2D Fighters for the Ages

The 2D fighter: as a genre, perfect. Almost nothing pushes the edges of the concept: everything’s definitely a fighter or definitely not.

Most challenging example: Smash Bros? Combos and movesets like a fighter but movement like a platformer, not just relative to your opponent – you can turn your back and fireball the wrong way. Traversing levels like a beat-em-up but not on a long scroll. So, platform-fighter-beat-em-up?

But what other examples? Fighters end up looking alike – across series, across IPs, across developers, across the decades.

Few 90s games are so timeless, standing side-by-side with modern peers in almost every way.

On these cabinets in Club Sega Shinjuku Nishiguchi’s basement Battle Arena:

• Fatal Fury Special (SNK 1993)

• The King of Fighters ‘96 (SNK 1996)

• Vampire Savior: The Lord of Vampire (Capcom 1997)

• The Last Blade 2 (SNK 1998)

• Fatal Fury: Mark of the Wolves (SNK 1999)

• Hyper Street Fighter II (Capcom 2003)