A strategic fighting game that actually relies on skill and not randomly hammer quick-combination buttons.
Graphics:
The animations of the fighters are amazing with over 50 different attacks, a fat, funny judge and even animations in the backdrops. The main sprites are the most impressive though. As you create a character you also get to choose a face. Some of these faces look horrible and you can change the face in the middle of the tournament (?). Nothing changes in the main sprite though. It doesn't matter if you're black or white (Where have I heard that before?) the player looks the same while fighting. The backgrounds are effective and you really get a feeling of obscurity and danger as you enter the Kumite mode and start fighting in the underground. The judge is gone, everything is dark, the flashy spotlights that represented your health in the championship mode have been changed into burning torches that gradually die out as you take hits. The scoundrel-looking characters in the audience too, add to the feeling of illegal fighting pits. The girl who presents the number-of-the-round signs in the championship mode looks awful though! All in all, a very good looking game that runs smoothly and nicely. On top of the nice animations there are a couple of nice stills as you live up to certain conditions in the game; "Congratulations, your fighting skills are amazing!"The menus are also nice to look at. The main menu changes as you enter the underground mode and changes from the flashier gold colored menu to a set of bamboo sticks put together with black background.
93%
Sound:
Best of the best: championship karate is a very silent game that lacks hit music. It has a score that plays as you make choices in the menu in between fights. The sounds of kicks and punches are cool and exaggerated, just the way they should be. The sound of the gong and the referee counting down are well done too. The audience's cheers grow louder as you perform certain attacks.
65%
Game play:
The fact that you can explore different kind of attacks on different opponents makes this game a feast for fighting game lovers. You have over 50 attacks to assign to the gamepad. You can change hits and attacks any time in between fights, which makes this game very enjoyable. There are very few quick combos available so you'll have to create your own combinations of punches and kicks as you play through the game. If you keep losing against a certain opponent, you can try to change attacks and use different strategies next time. It's a thinking man's fighting game! Cool and different. The different modes of playing also add to the gaming experience. A championship mode, a full-contact mode, training and a player vs. player mode make a cool and fun experience. The fact that you have three attributes is also interesting. You can boost your strength, resistance and reflex by winning matches or by training. The values are represented by a percentage with a maximum of 99% (this does not seem to apply always though as I keep getting punched out by certain opponents while having 99% in resistance). The training consists of three sections; the first, adding to your resistance percentage, is to spar with a partner. The second gets your strength up and involves nothing but hammering the C button to kick a punching-bag. The reflex training is to kick high, low or middle as you see pads of a training doll extract. With all it's many modes and different attacks and nice animations, surprisingly, what this game suffers from the most is:
91%
Lastability:
Repetition. The game play DOES get repetitive after a few hours of playing, simply because all the opponents look the same and there are (good-looking as they may be) only two different sceneries. The magnitude of strategy, tactics, number of attacks and nice animation makes up for a lot, but I can't help getting a feeling of repetition and doing the same thing over and over. If you have a friend who enjoys these kind of games it's good fun to kick-box each other in the versus mode. You have many choices in the menus. Match time, number of rounds, choose nationality and choose face. There's a high-score list but since you CAN'T save it doesn't matter. There's a password system though.
74%
Overall:
A strategic fighting game that actually relies on skill and not randomly hammer quick-combination buttons. Good-looking and smooth running. If you're looking for a GOOD tactical match-based fighting game, that presents a nice challenge, for your Genesis look no further, get this and fight your way to glory.
86%