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Express Raider

Video games where a character walks across the screen beating up anyone that gets in their way are nothing new, beat-em-ups are among the most prolific types of game one can find. But in the years before the massive popularity of Technos’ Double Dragon and Capcom’s Final Fight would codify the “rules” and structure of the genre for the next decade, Data East had a few breakthroughs of their own. Soon after effectively creating the fighting game genre with Karate Champ in 1984, we would also see them take a major stride into beat-em-up territory with Express Raider.

Captain America and the Avengers (NES)

Captain America and the Avengers also appeared on the NES in late 1991. Unfortunately, it’s a completely different game compared to the Data East arcade game. The premise is that Iron Man and Vision have been kidnapped, so Captain America and Hawkeye must set out on a quest across the US to find them while fighting the Mandarin and a few of his cronies along the way. Hawkeye and Captain America busting up evil cyborgs and mercenaries while on a transcontinental road trip sounds like a great premise for a game, but unfortunately that potential vanishes as soon as players press Start. Instead of the fast brawling action seen in the arcades, on the NES players are presented with a tedious side scrolling action game. Both Captain America and Hawkeye have a pretty good arsenal of moves and techniques, but the game’s levels rarely require one to use them to the best of their ability. Partially because each level has to be potentially navigated by either one (it’s just a one player game now) with equal effectiveness, and partially because the enemies and bosses are uninteresting to battle.

Avengers in Galactic Storm

Games that make heavy use of pre-rendered assets for their graphics have a well earned reputation for featuring polarizing visual presentations. For every fondly remembered Donkey Kong Country or Resident Evil, there are some garish releases best left forgotten that appeared dated and ugly even when they were new. Avengers in Galactic Storm casually slouches across the exact midpoint of these two extremes.

BreakThru

BreakThru is one of many mid-80s Data East games that fell through the cracks and was quickly forgotten. It’s a fun game, but it’s also easy to see why it wouldn’t leave a lasting impression. In 1986, arcade goers were treated to several games featuring flashier graphics and larger character sprites (Data East’s own Express Raider, released just a year earlier, among them), but BreakThru gives you just a tiny car, a limited arsenal, and a lot of bland military vehicles to blast through.

Hippodrome

The leading up to and right after the release of Capcom’s Street Fighter II: The World Warrior were an interesting time. It’s a genre Data East effectively invented with their release of Karate Champ, but that they were never really known for even after they were sued by Capcom when they released Fighter’s History in 1993. Capcom felt the game was a bit too close to their own smash hit, though it was a genre defining game that already had several imitators. Capcom also didn’t hesitate to imitate their competitors’ innovations in the final iterations of Street Fighter II!

Either way, in the years before Street Fighter II‘s release developers were typically creating fighting games with much smaller characters, more subdued color palettes, and less complex controls. Data East’s Hippodrome is one of several of these games where characters’ abilities are much more limited, but also much more accessible. Unfortunately, however, the game is a mess, with glimpses of personality and a fun soundtrack that do little to alleviate how frustrating it is to actually play.

Captain America and the Avengers (arcade)

In the wake of Final Fight‘s explosive release in 1989, there was a flood of brainless beat-em-up imitators trying to get by just on their looks. Even companies becoming known for high quality 2D titles in the early 90s like SNK published a few absolute stinkers like Gang Wars and Ninja Combat. Data East joined the fray with Captain America and the Avengers, one of their most well-remembered games in the US. Captain America isn’t a rip-off of any one beat-em-up, though. Instead, it’s a focused refinement of what’s come before that still holds up today.

Predator

The original Predator game is not particularly outstanding, but does a good job translating the movie into video game form. Players get to run from left to right shooting enemy soldiers while also avoiding being picked off by the Predator itself. When the time for a Predator game to be released on the MSX and NES came, however, it would be made by the masters of disastrous games, Pack-In-Video. Yes, Pack-In-Video, the makers of a great number of licensed and unlicensed video game tragedies like Back to the Future and Deep Blue, are responsible for Predator on the NES and MSX. The NES version was made for Pack-In-Video by Klon Co., Ltd., a little known developer that disappeared off the map after their first game until appearing out nowhere again as a developer of dating simulators for the 3DS in 2012. And of course that NES version of Predator was delivered to US shores via Activision, another publisher of outstanding examples of horrible licensed games on the NES like Ghostbusters, The Three Stooges, and Pack-In-Video’s own adaptation of Die Hard.

Mutant Fighter

Originally released as Death Brade in Japan (we can assume this was meant to be “blade”), Mutant Fighter is a superior follow-up to Hippodrome. The ambiance of that game is improved upon, and its limp sword play has been removed completely in exchange for a wrestling tournament. This game bears a much closer resemblance to WWF WrestleFest than its medieval stylings would make one expect. Unfortunately the format change, while making for a much better game than its predecessor, also brings with it some of the frustrations common to arcade wrestling games. On the other hand, players do have eight cool characters to choose from, along with some even cooler bosses to overcome.

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