Video length: 23:33

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Difficulty level: 2 out of 5

A very poor port of the Neo Geo game, the Genesis version of this turned out a lot better. I wonder if Takara knew they had no chance of beating SNES Street Fighter II, so put more effort into the Genesis version of this game instead.

Anyway, this is a playthrough with Terry Bogard. The poor controls mean using some of his moves is very difficult, but really all you need to win is to use the power wave and burn knuckle a lot. And we get an early look at SNK boss syndrome with this game -watch what happens in the round 2 fight with Geese.

Video length: 26:59

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Difficulty level: 2 out of 5

Playthrough with Ryo. Ryo is a hidden character who, in this version of the game, can be used in the single player mode. As a secret character he's extremely powerful and the CPU doesn't really know what to do most of the time against his basic fireball attack, even on the highest difficulty setting.

The controls for this aren't that great -whilst I could do most moves OK, I couldn't do charge moves very well at all. Thankfully with Ryo his fireballs are enough to get you through the game.

Video length: 20:07

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Difficulty level: 3 out of 5

Playthrough with Ray. This game's default difficulty setting is easy, so I moved it up to normal. If you beat the game on hard you get a credits sequence, but the CPU does ridiculous amounts of damage on the harder settings, and I couldn't be bothered with that.

Video length: 51:31

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Difficulty level: 4 out of 5

Playthrough with Cody. To change the difficulty for this port, you have to use a cheat code at the title screen to bring up the options, press and hold L, then press start. I upped the difficulty settings to the highest, if you want to full ending I believe you have to be playing through the game on these settings to get it.

This game isn't too bad difficulty wise until the fourth level and onwards. Abigail can be very annoying to fight, since this throw does so much damage, he can easily take several lives if you get unlucky. The last level is very long so having a few lives in reserve is a must.

Video length: 1:19:46

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Difficulty level: 4 out of 5

Co-op playthrough on the highest difficulty level. I'm playing as Haggar, Matt was playing as Carlos. This game isn't much fun, there aren't many different enemy types to fight and on expert difficulty it tends to drag on and on due to most enemies having a lot of health. The third game was the best one for the SNES.

Video length: 1:03:48

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Difficulty level: 4 out of 5

Playthrough with Guy. This version of the game lets you play as Guy, but at the expense of Cody being removed. There are several other changes, but it still has the same flaws as the original Final Fight port -the Industrial Area round is missing, there's no 2 player mode, only 2 playable characters instead of 3 and lots of slow down. It also takes longer to beat the game than with Cody, as Guy's attacks do less damage.

This is also the incredibly rare USA version of the game. This version was only available at Blockbuster and is highly sought after by collectors.

Video length: See below

Game region:

Difficulty level: 2 out of 5

This is the Japanese version of Final Fight 3. I've done two playthroughs of it, since this game has a lot of different routes you can take, that lead to different levels. I did both playthroughs on the highest difficulty setting, using a CPU partner. The A.I. of your partner isn't great, both times they ran out of lives towards the end. However, in terms of difficulty, this is the easiest SNES Final Fight game. You can now run and have a lot more moves, including super attacks that do lots of damage.

Lucia & Guy playthrough (46:26)

Guy & Lucia playthrough (56:04)

Video length: 27:19

Game region:

Difficulty level: 3 out of 5

This is the Japanese version of Fatal Fury 2, and I get through the game with Andy Bogard. The SNES port of the first game was dismal, but this is a lot better.

I found it easier to beat than the Neo Geo CD version, there were a few tough parts towards the end, but overall I think Takara toned down the CPU.

Video length: 11:36

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Difficulty level: 2 out of 5

Playthrough with Kaioh. Previous Fist of the North Star games had either been side scrolling beat 'em ups or RPGs, but this one is a fighting game, no doubt due to Street Fighter II's popularity. Unfortunately this game comes nowhere near to the quality of SFII, just looking at it in motion should probably be enough to tell it's awful.

There is a secret boss fight you can get by beating the game without using a continue. If you do this, you'll fight an extra opponent at the end, known as the spirits of the North Star lapis lazuli successors. In reality this is just a gray palette swap of Kenshiro.

