm of fighting games, and I do think that carries a bit more. I know Ken was anticipated by some with a certain degree of resignation. But while I think his distinct spin on Ryu looks rather fun on its own, I also love that thematic wealth he adds. He was the iconic “clone character,” one of the two mandatory Street Fighter icons, and ultimately, he and Ryu really are a double act. That laconic charm is a necessary counterweight to his friend’s intense stoicism, and a worthwhile point that Street Fighter is a lot more than scowling martial arts masters. He’s great, more than I necessarily expected. And he feels earned in a way not ton of characters necessarily do. As expected as he was, he’s lived up to that history.

(Link to my writings on Super Smash Bros. Ultimate)

[fnlrndcllctv]

REVIEW: Rival Schools: United By Fate (1997)

The later part of the 1990’s was a busy time for Capcom’s fighting game lineup.

In 1997, not only was the third entry in the Darkstalkers series on the horizon, but a whole bunch of entirely different Street Fighter-related games were scheduled too (such as Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter, Street Fighter III: 2nd Impact, Super Gem Fighter Mini Mix and Street Fighter EX Plus Alpha).

With the busy calendar that the company was keeping up with, dropping a new fighting game IP that year would surely have been a case of commercial (and critical) suicide, right?

Not exactly.

Released in arcades in November 1997, Rival Schools: United By Fate began development when Hideaki Itsuno from Capcom wanted to make a 60FPS 3D polygon-based fighting game. The previous 3D fighter from the company, Star Gladiator, was set at 30FPS due to the various weapons and effects that the game used, which resulted in the technical limits of an arcade machine not being exceeded at all.

Originally titled “JUSTICE FIST“, Rival Schools: United By Fate was originally going to be based around a tournament where fighters from around the world meet up and try to determine who is the strongest of them all (sound familiar?). After a humble response from his team, Itsuno decided to base the game around a shared experience that everyone could relate to; school.

Gameplay

Rival Schools: United By Fate differs from many other Capcom fighting games in that it opts for a four button fighting system (instead of the standard six buttons that Street Fighter II introduced us to back in 1991) which immediately makes things feel more like an entry in SNK’s fighting game catalogue. Capcom would eventually crossover with SNK a couple of years later, but having this system in place felt quite different to pretty much everything else in the realm of arcade fighting games, especially for a 3D fighter.

The game also employs a tag team system that is similar to Marvel Vs. Capcom (and, weirdly enough, The King Of Fighters games), where players select a team of two fighters each before their fights. The gameplay is still one-on-one, but players can swap out their fighters at the end of a round, or even call in their team-mate during a match for a special move known as a “Team Up” attack (if their special meter at the bottom is full enough!). These attacks vary greatly depending on which combinations of fighters are used, with some synergies working more effectively if the characters are from the same school.

This selection of teams also greatly affects the game’s story mode too, with several different story branches only being available to specific teams.

As is to be expected from a Capcom fighting game by this point, players each have a special meter at the bottom of the screen, known in Rival Schools as “Vigor Meters”. These work just like a normal special meter, as they gradually fill up during fights. A maximum of 9 levels can be stored, but with Team Up attacks using up 2 whole bars and special “Burning Vigor” attacks quickly drinking the meter up too, players must approach this feature with an element of strategy about them.

The game also utilises a couple of new defense techniques too. The first, known as “Tardy Counters”, allows a player to immediately counter an opponent’s attack from a blocking position. The second, known as “Attack Cancels” allows players to cancel out incoming attacks by timing their own hits with the attack. This does require a bar to be filled in the Vigor Meter, while Tardy Counters are free to use.

Story

The story introduces the player to a Japanese city called Aoharu City, where several local schools are the victims of unknown attacks and kidnappings of students and staff.

The various fighters in the game set out to find who is responsible for the attacks on their school, with the cut-scenes and fights portraying their interactions with the other schools and amongst themselves.

Eventually, the story reveals that an elite school in the city, Justice High, is responsible for the attacks. The player's team eventually faces off against Raizo Imawano, the principal of the school, and first boss of the game.

If certain requirements are met during the fight against Raizo - namely hitting him with a “Team Up Technique” as the final blow in the match - the story continues and the players play a last fight against Hyo Imawano, Raizo's nephew and the true mastermind behind the events of the game.

It’s a refreshing take on the fighting game story mode, and utilises the trope of students fighting each other for no other reason than their association with a different school pretty well. The cut scenes and animated sequence are all executed almost perfectly too, even if they’re a bit pixelated.

Roster

There are five high school factions to choose from in Rival Schools: United By Fate, each with their own specific focus;

Taiyo High – “The High School That Loves Freedom” – A private school that focuses on student individuality.

