Have you ever had the feeling where you just wanted to beat the fuck out of someone? Of course, you can’t really do that IRL without getting into some kind of trouble (in most circumstances, anyway), but thankfully, video games are there to help with that. Obviously, not all games involve violence, or necessarily beating people up, but games where the main goal is to beat down someone else trying to beat you down, especially in a professional manner, works pretty well, as seen previously with Punch-Out. The original arcade game, while not being too much nowadays, especially in comparison to the much more beloved console games, does still hold up really well, and was successful enough to where less then a year later, a “sequel” was made for the arcades known as “Super Punch-Out!!”.

Now, despite the fact that the game is a sequel to the original game, it is practically identical to the original game in many aspects. There are very few changes made to the game, and it could be seen as a precursor to DLC, so with that being said, I will treat the game as DLC rather then a full new sequel. If you wanna know my full thoughts about Punch-Out (and to an extent, this game), you can read my review on that game, but for you who don’t care about that, I will only discuss what this game changes compared to the original, and how it improves on it.

In terms of gameplay, it all remains pretty much the same, with the only real change being a new mechanic where you can now duck to avoid attacks that you wouldn’t be able to block or dodge. It is a pretty good technique, but you only really need to use it when it is absolutely necessary to use, so it just comes off as another step to winning a match. The main changes only come in the form of the new fighters you take on, as most would become recurring characters in the series. Each one of them are still pretty unique, having traits that make them stand out from each other, as well as moves that no other boxer before were able to pull off, such as kicks and spinning punches. And not to mention, their animations are very charming, and they still have standout, charming titles that will make you remember them, such as Bear Hugger, Super Macho Man, Vodka Drunkinski………… well, glad to see we still have consistency with names that don’t age well.

Aside from those things though, like I said, it is practically the exact same game as the original, which can be a reason people wouldn’t wanna check it out, which is understandable. I would still consider it to be pretty good, and when compared to the original, I would say this is the better of the two, due to having more movement then the original. Nevertheless, if you were to check out the original Punch-Out games, you only need to check out one of these two games, not both of them. Thankfully, the rest of the games in the series would differ somewhat, so this problem of repeating won’t become a common occurrence… at least, not to this extent.

Game #226