Look, you and I both know that some people are going to see a game like this and automatically think of furries. For the uninitiated, furries are people who like to dress up in somewhat cartoon-like animal costumes. However, the internet has managed to make it all a little bit more complicated than that but this game will instantly conjure up thoughts of furry…ism…ness just on context alone. I mean it’s got Hyper Beast Duel in the subtitle. If you’re expecting anthropomorphic-on-anthropomorphic action then you’ve definitely come to the right place.
Because this is basically Furry Fighter in all but name. But to answer a few questions first:
No, I’m not a furry.
Yes, I like this game.
For those in the know, Bloody Roar was a fighting game series on the PS1 that eventually evolved onto the PS2, as well as the Gamecube and Xbox. It flickered out after the fourth main instalment ruined things somewhat by merely being AVERAGE – a fate worse than death in gaming circles. While there are still fans of the games, it is often regarded as something of a forgotten gem of the PS1 era. Asking around, I know a lot of people who are aware of this game’s existence, and most of them played the demo on the Official Playstation Magazine’s demo disc. To call it a forgotten gem is a bit of a misnomer in some ways. I remember the game fondly and returning to it after a fair few years reminds me of why this game deserves far more credit than it gets.
Yes, it has its flaws, and the sequel is arguably better, but the original Bloody Roar felt like a fighting game trying to be different and succeeding wholeheartedly.
And holy shit, it does a bloody – LOL – brilliant job of it as well.
I could tell you all about the story here. But to be honest, there’s a distinct amount of ‘meh’ attached to it that basically means I could barely give a shit about it. There are some zoanthropes (the people who can go into beast mode in this game) and some of them are trying to fight for better things, some for revenge, etc… it’s a bit pap and mostly drivel, but it does at least set some tone to the fighting. Everyone’s fighting for a reason and we basically have to bash heads to get what we want.
So far, so ho-hum.
Oh alright. It involves someone wanting to use the anthros as some sort of military weapons in the future. There’s brainwashing involved somewhere. Yugo’s father dies. He wants revenge… Look, it’s fighting game trope 101 and you’ll either be into it or you won’t give a shit.
But Bloody Roar has something that few PS1 fighting games had back in the day: This game has a real heftiness to it. Everything about it feels raw, visceral, dynamic and authentic. There’s a real sense of power behind the blows. It has a weight and dynamism and every connection behind a punch, kick, slash or stab feels like it would genuinely hurt.
And holy shit, you cannot buy that for all the money in the world.
Bloody Roar is BRUTAL. And it fucking rocks because of it.
Entering the game, you are given the choice of 8 characters, each of whom can change into animal form once your beast gauge is filled up enough. You have the choice between a wolf, a tiger, a fox, a lion, a gorilla, a boar, a mole (wait… what?) and a rabbit – I AM NOT FUCKING KIDDING YOU.
Just when you think the game is going to go into the direction of being super serious, they threw in a rabbit. The other characters make total sense in a fighting context. The mole perhaps is a bit contentious but it’s actually implemented reasonably well, going the ninja route with him. But Alice the rabbit… which I just read out loud and makes a modicum of sense… NO. SHE IS A RABBIT. SHE IS A BIG, FLUFFY, LADY-SIZED RABBIT. She feels like the fan-service character and somehow, her inclusion keeps the game from teetering on being brilliant. However, Alice is a nurse and her attacks don’t do the blood-letting damage that other, more dangerous animals might do. There’s… reasoning behind it all. Just… a weird level of WTF-ery involved in her inclusion. She’s altogether a silly addition in the grand scheme of things, but let’s put this one down to Japan being Japan and let it go this once, alright?
I mean there’s more to this game than out-of-place rabbits.
There’s a sentence I never thought I’d ever write.
Also, it took me years to realise that Fox was actually a male character, despite the fact it bloody – LOL – well says so in the game’s manual. Although his character does have a female English voice actor so there is that. Also, Fox’s win quote is one of the best ever in fighting games: “THE SIGHT OF BLOOD EXCITES ME!”
Epic.
The game generally works as a 2D fighter and takes place in square fenced-in arenas. Characters tumble around the screen, sticking firmly to a 2D-plane and smashing opponents causing them to fly off in different directions, opening a little bit of 3D to the battles. The arena fences can also be smashed if attacks are hard enough, causing battles to end with ring-outs. This is customisable so it either happens any time or only in the final round. There’s something ridiculously satisfying about casting your opponent’s nigh-on comatose, ragdoll body through the fencing and out into the background. The jarring shudder from the screen and the meaty soundbite that accompanies it just makes it sound heftier than ever. The clang and clatter of fence pole breaking loose is awesome and fits the dynamics of the game perfectly.
