Final Fight

The Good
Final Fight cd is often praised for it's good music, extra introduction screens and being close to the arcade conversion. The introduction has spoken dialogues and extra animated screens that aren't in the arcade. The game has also a time attack mode where the object is to defeat as many baddies as you can. This mode has some new locations that fit the game very well.

The Bad
This "good" music are just plain audio tracks, and what is so special about that? Anyone can just record real music and put it on a disc. The audio tracks just fade out and start over and that can be real ugly to listen to especially in the real long levels like the bay area. The game is still heavily censored: there is no blood, roxy and poison's clothes are larger, the liquor is still absent, the thug that discovers his car in a bad condition still says: "oh my car" etc. Most of the stuff is still missing, from the beginning you can tell those barrels are deleted and so it happens many times during play. This is just an incomplete arcade version. The graphics may be close to the real final fight, it's colours are definitely not. Maybe the sega cd couldn't do any better, but I cannot bear to see these washed out colours any longer. There is something wrong with the animation and the hit detection. For some reason I can't explain it simply does not play the same as the arcade version. And finally my real complaint about this conversion: The introduction with spoken words is real nice but why didn't they hire real voice actors?? Haggar doesn't sound like a mighty wrestler but like a wimp! The voice of the villain also sounds like a goof. I am not very happy about that, it is a major disappointment as it just doesn't fit the gorgeous animated introduction.

The Bottom Line
If you want to enjoy the arcade game to it's full glory you still have to stick with the real arcade game. However, if you are a real final fight fan like me, I do recommend you to watch the enhanced intro and to try out the time attack mode.