Virtua Fighter 2

"PFFFFHAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA..."

...AAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...hold on wait a minute let me just regain my composu...PFFFFFFFFFFHAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA... :: tries with all my might to stop laughing :: Heh...hehe...alrighty then...this fighting game port immediately gets filed under SHOULD NOT HAVE EVER BEEN MADE!!! What's it's purpose anyway!? If you wanted the best port you could buy the Saturn version, if you wanted a mediocre version of VF you could have gotten VF1 for the 32X while it was still alive. But to make VF2 into a 2D GAME!? That's just sacrilegious! Now I myself think this is one of the stupidest, useless ports to ever be coded, but I have done my best to give it a chance. I have to admit they did one helluva job squeezing as much of the arcade gameplay as they could into this 32 megabit cart. Heh, anyway...

Story: 5
Well, the VF storyline is actually not bad if you read the character profiles in the manual, but the fact that there are no endings really puts a damper on things.

Gameplay: 4
Well, aside from the fact that you are playing with only two dimensions, making gameplay a lot less ''Virtua,'' character attack timing is actually a lot like the arcade version/way better port versions. For instance, if you are Pai, you can press punch punch punch kick the same way as you would in the arcade and you will do the same four hit combo. While this accurate arcade timing is impressive, not all of the moves made it into the port. For instance, there aren't HALF as many throw moves. Some other moves, like Sarah's Soccer Kick (awesome insult to injury move, lol) is also not here. Speaking of things that didn't make it into this port, Lion and Shun Di are right out! The final nail in the coffin is the only modes of play are arcade and versus. The least they could have done was put time attack and tournament mode in there; team battle would have also helped this useless port. How much more space would that have taken?

Even though Virtua Fighter 2 is a 3D game mostly played on a 2D line, there were some 3D things you could do. For instance, you could roll to the side after being knocked down and perform an attack as you get back on your feet. Obviously, you can't do that in this port.

I have no idea why they did this, but when you win, you see your fighter's mug and get to read an EXTREMELY CHEEZY taunt. For instance, one of Sarah's is: ''An amateur like you could never defeat me.'' WOW! SUCH WIT!!

Graphics: 3
All the fighters that made it in have as much animation as possible. Yes, like I said before, the effort is very commendable, but some movements still only consist of two frames of animation (like, for instance, moving backwards). At least the frames themselves are high quality, taken from scanned snapshots of the actual arcade game. What really sucks are some of the backgrounds. Take Lau's/Kage's stage (yes, they use the same background for each stage) for example. The trees and Japanese house look nice, but if you look into the DISTANT background, all you see is a wall of trees! No gaps for sun to shine through whatsoever! Very, very dumb looking.

Sound/Music: 3
Once again, they tried desperately to cram as much arcade voice as they could into this. The announcer sounds very authentic from the arcade (well, as authentic as the Genesis can make him sound). Since they tried keeping the announcer sounding as high quality as possible, very few character voices are present here. Oh well, at least Jeffry still says, ''Iiiiiii wiiiiiinnnn!'' Sounds on the menu screen also sound quite authentic. As for the music, it's complete crap, only vaguely resembling the arcade songs. Enough said.

Control: 10
All of the moves may not be here, but the moves you can perform are able to be performed well due to responsive controls.

Replay Value: 1
Heh...don't make me start laughing again, dammit...lol...

Bottom Line?
Why? Seriously, WHY!? It's a blast to make fun of, but other than that it doesn't deserve to exist, although the dumbasses who brought it to life made it as good as humanly possible on the Genesis, which is why I give it a 3.

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 10/15/01, Updated 04/24/04