Yu Yu Hakusho INFO BOX SYSTEMS Genesis (Megadrive) RELEASE DATES Japan - 09/30/94 PUBLISHER Sega OTHER TITLES Yu Yu Hakusho Makyou Toitsusen An interesting take on the fighting genre, and another creative hit for Treasure. The game is a slower paced fighting game, with a multitude of anime inspired characters who duke it out. I'm pretty sure these characters come from an anime, or manga of the same name, but I'm not really into all that to know for sure, but since there are other games called Yu Yu Hakusho by other companies, I'd say it's a pretty safe guess. The actual battles of the game are where things get interesting. The single player story mode isn't all that exciting; you just fight every single character in a one on one fight until you've beaten everyone. No final boss, no special stages, just beat everyone up until you are left the victor. It's alright, but it's not where the real meat of the game is. Mulitplayer is the name of this game, and not just two player battles here. Were talking four player free for alls, and even bouts of two vs. two. Now this is what makes this game so fun. When there are four characters all dishing out attacks, and juggling you around, it's hard not to have a good time. It's rather simple, yet it offers so much fun, that if you have some friends around to play the game with, it'll be hard to put away. Graphics It's alright, I suppose. There's nothing that stands out, but it's Treasure's best looking game on the Genesis. The characters are all clean, but some of their designs are rather odd, but I don't think that can be blamed on Treasure since they didn't create the characters. The backgrounds, are surprisingly, pretty drab. Nothing that stands out as all that interesting, and certain backgrounds are just so plain. There's an arena where you're fighting in a stadium, and it's just a big grey background. Another level has you floating around in space or something, with debris floating around with you, but it just ends up looking silly. Certain levels like in the forest, or cave are alright, but nothing to wow you. Sound Hmm, the music. About two or three of the songs had me humming along. Any other song quickly entered one ear and exited out the other, or in other words, I didn't even notice it was there playing. Each arena has its own song pasted onto it, so if you enjoy a certain song, you can just play that level every time, unless you play the story mode of course. It's about average for the music you'd expect from Treasure, it's nothing special, but it's alright. I don't recall the sound effects during the game. I guess they weren't too impressive. Just you're standard ooo's and aaa's. You hear the occasional voice, such as when you win a match, or when you start the game up. The voices come in the usual muffled up style that you can't escape with the small size of the genesis cartridge, and it's in Japanese anyway, so most people won't understand it in the first place. Gameplay The fighting in the game is fairly straight forward. You've got a strong attack button, and a weak attack button. You use the weak attack to start up combos, and you use the strong attack to get one powerful hit in. You also have around five or six special attacks for each character. These are what you'll be pulling off for most of the fights, because your basic attacks are rather limited with only two buttons. You also have two different planes to play in, which you can jump back and forth between, or two different levels to put it another way. The fighting engine is somewhat a cross between the Dragon Ball games, and Super Smash Brothers, I suppose, so if you've played either of those, then you know what to expect to a degree. Actual fighting is actually quite a joy. With the simple amount of buttons, you'll usually have to find the right time to pull of certain special attacks, and then find a few second so that you can refill your power meter, so that you can use more special attacks. When playing in a four person free for all, finding time, and timing everything becomes a lot more complicated and a lot more fun. With three friends along, the four player modes offer some of the most fun moments you'll have playing a video game, unless you aren't into this game in the first place because then you won't have fun. Overall This game really surprised me. I wasn't expecting anything much before I played this game, and at first, I was a little disappointed. After I played around for a while and learnt a few characters and there moves the game really started to pick up, and now I just can't get enough of those four player free for alls. If you have an import friendly Genesis, and manage to find a copy of this game, then I highly recommend you get it because this is one hard game to find, and it's well worth the trouble.