Combat involves a simple punch and kick button, a beast mode button, plus a RAVE mode button (which essentially drains the beast bar and allows you to move a bit quicker). Combos are created by stringing together different attack buttons and special moves can be done for all characters with fireball motions towards and away plus punch or kick. This CAN be seen as a bit simplistic, and it doesn’t really change the way a character feels to play as. As such, choosing a character could appear as merely cosmetic. However, the moves themselves are different for each character and can be used for straight-up smash damage, anti-air, defensive manoeuvring and suchlike. You can go big and brutish with Greg or Mitsuko, or you can be more fancy with Long or Alice. Yugo, the game’s main protagonist, has the balanced attacks that all main bland men in games have, so of course he’s super serious and ordinary as fuck.
It definitely feels as though Bloody Roar has all the right ingredients to be a solid fighting game, even without the addition of Beast Mode. However, that IS the game’s main mechanic and turning it on adds a HUGE sense of weight to the game. Beforehand, characters paddled each other with punches and kicks that didn’t quite hold the sheer weight behind them of, say, a Tekken 2. There’s a reason for that. When you go full on beast, the game EXPLODES. Your character is shrouded in furious transformation energy, knocking your opponent back at a rate of knots, and all of your attacks feel as though they’re suddenly pounding at you with bricks in their hands, knives in their fists or jaws of steel ripping out your jugular.
IT. IS. INTENSE. The sheer HEFT behind each blow is substantially meatier and you will never quite understand the satisfaction behind it without feeling it for yourself. Compare that to the positively wimpier sounding punches from your human counterpart and SUDDENLY it makes sense. And this isn’t to suggest the human fighting is lame. It’s bold and hefty in its own way too. But going full-on beast mode just amplifies it to 11, maybe an 11.5 on a good day. Add to this an extra couple of moves that using the fireball motion plus the beast mode button, and you’d be foolish NOT to go into beast mode as soon as you can.
HOWEVER. The beast bar can be used when it’s roughly 30% full, so implementing the feature could mean a short burst as a beast if you get beaten back into human form. OR you can wait until it’s full and potentially even use the RAVE mode feature to go full beast on everyone for a longer period. Tactically, a brilliant idea executed absolutely flawlessly here.
Some characters even cause claret to start spilling from the characters’ bodies upon impact. This doesn’t happen in human form, obviously, but slashing at your opponent with enormous claws is going to cause a heck of a lot of blood loss in the right circumstances. It makes the game quite dark in tone as blood sprays out across the floor. Contextually, it makes complete sense, and it can at least be turned off if that’s not your thing.
Even with the red stuff flying about, the game holds its own in terms of aesthetics. The graphics are really impressive for their time and move fluidly even now. There’s very little slowdown, if any at all, and the character movement is mostly good. There are a couple of weird movements and motions that don’t quite look right, and some of the character win poses are downright silly (Alice, I’m looking at you here). The stage backgrounds are alright for the most part and vary from the ironworks, a desert, a Colosseum and a nuclear plant. Most of them look alright. They’re all fairly standard fighting game backgrounds, although it’s nice that they’re all in 3D.
Bloody Roar works as an arcade fighting game better than it does a console game. To be fair to it, that’s not a bad thing. However, the game’s main problem is the lack of reward from completing it. There’s only one other character but she’s not playable in any way, shape or form. As such, you are left with eight fighters to pick from and there’s nothing else to actually fight for. Granted, there’s the usual survival, time attack and versus modes, plus an art gallery, but there’s no real incentive to keep playing it.
Aside from the fact that it’s bloody – LOL – amazing to play. The satisfaction of the fighting mechanics is an absolute joy to behold. There’s so much that could have been done to the game, I grant you, but what you have here is substance by the bucketload. The game drips with atmosphere, even if the rock soundtrack sounds like the kind of stuff you’d hear in the background of a bad action film or filler tracks from a late 80s rock album. The gurgles and whimpers and roars from the characters throughout the fighting are spot on. It just feels… fun.
And in the world of gaming, that’s what it needs to be.
Suffice to say that Bloody Roar really had the potential to run and run as a series. There was something just about beginning to happen with it, particularly when it came to Bloody Roar 2 and 3. Somehow… 4 just couldn’t keep things going somehow. As I say: disturbingly average. And it’s a real shame because Bloody Roar really is a fantastically striking fighting game. It had the balls to try and be different and implemented it so well that it doesn’t seem right that it fizzled out.
But oh well. At least I learned the reason that Alice is a white rabbit in particularly. And in the end, isn’t that what really matters?
Stop rabbiting on about it now.
I’ll get my coat.
Blimey, boyo 