As a hard-core fan of Japanese animation, I was really happy when I gave
back the copy of that crap Hokutou No Ken 5 (Fist of the North Star) for this
anime fighting masterpiece. Fist of the North Star is my most favorite anime
saga in the world, but inspite of exploding body parts from hard blows and
Chun-Li-like flurry attacks, some of the Fist games have gone pretty much
downhill just like the live action movie that came on HBO once. But let's
not change the subject, we're talking Yu Yu Hakusho here. It's all good though that this is
still your typical " fireball-throwing-one-on-one-Street Fighter-type game", straight from
the Land of the Rising Sun and nowhere else.
First, the graphics are top notch for a SNES/SFC game. So far the intro
has the best graphics ever with four of the game's characters individually
introduced along with their close-up pictures. Then Yusuke, the star of the
series, brings on the title screen with one shot of a fully charged fireball
blast coming straight at the player. The graphics are real hi-resolution
like other fighting games giving it an arcade sensation, and are really
colorful.
Now the best thing about this game is the sound. The music can get a
little annoying sometimes, I don't think there's too many sound effects, but
the greatest thing in the sound category are voices. Yu Yu Hakusho 2 is
loaded with voice samples almost accurate to the anime. Even if you can't
read Japanese, at the mode select screen, you'll have to press your way
through things and there is a BGM/Sound Test, and to give players a treat,
they threw in the Voice Sampler Test to hear the voices of the game,
everything from special moves to victory poses. They all sound really clear.
The game's controls are easy to get the hang of, it's one of those
fighting games where button Y makes light punch, X hard, B light kick, and A
hard, and the top L & R shift buttons don't do anything. There is a vertical
yellow meter on the side of the energy bar that builds up everytime you get
hit and when it fills up, you see alot of stars. Then there is the
"Ki-meter" on the bottom of the energy bar, which costs a percentage of move
points and cause it to go down. Those who have played the Art of Fighting
series on the Neo Geo will feel right at home with this, the exception is:
you can't refill the meter quickly by holding down a button in this game.
When each character's Ki meter is full and his/her health bar is halfway
down, the character has a chance to perform a Super Power move, like Yusuke
shoots a fireball much bigger than a fully charged Mega Man mega buster
shot, Hiei throws out a dragon and I can't say anything from there.
There are different modes of play like the story mode, which you only
play as Yusuke, and more characters build up as you progress further in the
game. Then there's a regular 1 on 1 mode. And like SNES Killer Instinct, it
has a practice mode where a match never ends and you brush up on your
fighting skills.
If you think you're anime's biggest fan and collect import video games,
check out Yu Yu hakusho 2. And if you get rid of it, it's going to hurt,
verrrry badly....
