Art of Fighting

""Art of Fighting" masters the art of fun!"

I'm a pretty big fan of Street Fighter type games, so when I first saw this one in the arcade, I just had to play it. As far as head to head fighters go, it's not bad, and like many of it's type, it has a story mode you can play through to give it some depth, but for the most part, if you've played Street Fighter and it's many offspring, Art of Fighting won't really teach you anything you didn't already know. Here's the breakdown.

Story 9/10

I can't complain. The plot is pretty simple: Guy's girlfriend gets kidnapped by thugs, guy and his buddy go after thugs and beat the heck out of them, love wins over all. Most of the time, though, the story behind a game like this isn't what attracts people to it, but it works well enough for this game. If you want a deeper story, go play Chrono Trigger or something.

Game Play 9/10

You'll find that the control and feel of this game is very much like Street Fighter. In fact, like most head to head types, there you'll find that a lot of characters have those same moves you find in every fighting game of the type (ie the down to toward fireball, the dragon-punch-like uppercut, etc), and it's pretty easy to jump right in to the game without any kind of research on the moves. Some of the moves you have to ''earn'' as you go through the game, and unlike Street Fighter, you have the ability to increase your levels of speed, spirit, and strength to your liking as you progress through the game, depending on which you favor. The characters in this game aren't anything extraordinary, but they're not bad either, and they’re at least different from one another to make them interesting. Most of the moves are fairly easy to pull off in this game, with the exception of a few. Over all it’s easy enough to control your character and whoop up on your opponents.

Graphics 9/10

This is a good-looking game. The characters and backgrounds are colorful and didn’t suffer any size change really in the translation from arcade to console (unlike Samurai Shodown and some others.) A fair amount of work went into making sure that everything closely resembles the arcade version of this game, and it looks at least as good as if not better than (and I hate to keep using this comparison) Street Fighter.

Sound 9/10

The sound effects are typical head to head fighter noises, and will remind you of most other decent fighting games you may have played before. The music is pretty good, and sets the mood well for a slugfest like this. I thought the sound effects closely matched those of the arcade version of this game, and in my book that makes them pretty darn good.

Overall, I’d recommend this game to not only fans of head to head fighting games, but non-fans as well. Like most fighters, you should get some re playability as you experiment with using the different characters and mastering their moves, and the ability to stomp your best friend always makes these games worth keeping around. If your looking for your next head to head fighting challenge, and you haven’t tried this one yet, what are you waiting for? Get out there and learn the Art of Fighting!

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 12/06/02, Updated 06/16/03