Arcade Archives: Final Blow

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This week's Arcade Archives release is... Final Blow (Taito, 1989)

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Both the Japanese and English ROMs are included. No Preference Settings are here, but you can assign Light Punch + Medium Punch to a single button for easy access to Heavy Punch.

 

Live from the Dr. Toppel Memorial Stadium and brought to you in association with Roy Adam's Power Drink, it's Taito's World of Boxing! Five of the most pugnacious pugilists in the world- Detroi Kid, Dynamite Joe, Kim Nang, King Jason and Fernando Gomez- are here for the coveted Taito Championship Belt, and it's anyone's game. Jabs, hooks, uppercuts, ducking, it's all here, but keep an eye out when someone hits the mat, as they might just make that comeback with the special Final Blow (see what we did there?) and drain that opponent's life bar like no-one's business! We're even accepting entries until the first bell, allowing for two players to fight against each other and see who's mastered the sweet science! Please take all your belongings with you after the fight ends, tomorrow the stadium's being renovated for use in the Power Wheels tournament, that's gonna get messy.
 

If this game looks familiar, then you might've already played it on the Mega Drive where, in the US and Europe, it was slightly retooled to become James "Buster" Douglas Knockout Boxing (with Douglas replacing Detroit Kid as well as a new final boss, Iron Face, being added). This arcade version looks a bit nicer (the Mega Drive did a pretty impressive job with the sprites, albeit with a much darker and less detailed colour palette) and has far more voices and realistic sound effects (although I won't lie, I miss the weird sound effects of the MD port). The main thing with this one is the impressive size of the spirtes for the time, covering a huge amount of the screen! The animation is pretty good too, with plenty of frames for the punches, even if some of it looks a bit awkward. Gameplay-wise, this takes its cues from the likes of Urban Champion with its high-low blocking system and movement meaning you'll never switch sides, but it adds a few things like ducking, extra moves via direction and button combos, back-dashes and the ref breaking up fights, so it does a decent job at a bit of arcade-based boxing. It even has proper two-player versus which wasn't the norm just yet (and even has Here Comes a New Challenger text!) so if you remember the Mega Drive port, maybe you could give this a look too.