Gorin High – “School Of Advanced Sports” – A private school that aims to produce athletes that can compete at a national level.

Gedo High – “Collecting The Nation’s Worst” – an all-male school that seems to be more like a correctional facility to rehabilitate wayward youth and criminals.

Pacific High – “High-Class American School” – Located near a US military base, this is an exclusive school for foreign exchange students.

Justice High – “Super Elite High School” – A strict school with some shady rumours circulating around its admission process.

The game’s roster consists of 19 playable fighters (21 in the Shiritsu Justice Gakuen: Nekketsu Seishun Nikki 2 release);

Batsu - The game’s main protagonist; a recent transfer to Taiyo High who is looking for his kidnapped mother.

Hinata - A first-year student at Taiyo. She immediately joins Batsu in the investigation of his mother's disappearance.

Kyosuke - A first-year student and member of the school's morals committee with some interesting family ties to another character in the game. He too joins Batsu in his investigation.

Ran - Appearing only in Nekketsu Seisyun Nikki 2, Ran is a journalist for the Taiyo student newspaper looking for the next scoop on the kidnappings and attacks. It is also suggested that she is related to Dan Hibiki from the Street Fighter series.

Hayato - A PE teacher from Taiyo who seeks out the persons responsible for the attacks in order to help his students and to watch over them. While he does appear in the Arcade version, he’s only playable in the PlayStation version of the game.

Shoma - A baseball player for Gorin High who seeks out the people responsible for injuring his older brother, Shuichi.

Natsu - A volleyball player for Gorin High. Like Shoma, she seeks the people responsible for hurting her junior high pupils.

Roberto - A soccer player for Gorin High. He helps Shoma and Natsu in their pursuit, as well as serving as a mediator for arguments between the two.

Nagare - An exclusive character to Nekketsu Seisyun Nikki 2, a third-year student and swimmer for Gorin High. He investigates the incidents on his own, as well as keeping tabs on Shoma.

Akira - A first-year student and new transfer to Gedo High who claims to be the younger brother of the school's gang leader, Daigo. She is later revealed to actually be his younger sister.

Edge - A student at Gedo and member of the school's gang. He is one student that joins Akira in searching for the gang boss.

Gan - A heavy-set student at Gedo and member of the school's gang. Like Edge, he helps Akira in searching for her brother.

Daigo - The leader of Gedo High student gang, he cares much for his hometown and seeks the persons responsible for the attack to exact vengeance upon them.

Roy - A foreign exchange student from the United States. He is investigating the attacks and kidnapping at the request of his father.

Tiffany - Another American foreign exchange student, and a cheerleader. She follows Roy in his investigation, not only to help solve the case but also impress him.

Boman - A foreign exchange student and preacher-in-training. He joins Roy and Tiffany to help solve the case, although the fighting conflicts with his moral beliefs.

Hideo - A Japanese language teacher. He is recruiting new students for Justice High at the request of the school's principal.

Kyoko - Justice High's school nurse. She is asked to join Hideo in recruiting students to the school.

Raizo - The principal of Justice High. Appears to be the mastermind of the kidnappings and attacks on other schools.

Hyo - A student at Justice High. He is the true mastermind behind the events of the game.

Sakura - From the Street Fighter series. Sakura is childhood friends with Hinata and Natsu, and she helps them in finding the people responsible for the school kidnappings and attacks. Her appearance is set before her debut in Street Fighter Alpha 2.

There’s also an extra 24 unlockable characters were created using the facial expressions from the cut character creation mode. These new characters are meant to resemble random students from each of the game’s high schools.

Graphics

Rival Schools: United By Fate is a prime example of the state of 3D fighting games in the late 90’s, especially the output from Capcom.

The character models themselves are well animated, and are exciting to watch in action, but are incredibly blocky and pretty ugly to look at, which also rings true for games such as Street Fighter EX, Plasma Sword and Star Gladiator.

Games such as Tekken and the Virtua Fighter series were constantly breaking new ground with their graphics, but many Capcom games seemed like they were struggling to keep up.

Rival Schools: United By Fate almost gets a pass due to it’s tongue-in-cheek, anime-like nature, but it isn’t quite enough to ignore here.

It isn’t Capcom’s worst-looking 3D game (we’ll talk about that one soon…), but it’s definitely not the best either.

Stages

There are 11 stages to fight in throughout Rival Schools: United By Fate, and each of them is based on an area from or around each of the game’s respective high schools.

Ranging from a classroom, the gymnasium and the athletic tracks, to some very imposing school gates, a library and a drive-in movie theater, there’s plenty of variety when it comes to the game’s scenery.

These stages utilise a similar graphic style found in the Street Fighter EX series and even the earlier Tekken games, in that the floor of the stage is in 3D, but is surrounded by 2D backgrounds to give an illusion of depth.

