Shaq-Fu

""COME GET YOURS!""

“SHAQ BRINGS HIS AWESOME SKILL AND SIZE TO A MULTIWORLD FIGHTING GAME.”

Shaq Fu was released in 1994 by Electronic Arts for both the Sega Genesis and the Super NES. The game is a tournament fighter similar to Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat, Fatal Fury and their like. You’ve got special moves, a dozen fighters to choose from, and several modes of game play. Sounds like your typical fighter right? Wrong. What sets Shaq Fu apart from the rest is that as a twist on things the main fighter is Shaquille O’Neal (the basketball player). An original and creative idea but unfortunately due to the terrible execution of this idea it pretty much dooms everything else in the game. It seems the developers focused so much on the Shaq idea that they missed a number of key game elements including graphics, sound, game play, and most importantly fun. The end result is what most gamers regard as one of the worst attempts at a game the world has ever seen.

In the game you have the option of playing as Shaq in the 1 player story mode or as any one of 12 characters in the duel mode. You can also play 2-player versus matches if you have a second player. Unfortunately they didn't include a training mode to practice special moves (not that it would likely help you much in this game).

As for the characters you've got Shaq (at least it kind of looks like him), Kaori (cat women wanna be), beast (big ugly red thing), Sett (a mummy how cool), Colonel (robot who bears some resemblance to Robo Cop), Diesel (typical tough guy), Leotsu (some old Karate Master), Rajah (Aladdin gone horribly wrong), Nezu (some little kid), Voodoo (the name says it all), and Auroch (ugly monster thing with a ball and chain). I must tell you these are some incredibly lame and unoriginal characters we got here. Also the only one that is really any good is Shaq himself.

The game play in a word is horrible. The controls are incredibly stiff and unresponsive. It takes about 2 seconds for the computer to respond to your commands making it easy for your opponents to pummel the living day lights out of you that is if they could actually fight. After 10 minutes of this game's pitiful controls I was almost frustrated to the point of throwing the game from the 2nd floor stairway of my house into the basement. Most special moves are also painfully difficult to pull off. Of course considering that the special moves are no more impressive than the characters themselves I wouldn't say your missing out on much of anything. There really are no redeeming qualities about the game play in Shaq Fu.

The graphics are also horrible. For one thing the animations with Shaq in them look nothing like him and considering that the inclusion of Shaq is the game's entire focus can only mean big trouble. The character sprites are also ridiculously small almost to the point of needing a magnifying glass to see them and considering that they are zooming across the screen at Sonic the Hedgehog speed makes for an eye sore. It also makes it difficult to tell if your moves are connecting when you are fighting up close to your opponent. The stage backgrounds are also dull and unimpressive. Believe me this game looks ancient even for a Genesis title. But I think the real kicker is that one of the high lights of the game’s box description is that the game contains “Awesome animation from the designers of Flashback”. Yeah sure.

But if you though the visuals were bad the audio is even worse. There is not one single track in this entire game that is the least bit catchy or enjoyable to listen to (with the possible exception of the music in the story intro). In fact most of the music is gloomy, depressing, and downright annoying. Now sure I know music isn’t everything but when I play a fighting game having good music helps establish mood and gets me more into the game. In fact sometimes I play games like Street Fighter II simply because I enjoy the music. But it’s the sound effects that really take the cake. Not only do they not sound anything like real kicks or punches but they are often muffled out making it difficult to tell whether or not you’re even hitting your opponent. Add this to the fact that it is also difficult to see whether or not your attacks are connecting close up and utter chaos is bound to ensure.

But when you talk story things go from bad to just plain bizarre. The story goes something like this; Shaq is playing a charity basketball game in Tokyo Japan but since he has some extra time before his game starts he decides to walk around town (he’s a tourist after all). Shaq goes into this building that happens to be a Karate Dojo run by some old man. The old man proclaims that Shaq is a great magic warrior sent from the stars to rescue some little kid named Nezu. To rescue Nezu Shaq travels through a gate in the back of the store leading to another dimension. In this alternate dimension Shaq has to fight each of the game's other characters to find Nezu. Man what were they smoking when they came up with this award winning literature. Seriously this game would have been better off with no story at all.

Shaq Fu is an awful attempt to cash in on the super star’s fame. The game is not the least bit fun and is really only good for two things (a) a coaster (b) 5 minutes of laughter at it’s crappiness. The only way I could possibly recommend this pile of garbage would be if you could get it for under $2.00 and planned to use it solely for the above purposes. Still this game is a cult classic much like another Genesis game starring a certain purple dinosaur who had his own TV show a while back *cough*Barney*cough* so for some it might be worth having for that reason alone. Other wise just avoid this thing.

Maybe one day someone else will pick up on this idea and create a good celebrity style fighter or at least one with more celebrities in it. Think of the possibilities this could have.

Reviewer's Score: 1/10, Originally Posted: 08/08/02, Updated 08/08/02