Blade Master

The Good
Blade Master is a refreshing change from the many shoot-em-ups Irem has been dishing up for us over the years, and it is a title designed to compete with Final Fight. The games share the same objective: rescue the girl who belongs to one of the characters you can play as. In this case, it is Arnold’s sister, Princess Enima. She’s not just an ordinary kidnapped dame. This is a dame who knows the spell capable of locking away the King of Darkness who has been threatening the townspeople. The King knows this, so he sends his loyal army to take her away to his castle.

In the game, you play Arnold or his brother Roy. No matter who you pick, you character goes around fighting in their underwear, and both of them perform just about the same moves. I don’t know about you, but I think Arnold bears a striking resemblance to Schwarzenegger. Each character has their own special moves. I like how Arnold can thrust down on his sword, causing fireballs to emerge in both directions and killing anyone foolish enough to get in the way.

Your character’s portrait appears at the top left, alongside the player’s score. One of the nice touches of the game is the way it changes depending on how much health you have. If your health is very low, your character looks as if he was beaten up. Health can be restored by collecting the “Water of Life” found in the many jars you can smash along the way. You can also get other items for extra points. Another nice touch is the animation of your characters grabbing onto a ledge they fall down from and helping themselves up.

The backdrops for each of the game’s seven stages are breathtaking, and they range from canyons to waterfalls. The animations of each of the enemies are spot on. I like how the first wave of enemies stick their green heads out of their sockets if they stop moving, and how you get a close-up of Enima screaming as she is taken away. As usual, there are bosses you need to defeat in order to proceed to the next stage. Those knights on stage two take quite a pounding. Those knights are sneaky bastards; they fall down, making you think that you killed them. But then, they press a button on their belt to help themselves up. And as if one knight isn’t enough, Irem has made you deal with three later.

There is background music as you fight your way through the stages. The one piece of music I love happens on stage six; it has that relaxing feel to it. Most of the enemies have an amusing sound effect when they die. For instance, the aforementioned green enemies shout “yeah” when they die. A warning sound is played when you are under ten seconds.

The Bad
Nothing is bad about this game.

The Bottom Line
Blade Master is a great game that deserves to be played at least once. The graphics and sound are excellent, and there are nice touches to the game, touches that didn't exist in Final Fight. We may not have ports of this game to other systems, but, hey, at least we can take home Capcom's game.

The Good
Pretty much everything Is of a high standard. Except.....

The Bad
.....the combat. Which Is literally one attack button with no special, combo attacks.

The Bottom Line
Very good game, or would have been If not for the mind-numbing combat.