Fighters Megamix

"This is no VF3... but hell, this is way better!"

Fighters Megamix

Back in 1997 Sega began to capture arcades but lost alot of control in the home console front. They released ace games like VF3 in the arcades and also announced VF3 for saturn.. it never came but they did come with a very neat surprise: Fighters MegaMix (FMM). And man this game is great.. the gameplay, amount of characters and unlockable secrets blow even the year later released tekken 3 away. The best part of FMM is that you can call it VF3 for saturn. Aside from the somewhat more juggling way of fighting the virtua's play exactly like VF3 on the dreamcast they also have the same stances and animations. The only difference is horse power, this is low res 32 bit while the other is hi res 128 bit.. and face it, no console could do a VF3 conversion well back then, no N64 no PSX no saturn and not a high end pc either. Thats why FMM is so great, I played it once before i had a DC and thought it was somewhat less sharp and slower than VF2.. but after having VF3 on the DC years later i realized FMM played just as smooth as VF3 but then on a simple 32 bitter... I recently picked up a saturn and bought this game immediately... and boy was I still amazed!

When i came home I expected a huge turn down in graphics, well it turned out different: The graphics in this game still look cool imho, I also have a DC connected to the TV so I can switch easy. I like this more than DoA2 and VF3! Graphics dont make a game but this graphics are not as bad as I expected it to be The characters are big, they control very good and animate very well... its like I said only slightly blocky but it does not distract me at all. In jacky and kage's stage the reflection of the sun is very neat for a 1997 game... I think this game looks better than Tekken 3. It feels at least really 3d and thanks to the sidestep even more than VF2 does.

The sound is also good, the sound of the punches are not that great but the music does well enough.. The music is very varied its taken from games like VF, FV and even daytona to name a few. Some BGM's are also quite nice. the downside is they reset after each round.. I don't think VF2 had this.

The gameplay is the best of any 3d fighter for a 32 bit system. The moves almost never fail and there is the options to change style; Fighting vipers style which rely on juggles and armor destroy or the slower VF style which relies on skill and counter attacks. The downside here is that the game feels a bit slower if you have played VF2 right before. Concerning the gamespeed think of it being as fast as VF3 on DC (which also was slower than VF2). Another downer is that the Vipers seem to be stronger, when I play with akira and fight against Tokio it looks like Tokio's combos are way more lethal. The Virtua's seem to have more counters and knockdown moves in turn and are for me more fun to play as.

The Replay value here is very great. There are a ton of characters and dedicated fight courses to unlock which keep you coming back for more. The names of this courses are nice: Girls, Smart guys and even dirty fighters. And guess what? The dirty fighters really play dirty by using alot of low pokes and ground attacks. girls course is ofcourse nice cuz we all like them don't we? (hm didn't make sense since we have to beat them now.. gasp.) This course also features the coolest secret boss... on which I add more later.

I play this game for over 2 weeks now and didn't unlock everyone yet (meat, palm tree etc..) I still miss alot in the extra options menu. So this game is rewarding. It may lack ending FMVs but it does feature a nice intro which was on the level of the better PSX FMV's at the time. But 90% of the endings in Tekken never made any sense to me anyway..... I am sure alot of others agree on this, big deal? nah. VF2 didnt have any either and did ppl dislike it because of that? I don't think so.

In my opinion FMM is better than Tekken 3 and also VF3. It has more characters than both combined and almost no one is a carbon copy like tekken where Anna = nina and Kuma = gun jack. Tekken 3 has more modes but NOT more secrets to unlock. VF3 doesn't even has as much modes and virtually (heh) nothing to unlock. On a side note its also cool to see that Sega can integrate weirdo's in the game so well ( a race car? a bird?) for example look at Doctor B and gon in tekken.. those were not fun, just a nightmare to play against/as. Besides FMM has 2 special weapons: Janet Marshall (hot!) and RentAHero. especially Janet Rocks! The best female fighter in the game and maybe the strongest of all. Her gun is a bit cheap but for the rest she tears fighters apart like its her daily job. I also heard there is a way to view her with even less armor etc... might check that out once.

All in all FMM should be owned by everyone with a Saturn. try to find it its worth it, I was lucky enough to find a new copy in the local store and it wasnt a bad purchase at all.

PROS:

-Janet
-Akira VF3 style rules
-Lots of fighters
-Lots to unlock
-Lots of fun
-2 fighting styles
-Better than 1998's Tekken 3

Cons:

-Somewhat slower for the VF2 purists.
-Vipers seem somewhat more lethal.
-Another Triple A game ignored by the mainstream.

10/10

~Saturn a bad console? How can a console be bad when games as this are released on it?~

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 04/02/03, Updated 04/02/03