Neo Geo

World Heroes

Alpha's attempt at a 1 on 1 fighting game is a success! I found this game to have all the ingredients necessary to make a great fighting game, rivaled by Street Fighter 2 and surpassed only by Art of Fighting. A must-have for Geo owners.

The attractive but forgettable stage backdrops include a clock tower with stained glass windows, a circus, and the obligatory Japanese temple. The rooftop with the evening city skyline would have been great had it not been obfuscated by ugly caging. I tend to favor the Mount Fuji stage, because it has monkeys sparring in the background, and I love me some monkeys! World Heroes features two modes of play: normal and death match. The death match incorporates hazards like spiked walls and electrical beams, which add a new wrinkle to the mayhem. Although World Heroes does a lot right, the time travel theme gets lost in the noise, making this feel like any other fighting game. But it's on the Neo Geo, so you know it's good.

Let's pretend for the sake of argument that the Street Fighter series never existed. It's hard to estimate what the public reaction to World Heroes would have been in such an imperfect world, but I 'd have to guess that the game would fare pretty well. If the genre didn't have a solid foundation, it wouldn't be so widely imitated. I should stress, too, that the graphics, sound and gameplay for World Heroes are certainly strong enough to make a favorable impression. The game won't win any awards for originality, but it's not hurting anybody. The only problem with playing World Heroes now is that there's a superior sequel already on the Neo Geo, but if you want to see where this series started, then you won't be too disappointed with this average fighter.

World Heroes, with the deathmatch mode, could have been a contender. The game is both derivative of and inferior to Street Fighter II. Try it for the deathmatch mode, but don't expect it to keep you coming back for long.

Maybe, just maybe, fans of fighters from this early time period in this genre's dominance will find something to enjoy, but anyone who's played anything later will have a tough time adjusting. In most cases, they'll never adjust at all. A sad state of affairs all the way around.