The Mog List: Terrible Fighting Games

If there’s anything out there that will peak my interests, it’s learning about all these different fighting games. Ranging from Street Fighter to Fighter’s Destiny, there’s a huge multitude of fighting games that either are really good and fun to play and then there’s the really bad fighting games. There are many ways to define a bad fighting game and honestly, I could just load the list up with a bunch of bad ones. However, in interest to keep things interesting, I’m just going to mention the ones that, at the very least, “tried” to be playable. Note that this isn’t a Top 5 and there’s no particular order as to how good or bad these games are. I’m just throwing out random terrible fighting games that I’ve experienced and also by no means a complete list of terrible games out there.

Number 5 – Street Fighter: The Movie (Arcade Version)

Because I felt like I had to get this out of the way as this game already has a lot going for it. You mix in digitized characters like Mortal Kombat and try (and I do mean try) to add in Street Fighter mechanics and you get Street Fighter: The Movie. What really makes this a terrible game is that it resembles nothing like Street Fighter. Sure, you have characters with their signature moves. However, the game plays so clunky with everything feeling out of whack. Regular attacks feel next to useless and special moves have weird ass properties. For example: You can steer Ryu’s hadouken. Not only can do you influence it up or down, assuming your opponent lets you do this, you can veer it back on screen with it going backwards.

Now I will admit, it isn’t a terribly terrible game. It’s fun to mess around in and figure out fancy combos that you’re entitled to do. It featured a lot of mechanics that you would see in other games like Killer Instinct 2 with the “red” and shadow moves and even hosted a good number of easter eggs as well. It also had a bit of a back story to it. One day on the Shoryuken.com Forums, a person by the name of Alan Noon revealed that he worked on the game and gave details about how development went and how much of an ambitious project he felt that he had in his hands. It’s an interesting read to see the thought process of the game, considering that most are willing to brush the game aside and call it absolute garbage. I highly recommend reading it and even giving the game a try on a MAME emulator.

And to avoid any confusion: The PSone and Sega Saturn version of the game is completely different from the Arcade version. Unlike the arcade game, the console versions went for a more traditional Street Fighter 2 feel for it and actually ended up being a pretty solid game.

Number 4 – Tattoo Assassins

This gem was a game that never saw release and we, as a community are thankful for it. Tattoo Assassins was a game that clearly took its idea from Mortal Kombat and attempted to cash in on the idea of making a violent game with realistic graphics. To attempt to overtake Mortal Kombat and the rest of the violent fighting games out at the time, it marketed itself as having over 2000 different fatalities.

The idea behind Tattoo Assassins was that you picked a character, you choose a special tattoo ability and you go and beat up people. The various characters featured in this game are “unique” to say the least. For example: Karla Keller is an ice skater character who is a direct spoof of Nancy Kerrigan, right down to the knee crippling part. Another character is a stripper who had a friend die and now she’s out for revenge. Heck, come to think about it, everyone in this game seems to be out for revenge.

Hmm.

With the game having poor feedback, missing deadlines and going over budget, the game was eventually cancelled. It’s a good reason though: the game just sucked. There are prototypes out there and can be emulated on MAME. Sure, we can argue that it’s a prototype and it would not be the final representation of the game. However, when you try to pick up and play it, you can immediately tell that it is a terrible game. It isn’t fun and all the fatalities really just boil down to just random sprite work that do not feel at all fulfilling like the Mortal Kombat fatalities.

Number 3 – Super Strip Fighter IV

Where do I even begin with this? Well, Super Strip Fighter IV is a fan-made fighting game that is centered around… well, some rather adult matter here.

You know what, I’m not even gonna write anything about this game. Screw this, I’m switching this out.

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MogKnight

Hanh "MogKnight" Nguyen is owner and Editor-in-Chief of The Mog Blog. A fan of pushing buttons and making things happen. He has recently been seen going around random GameStops to slowly rebuild his Dynasty Warriors collection.