The quality here has aged as well as the graphics, and is sadly one of the weaker points of the game.

Replayability

Rival Schools: United By Fate undeniably features the highest amount of extra content in any PlayStation-era fighting game.

Not only does the game contain several unlockable fighters and alternate costumes, but it also collects together every unlocked ending movie and loading screen in an extensive gallery mode. There’s even specific criteria for unlocking a character’s “good” ending too.

The game’s training mode is one of the finest that the era could offer, by grading your training performance much in the same way as a school student taking a PE class, showing players exactly which areas they are performing well in and which areas need improvement.

Then there’s the “extracurricular” game modes that are unlocked on the “EVOLUTION” disc.

Players who complete several playthroughs of the game’s story mode are rewarded with new game modes;

“Target mode” (in which you take control of Roberto as he tries to achieve the highest score possible by aiming and kicking a football towards scoreboards).

“Home Run Derby” mode is a baseball simulation, where players take the role of Shoma, with high scores being determined by how far players can hit a baseball across the field.

“Penalty Shot” mode is similar to “Target” mode, but this adds the ability for a second player to take on the role of a goalkeeper, and goes off the number of goals scored instead of points scored.

“Service Mode” is a volleyball game that sees players take control of Natsu, who must volley a ball toward large “chibi” versions of different characters from the game, each varying in their worth points-wise.

“Kyoko’s Office” is one of the more unusual additions to the game, as it isn’t really a “game” as such. Players press combinations of the controller’s shoulder buttons in order to make the controller vibrate, while Kyoko looks like she’s giving you a massage. Given that the original Dualshock controller was released just a few months before the game’s arrival on PlayStation, it makes sense for this fun little feature to be included.

For the exclusive Japanese release of the game - Shiritsu Justice Gakuen: Nekketsu Seishun Nikki 2 - even more content was added into the game, offering a school sim mode in the same vein as the Persona series, along with the ability to create your own character in the process. This was scrapped from the western releases, as it would have taken way too long to localise and translate. Many of the assets from the character creation mode did sill find their way overseas in the form of unlockable fighters, so it wasn’t a total loss.

Final thoughts & overall score

Rival Schools: United By Fate is, without a doubt, one of the most criminally underrated fighting games in the genre’s long history, and didn’t get the exposure it truly deserved when it was originally released.

While the graphics are somewhat choppy by today’s standards, the gameplay aspects that it shares with other Capcom games such as the Marvel vs. Capcom series make the game an absolute dream to play through, and throwing in such innovative features such as a Persona-style school sim mode*, character creation* and a plethora of fun bonus content that is bursting with character makes Rival Schools: United By Fate a worthwhile investment of any fighting game fan’s time and attention.

It’s just a shame that some of the extra content was cut from the version I grew up with.

*These modes are exclusive to the Japanese upgrade of the game; Shiritsu Justice Gakuen - Nekketsu Seishun Nikki 2

Do you agree with our review of the original Mortal Kombat?

Let us know in the comments section below!

[epiceneandroid]

now i’m gonna show my true colors...as a street fighter fan AND a xenogender headcanon-er.

xenogenders made by @flagmeanew

i honestly think these genders heavily fit these characters as dan’s identity is heavily formed around “being a joke” and kolin’s identity is heavily formed around “being a martyr for gill” though i honestly like to believe they’re working on improving that

[image description: two icon sized flag edits of dan hibiki and kolin from street fighter. dan hibiki is a heavyset, slightly tanned skinned man with brown eyes, a small nose, thick brown eyebrows, brown hair, and a pink karate gi with a purple undershirt. he is roaring in determination. he is wearing purple gloves and he is barefoot. behind him is the ridiculusvoxic flag, an eight striped flag with a white top stripe, a pale pink or salmon pink second stripe, a darker pink but still pale pink third stripe, a yellow fourth stripe, a light blue fifth stripe, a darker blue sixth stripe, a bright red seventh stripe, and a blood red eighth stripe. on top of it, it has a white peace sign glyph, but the glyph is obscured by dan’s frame. the second image features kolin, a thin woman with blonde hair and blue eyes. she is wearing her hair in a ponytail, and she has a black suit with a white undershirt and a pink handkerchief in it. she has a concerned yet angry expression. there is a circle in front of her, from my editing, that is white. behind her is the martyrisvoxic flag, a flag with 9 stripes and a white flower glyph. the first stripe is midnight purple. the second stripe is a slightly dark greyish purple. the third stripe is a slightly lighter dark greyish purple. the fourth stripe is a dusk purple. the fifth stripe is a slightly wine colored purple. the sixth stripe is a slightly grape colored purple. the seventh stripe is a blood red, and the eighth stripe is a bright red. end image description]