Final Fight (Arcade, 1989)

This has to be the best-looking game from the 1980's that I've played.

Here in Metro City, crime has gotten so bad that you can barely walk down the street. And nobody wants to be a good samaritan anymore because they might end up on the nightly news as the villain of the week.

...wait, is this a game or real New York?

"MAYOR MIKE HAGGAR: He will fuck up crime!" was the best yard sign ever during the campaign.

He gets a call from the fearsome Mad Gear Gang. He's been cracking down on them, so they kidnapped his hot daughter Jessica.

The Mad Gear demand that Haggar back off and let them burn down police stations or whatever it is that they do in their spare time.

But wait! Jessica's boyfriend Cody is also ready to swing into action! And his main man, the homie Guy, is going too.

She's Guy's friend too!

That's a hell of a squad. The police are effete and ineffectual, so these guys are gonna have to clean up the mean streets of New York Metro City.

I played the Super NES version of this game and it didn't have Guy in it for some reason. Later they released a second version of it that DID have Guy... and no Cody. Well, here we've got the Arcade version so everyone's here.

Cody is the balanced character, while Guy is fast but a little weaker and Haggar is slow but hits hard.

The first boss is the goggle-goon who called Haggar in the intro.

Two notable goons are Poison, who wears microshorts, and Andore, who is based on Andre the Giant.

This bears a striking resemblance to the actual subway in Chicago.

Not sure if the big guy here is based on Arnold or not. I don't think so but it's possible.

Sodom was always the toughest boss in this game for me, outside of maybe Rolento. He's very difficult to launch any kind of attack on because his swords have so much reach. Fun Fact: In the American SNES version they renamed him Katana. Possibly as a tribute to the #1 movie in America Highlander II: The Quickening and its Oscar-winning villain.

This game is MUCH easier with two-players. One of 'em is always gonna be able to whack the boss while it's distracted.

Next is the iconic car-destroying minigame! I THOUGHT THEY WERE THE GOOD GUYS

Haggar was always the character I played as the least due to his slowness, but now I'm becoming a big Haggar fan. He absolutely clobbers everyone.

Except Andre the Giant, seen here doing a big two-handed choke to Cody.

Now there are a swarm of Andores!

The next boss is this guy. I wonder what the story is here. He's probably on the Mad Gear Gang's payroll.

Rolento is the only boss that might be more difficult than Sodom. Even having two players doesn't help that much here because he moves so damn fast and drops grenades everywhere.

Now he's trying to cup Cody's buttock!

Guy moves so fast that he gets afterimages. Capcom loves afterimages.

Eventually I get past Rolento and that puts us at the second-to-last stage: An Andore-fest on the waterfront.

That "sexy" definitely got censored on the SNES, that's for damn sure.

Boss here is Abigail, a freakish Legion of Doom Andore.

This gets us to the sixth and final stage, the tower of the Mad Gear Gang. Is that statue showing the teet?

The building has a lot of floors, but they're all on the short side.

Belger is the big bad of the game, with his iconic wheelchair and autocrossbow.

And of course, iconic Marian being held captive. Sorry foot-fetishists: You sick freaks are going to have to get your jollies somewhere else!

The wheelchair is just for show (I guess?) and he moves around fine without it. Boot him out the window, and...

...we get this comically long fall that I believe was parodied at the end of River City Girls.

Jessica is fine and everyone lives happily ever after! What a damn good beat-em-up this is, and kinda revolutionized the genre. Never quite realized how much I like this series.

Cody and Jessica have a make-out about it, then he takes off to fight more crime or whatever. Except...he isn't playable in the two main sequels so they might as well have just let him go live his life here.

To be continued.