Game: Warriors: Street Brawl
Publisher: Xbox Live Arcade
Developer: CTXMÂ Games
Genre: Beat Em Up
Pro: Fun with friends if you can get them to buy the game, for the most part looks really good.
Con: Dated style of playing, minimal reason to replay, multiplayer can be very frustrating.
Confession time… I have never seen “The Warriors” movie. I don’t think that is a revokable offense to my nerd street cred, but it bears mentioning. That being said, this game did in fact give me the urge to seek out and watch it. Unfortunately, that is probably the most positive thing I can say about the game. There is no question that this game borrows HEAVILY from games like Final Fight and Streets of Rage. Everything from the way that “Vermin’s” special attack is just like Haggar’s from Final Fight and the fact that you fight girls in high heeled boots with whips, reminiscent of Rage, though this time the girls are actually females! Further proving my point, all three feature cheeseburgers and chickens that refill your health, that can be found in of all places, trash cans.
I am honestly trying to figure out why this game came to XBLA in the first place really. Maybe it is just because my tastes have changed over the years or it could be that we as gamers expect more substance in our games now-a-days, but this game felt like it just needed more. At its core, Street Brawl it is a basic left-to-right, side scrolling, beat em up. You play as one of the core members of the Warriors gang, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. Some characters are faster, some are stronger, some have more energy… you get the idea. Your basic motivation is to get back to where the Warriors home base is, Coney Island NY. On your travels you make your way through several different and iconic (I guess…) gang territories.
Your best weapon is your fists and your feet… not to mention repetition, LOTS of repetition. Sure you can pick up knives, 2×4′s, bats, even shovels, but none of them are as quite as good as the weapons you were born with. Most, if not all of of the weapons, take too long to swing, offer almost nothing in the reach department, and don’t have much in the way of extra power. However, thought it is fairly weak, the Molotov Cocktail is a fun weapon to use. There is something very satisfying (in a video game anyway) about setting an enemy on fire and watching them run in circles. I guess they don’t teach the stop, drop, and roll rule at AI night school.
There are seven different levels to play through, each with several of their own sub stages to complete. The different areas all offer a new an fresh look at the fictional run down slums of New York. Most of the areas you enter have multiple pathways to choose from. Some will take you through a run down bar, while others will take you over a different subway platform. It isn’t much, but it does add some diversity to a play through. The sad part is, even with all the variety, it feels like the game lasts about 4 stages too long. By the end of the game, my hands were cramping up, leaving me desperately hoping for the next stage to be my last. All of the environments were pretty well animated with burned out cars, run down buildings, and plenty of trash cans to kick over. An exception to this was the graveyard, which was just too dark to be able to navigate properly. In these type of stages, it just looked like I was a single character sprite against a dark backdrop, frantically running from left to right.
A couple of different modes are available, but the only one you really need to worry about is multiplayer. This is one of the best and unfortunately worst parts of this game. Just like in the single player mode, you can pick whichever character you want to play with, or you can just jump into a game and let the computer pick for you. You can then play alongside of up to three other Warriors members, controlled by other human players. Walking the streets, beating up rival gangs with your friends is nothing short of fun.
The worst part comes when you have to move on. I was in a game where one of my teammates was either not paying attention, or just wanted to be a dick, and just sat on the left side of the screen. In doing so, he wasn’t allowing us to progress further along in the game. We were, for all intents and purposes, stuck until he wanted to cooperate or we left the game, forgoing any points we had earned or game progress we had completed. If there had been a way to kick players from your game so that you are able to then proceed, I wouldn’t even mention it.
If you are a super fan of the movie I can see where you would probably want to have this game in your library. The character models do look like their real life counterparts. As far as the story of the game goes, I have no idea if it follows the plot of the movie, or vice versa. I can’t say that I would have ever bought this game on my own, but like I said earlier, I now have the desire to see the movie. So, I guess that says something about the game… right?
Popularity: unranked [?]