Video length: 15:52

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Difficulty level: 3 out of 5

Playthrough of the game's story mode, where you get to play as Kenshiro. This game is another fighting game, and it's also as bad as the previous one. It fails to make any significant improvements and is actually worse in some areas, such as featuring an awful frame rate.

Video length: 30:12

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Difficulty level: 4 out of 5

Playthrough of the story mode, have captions on if you want subtitles. For a lot more info about this game, check out my shrine about it here.

Video length: 24:39

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Difficulty level: 5 out of 5

Playthrough with Robert. I think they did a good job with the graphics for this port, but one major issue is with the controls. I found it much more difficult to pull off special moves in this version when compared to the Genesis port, which is why this gets a 5 out of 5. Takara seemed to struggle to get the controls right with several of their SNK SNES ports, the first Fatal Fury being another good example.

Video length: 30:06

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Difficulty level: 3 out of 5

This game, which is known as Art of Fighting 2 in America, has a reputation for being the hardest fighting game ever made. The Nintendo version (which was only released in Japan) has had a big decrease in difficulty, although you've still got to play carefully if you want to fight the secret boss -to reach Geese Howard you need to play through the game without losing any rounds. Throwing in this version seems to work really well against the CPU.

The controls are also better than in the first game, but not by much. I still had a lot of issues trying to do charge moves (like the hien shippu kyaku) but at least I could use Robert's desperation move easily.

Video length: See below

Game region:

Difficulty level: 3 out of 5 (level 1 and 2), 5 out of 5 (level 3)

Playthroughs of all three "levels" You can select which level route you want at the map screen when you start the game, the higher the level number, the more difficult the route is. The first route is the easiest, the second route is a little tougher but nothing really hard for the most part -you do have to make more use of the boosts, but that's about it.

The third route, however, is really hard, and is one stage longer than the others. It took some practice to get it down to the point where I could beat it at all, and then even more to do it without losing a single life. I did find that the great commander boss was harder than any of the other bosses. And there is a glitch in the Japanese version -whatever you do, don't change the camera view too early, or it soft locks the game.

Level 1 playthrough (39:11)

Level 2 playthrough (35:51)

Level 3 playthrough (44:05)

Video length: 22:41

Game region:

Difficulty level: 4 out of 5

Playthrough with Ryu on the hardest difficulty setting. I also used the Champion Edition code. This code lets you use the same character in two player games, and also gives everyone their second Champion Edition costume color in the single player mode.

The only hard parts are with the bosses, who are much cheaper in this game than in the later ones. M. Bison in particular has some nasty tricks with his knee press, but if you want to take it slowly, just throw out fireballs and then dragon punch him when he jumps over them.

Video length: 24:43

Game region:

Difficulty level: 2 out of 5

Playthrough with Ken, in the Turbo mode and on the hardest difficulty setting. This game is easier than the previous one, since the bosses had some of their moves changed to make them much less cheap. However I've never been a big fan of the faster game speed, and some opponents tend to abuse their new moves in impossible ways.

Video length: 25:44

Game region:

Difficulty level: 2 out of 5

Playthrough with Gouki. This video includes the extra boss battle against Shin Gouki. I found Shin Gouki easier to beat in this version than any other. The controls for this port aren't too good, mainly I couldn't do special or super moves that require a half circle motion very well at all. Thankfully Gouki's got plenty of other moves that don't require than motion.

Video length: See below

Game region: &

Difficulty level: 3 out of 5

Playthrough with Ryu, on the hardest difficulty setting. I've done two playthroughs of this game since I heard that the music between them is different, which it is.

Even on the hardest difficulty, this is still the easiest version of Street Fighter II.

American version playthrough (28:40)

Japanese version playthrough (27:00)

Video length: 19:38

Game region:

Difficulty level: 3 out of 5

Playthrough with Rasputin. Rasputin has many strange attacks that make beating the CPU fairly easy (although this is one of the easier Neo Geo fighting games anyway).