Last Battle
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 "Now you have the look of a hero!"
— Kenshiro/Aarzak, responding to Bat/Max
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Last Battle is a beat'em up game developed and published by Sega in 1989. This is a localization of Shin Seikimatsu Kyūseishu Densetsu: Hokuto no Ken (新しん世紀末せいきまつ救きゅう世主せいしゅ伝説でんせつ 北斗ほくとの拳けん, lit. "Fist of the North Star: The New Legend of the Post-Apocalyptic Messiah). The game was first released in Japan on July 1, 1989 and was a launch title in North America and Europe. This game is a sequel to the Sega Mark III game Hokuto no Ken, which was localized in the west as Black Belt. The game was also ported to the Commodore Amiga and Commodore 64 by Elite in 1991 for the European market.
Why It Doesn't Have the Look of a Hero
- Stiff controls, especially when you try to jump over holes in the maze-like stages.
- Slow and unbalanced gameplay.
- When you punch or kick an enemy, they fly offscreen which is laughable. In the original Japanese version, the enemies freeze in mid-flight and their bodies explode when hit in a bloody manner.
- Uninspired music. It doesn't even have the trademark theme song from Hokuto no Ken / Fist of the North Star, "Ai o Torimodose".
- Ear-piercing sound effects.
- Nonsensical story.
- Brutal difficulty.
- Stupid renaming of characters. For example, the character of Hyoh is renamed into "Gross".
- Cheesy dialogue, especially when Kenshiro / Aarzak says "Now you have the look of a hero!"
- Fighting a boss is rather picky when it comes to hitting. You have to punch the boss if you wanna finish it off.
- Whenever you get hit by an enemy, you bounce to the opposite direction, which is pretty annoying.
- Tedious maze-like stages, which can make the player easily lost if they don't know where they are.
- In the Amiga version, the bosses explode in a rather cheap manner.
- The Commodore 64 version lacks in-game music.
- The graphics on the Amiga version are a step down compared to the Genesis version, as it lacks parallax scrolling.
- No continues. Once you're dead, you have to start from the beginning. However, there is a hidden continue code in the game. When "Legend of the Final Hero" shows up in the intro, you press A, B, C, and Start.
Redeeming Qualities
- Good graphics for an early Sega Genesis game, with huge sprites, detailed backgrounds, and impressive parallax scrolling.
- The original Japanese version is more faithful to the source material.
- Good speech samples, especially Kenshiro / Aarzak's battle cry.
- This game has an overworld map to choose your own levels.
- Bosses still explode their bodies just like in the Japanese original, though the color of the explosion had to be changed from red to yellow.
- Impressive title screen animation.
- The Amiga version has both music and sound effects, unlike most Amiga games where you have to choose either of them, due to hardware limitations.
- Impressive graphics for a late release on the Commodore 64.
- The Commodore 64 version has a really nice remix of the boss music used as the ending theme.
- Some of the music can be pretty decent, despite not having the trademark Fist of the North Star theme song.
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