Nerdicus SNES Review #24 : Battle Blaze

Title : Battle Blaze

Publisher : Sammy

Genre : Fighting

Players : 1 /2  Player

Release Date : 1993

Estimated Value (as of today's date) : $5-$10

Are you not entertained!? Take every fighting game you've ever loved and throw it out the window. This is the true, reigning fighting champion for 16-bit systems. I mean, hell, once you add weapons into the mix, it's a guaranteed win. Okay, I'm exaggerating a bit, but this was really one of my favorite games for the SNES, especially when I had friends over. 

Fighting games weren't my thing, but I absolutely loved fighting games with a twist. Primal Rage for instance was my go to fighting game. Can't wait to review that one hahah. Oh, Golden Shower...So when Sammy came out with a gladiatorial styled fighting game, I was quick to jump on it.

Boy...was I disappointed. Seriously, this is one of the shortest fighting games in the history of fighting games. I know you don't go into a fighting game looking for a one player story line, but there's no story in this game besides avenge your dead father killed by a Dark Lord. Fight five guys ,and game over. Twenty minutes...tops.

So, does this game have any redeeming qualities? Well, it's got a Arnold Schwarzenegger look-alike on the start screen. Does that count as one?

There's only two modes in this game. The HERO which is the story mode, and THE BATTLE which is the basically the versus mode which you can play against your friend. Its not even a real versus mode, but it's the closest you're going to come to one. So, let's just play through the insanely short story mode.

So you take on the role of the hero, with a sword as your weapon. I already mentioned that each character has a weapon, which serves as their main attack. Oh, speaking of attacks you've got the basic ones. Jump, main attack, low attack, high attack, and the oh so powerful SUPER ATTACK. This is your power move, and if you want to beat this game even quicker..just spam it.

Seriously...one button..Y...over and over.

You'll face off with a grand total of 5 opponents, each with their own special weapon which varies their attacks. You'll have close range fighters, long range fighters, slow fighters, and fast fighters. That is the most generalized statement I have ever made about fighters, but that's about it. You can't describe them anymore than that. Sure, they look different. One's a god damn werewolf,

In between fights, you'll get a few caption boxes and a map showing you where you are going, but you really don't care. In fact, this doesn't even feel like a fighting game. It sort of feels like you are playing a brawler. But I actually like that about this game. It at least makes it play a bit differently from other games, as you don't have to master a combo. 

And for a person that is absolutely horrible at pulling off combos, that works for me.

Battle Blaze isn't THAT bad of a fighting game. It's nowhere near being one that should be high on anyone's review list, but at least it's different. There weren't enough "medeival" fighting games out during that time, but this one just fell short. If they added some combo moves, or at least changed the move set and abilities to make the game a bit more difficult it would have been a hell of a lot better.

Visually it's a little "aged". Animations aren't that fluid, and each character seriously only has like 8 poses. Music is bland, and sound effects are archaic. Still, it's fun...sort of. Okay, I think this is just me liking a game because of weapons involved in fighting even though they really serve no purpose.

Ah well....at least most people have never heard of it. So if you play it, you can bring that up in a conversation? I guess?

Final Score (out of 5) :

Until next time, keep on gaming!