Virtua Fighter is a perfect symbol of Sega in the mid 90s. It was innovative, bold, and also it’s own undoing. You see, this arcade game was a hit and was a driving force in the new era of 3D graphics. It was at this time that Sega decided to focus on two dimensional graphics instead of polygons. This makes little sense especially when they were a huge part of why 3D graphics were the new thing. They realized this was a mistake and Virtua Fighter wound up being the big launch game for the Sega Saturn. Let’s take a look at this version, shall we?
The story is focused around your typical tournament, in this case it’s called the World Fighting Tournament. An evil syndicate has organized this contest which has attracted combatants from all around the world. Each has their own reasons for entering, fighting styles, and that’s our cast! It’s a pretty interesting and unique one to say the least.
Virtua Fighter is an early one-on-one 3D fighting game (it was actually one of the first). The basics are simple and should be familiar to anyone who has even passing experience with the genre. You select a character from a roster of eight different guys (and girls too). The arenas are completely three dimensional but you can only move left and right as well as jump. Gameplay isn’t strictly limited to left and right however you can only move toward or away from the camera by being hit that way by your opponent. This helps to not over-complicate character placement.
This game was released in a time when fighters were using every button possible on a controller with superfluous options. Virtua Fighter keeps things simple in this regard. Aside from movement and jumping you have only three different button inputs; punch, kick and block. That’s it. This might seem limiting but Virtua Fighter has a level of depth that was unparalleled upon release. The basic punches and kicks can be paired with directional inputs for varying effects. These do not change between the characters. Pressing down while punching will always be a crouching strike, for example.
We might take it for granted in fighting games now, but Virtua Fighter introduced the world to the idea of ‘ring out’ victories. Generally speaking your goal is always going to be to drain your foe’s life-bar in order to win. In the heat of battle you might find you pushing your foe toward the edge of the stage. It is at this point that you might try attacks that focus more on knocking back such as the standard or mid-air kicks. If your opponent is knocked out of the ring you automatically get the win. My one complaint in regard to this is that the stages are all functionally the same. The graphics are the only changes between arenas, and a little diversity (especially given the ring-out format) could have gone a long way.
Where the game gets deep is in the countering system. Each attack has another one that will cancel it out. You can block both high and low as well. Reading your opponent becomes a mastering of strategy and predicting their approach based on how they’re fighting. It’s actually very intense and the simple gameplay engine allows for some really focused battles. Luckily each character has their own special moves as well. What I really like is that these are more based on reality and real-world fighting styles. You won’t find any fireballs or dragon uppercuts here; it’s more like piledrivers, throws, suplexes, etc. This was quite welcome at the time of release.
The roster of fighters is also more grounded in reality than your typical genre staple. It’s distinctly anime, but these characters are from real-life places and use real-world fighting styles. I feel like a few of the entries here are generic such as Akira who is your usual Ryu-like Japanese martial arts master, and the mysterious masked ninja called Kage. There’s also the two token female fights one of whom takes the slot as the typical movie star role. Characters like Jeffrey and Wolf are iconic and highly memorable. There’s a whole lot of personality in this game and that’s why it’s still relevant.
Action here is remarkably slower than in most fighting games of this era. This holds true even when compared to the original Street Fighter II. Characters seem to float while jumping like they’re in a wind tunnel or something. This can be a bit jarring especially when you’re comparing it to the likes of Tekken or other games of this era. It also feels like it takes forever for your character to get up after being knocked over. It can take a bit getting used to, but I can appreciate the more methodical approach which allows you more time to react to your opponent. This cuts down on button mashing at least.
I feel sorry for any new Saturn owner stuck with this game while looking for a graphical showcase for the console. This is certainly not a good choice for that. The characters just plain look bad. The models are incredibly blocky with a very low polygon count. It’s actually very similar to the 32X version. I don’t know if that’s good for the 32X version or bad for the Saturn release. The stages are also bland with almost nothing aside from the backgrounds and floor. The music fares quite a bit better with redbook audio and some jazzy compositions that are pure Sega magic. The only thing I don’t like are the low quality voice samples. When you win your character will scream ‘yeah!’ or something similar and it sounds fuzzy and weird. This was definitely just thrown in.
