Developer: SAS Sakata
Publisher: Data East
Genre: Fighting/2-D Fighting
Release: 1986
Console: NES (Also on ARC and C64)
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To begin, I'd like to highlight this game was released in 1986, deeming it one of the first NES games (At least, in the US), so going into this game my expectations weren't high. prettybad
I don't know if there is an actual storyline to this game, especially since I'm playing the game only - I don't have the manual or box to give me any more information, but I presume you're a karate fighter who's trying to be the best by overcoming various opponents to get to the top. I say various opponents, but in reality you fight the same guy simply called "Red" (which is strange because he's very purple in the game) until you reach the 8th Dan, where your opponent finally changes to this God-like fighter - physically he doesn't change but the difficulty in fighting him eventually creeps up to God-like status.
In each fight, you have to "hit" your opponent a total of 6 times to win, or the time can run out and the judge will decide who deserves to win the round - you ("White) or Red. There's this strange guy in the background in every fight that looks like an 8-bit Lionel Richie, I imagine he is your trainer, and it's him you're looking for (sorry, awful joke).
You start the game in the training stages, where the fights are relatively easy to win, I found myself constantly using the most basic attacks to win, but as the training stages finished and I entered the 7th Dan, I quickly found out that I had to actually introduce a tactic to beat the harder stages, so after a bit of practising and learning the controls a bit more, I figured out all the moves or at least I think I did and it was back into the dojo.
After grasping the controls, the best strategy was to constantly jump over the opponent until you can get in a quick kick whilst they face the other way. Cheap, I know.
Based on reading that, you might be thinking that this game is relatively good, but don't be fooled - the hit detection is almost completely random, sometimes your punches or kicks will register instantly, whereas other times it seems like the opponent is invisible and all your attacks are going straight through them almost, this might be due to the difficulty increase but it just feels very awkward at times.
At the end of each fight, there's this very strange mini-game where flowers in vases come from each side of the screen and I still don't know how to win - I've tried punching them, kicking them, jumping over them but no matter what I do, my score stays the exact same. A bit more explanation of how this mini-game worked would have been nice, but maybe it was described in the manual or box, but unfortunately I don't own either.
Overall, Karate Champ isn't necessarily a bad game, once you learn how the fighting mechanics work it can be a bit fun, but it has some of the worst hit detection I've ever experienced and the gameplay does get old really quick. Feature1
