"The game that could have been"

Way of the Warrior was released in 1994 for the Panasonic Real 3DO. A typical fighter of the time, it has a few good points and a few bad points. Some people had lots of fun playing this title, but it seemed that you either loved it or hated it. It was fun for a while, but what really killed it was the preconceived notions. I really wanted to like this game. It had the potential to be a hundred times cooler than other fighting games. But the horrible controls are unforgivable, and this major flaw is one thing that made the game shoot itself in the foot.

Story: 4/10 A group of fighters gather to do battle for a tournament. Each fighter has his or her own back story, but they aren't important to the game. I gave it a bonus point because it seems to have more attitude than others in the genre.

Graphics: 8/10 The characters in this game are digitized, which looked cool when the game came out. The graphics are fairly impressive overall, but are most notable in the stages and finishing moves. Some of these moves are super realistic (knocking your opponent off of the roof will send him crashing through the roof onto some steps below, a puddle of blood trickling out of his dead body).

Sound/Music: 7/10 I docked a few points because there is no original music in this game. Every song was taken straight from a White Zombie album. This turned out to be pretty cool, however, this was the first game that I had ever played that had foul language in it. If you've heard it before, you know what I'm talking about. That might not matter to some people, but this was before the days of the ESRB Rating system. Just a warning. The sound effects were lacking, nothing worth mentioning. The voice acting on characters was horrible, and you could barely tell what they were saying. The voice on the menu screen quickly became annoying as well. When you are selecting a stage, it repeats over and over ''the roof the dojo the roof the arena''.

Gameplay: 5/10 The characters are interesting and have humorous special moves. Each character has a taunt, but they are pretty lame. Where the game shines is in the finishing moves. Different stages have different 'stage fatalities' assigned to them. One consists of knocking your opponent into a large ceiling fan, splattering their remains everywhere. Another has them knocked into a pit of lava, and their melting skeleton flies towards the screen and slides down (which is pretty cool looking). However, Way of the Warrior tries to feed off of the success of games like Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter 2, so it's basically a clone with a few new features.

Control: 3/10 The controls are very frustrating. It's easy enough to do some of the basic moves (kick, punch, jump). However, anytime you want to use a special move or fatality, it's hit and miss. Sometimes it will work fine, and sometimes it won't. Also, some of the fatalities were quite complicated. At any rate, you'd be lucky to pull any of them off, even if you know the correct combination of buttons. This was the game that spawned the creation of an adapter that would allow people to use an SNES pad on the 3DO. People were quick to blame the horrible control on the 3DO controller, although the game plays just as bad no matter what controller you use.

Challenge: 5/10 This is a fairly challenging game. However, the game would be much easier if you could get your character to do what they are supposed to.

Replay Value: 6/10 The replay value of this game depends on your level of patience. If you can master the difficult controls, you'll be playing at least until you see everyone's finishing moves. There are also numerous secret characters and levels to discover. However, there are a lot of better games out there, so there is little reason to play this one.

Overall: 5/10 Way of the Warrior creates an awesome environment within the game. The menus are visually impressive. The character designs are mostly unique. Each character has their own superhero type of logo. Lots of little touches that make you very excited to play the game. That is, until you actually begin the fight. The fights are nothing special, and you'll find yourself not caring about the fight, only the finishing move.

Worth buying?: If you collect 3DO games, buy it. However, if you are looking for a serious fighter, you should pass.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 01/22/04