Double Dragon

Double Dragon applied a progression system to dole out its expansive movelist. A few RNG-rooted mishaps can't quite spoil the experience, that is actually a rather broad showcase of memorable enemy encounters and combatic details. Their combined effect yielded some intense yet balanced fights.

To put this review into context, I spent $100 to play Forza Horizon 4 a few days early instead I spent three of those days trying to beat Double Dragon. I spent $100 to not play a game I’ve been waiting two years for, to play Double Dragon.

There’s so many flaws with this game, the graphics are pretty poor even for the NES, there’s insane flickering when 2 or 3 sprites are on the screen, there is no real style or good soundtrack, even the gameplay isn’t great considering they have you play some of the worst platforming sections jumping using the a + b button, there is no use for the punch and all you need is to spam kick.

So why would I subject myself to this, I’m not sure. The first two levels are simple and honestly boring, but the insane difficulty spike on mission 3 compelled me, it forced me to play so smart, to memorize each screen and plan every movement. It was a lot of cussing and smashing the b button of my switch into dust but I did it, I got to the final screen and I felt more accomplished than I have playing a game in a while.

One of the most popular beat em ups at the time, but unfortunatly it doesnt quite hold up today. The game is just way too simple. Your amount of moves is very basic, and the enemies are slow and predictable. The game is simply a matter of getting close to the enemy and hitting them before they hit you. And you only need to hit one since they get stunned after each hit. Poor animations, poor ai and poor level design as it is just one arena after another. The story is another case of damsel in distress. The game is hard, but thats more because it is built to suck money out of you and the unfair lack of checkpoints, not because of the actual difficulty of the game. A mediocre game overal, i cant really recommend it except for historical reasons.