Even so, since the computer won't pose much of a long-term challenge, you probably won't get much value out of Bloody Roar Extreme as a single-player game.

Since it won't require much effort for you to beat the game with any of the characters, it's nice that the game at least throws in some bonus stuff for variety's sake. If you don't have a PhD in fighting-game theory, you might not mind Bloody Roar Extreme's relative lack of depth.īloody Roar Extreme has some secrets that can be unlocked, including a hidden fighter who wasn't in Primal Fury for the GameCube. The characters aren't too different from one another either, once you get past their looks. At any rate, characters in beast form gain a few new moves and abilities and regenerate some of their lost health, but they otherwise aren't too different from their standard forms. Actually, if you've played previous Bloody Roar games, it's far less of a gimmick by now. Meanwhile, transforming into beast form, as in previous Bloody Roar games, is just as much a gimmick as a gameplay element. These supermoves, though toned down somewhat from Bloody Roar 3, are still really powerful, letting you easily shave off about a third of your opponent's health. Every character has a couple of devastating supermoves that turn the screen into a porridge of hit sparks as a gratuitous combo meter racks up dozens of effortless hits. Other attacks send opponents skyward, letting you follow up with juggle combos. Many attacks send the opponent on the receiving end flying backward, fast and hard, sometimes into walls, and sometimes straight through them. As if to discourage you from even trying, there's no in-game move list for the fighters. The difference between an excellent fighting game and a game like Bloody Roar Extreme is that Bloody Roar offers little reward or advantage to players who bother to learn all the moves. However, you could get by more easily without bothering. It's unfair to say the game's fighting system is totally superficial, since there are a few complex tricks that can be learned. At any rate, if you've ever wondered what the pejorative expression 'button masher' really refers to, you'll find out when you play Bloody Roar Extreme. You probably won't mistake this for a challenge, though. At higher difficulties, and especially toward the end of the arcade mode, the computer starts fighting cheap. The computer can be easily beaten by using the same moves over and over. In practice, though, you don't really have to. You might think that varying up your punches and kicks, or using throws or counters, would be a good idea. You'd do just as well to jam on the punch or kick buttons rapidly in order to produce long strings of dazzling attacks. You can also use the shoulder buttons to sidestep left or right, though such tactics are usually unnecessary. Alternately, when your beast change meter is full, you can hyper-transform, which puts you in a powered-up beast form for a little while. The controls are simplistic-there's a punch button, a kick button, and a button that makes you instantly change into your character's beast form, if you can do so at the time. More than a dozen different fighters, each with a unique beast form, are available to choose from.īloody Roar Extreme is best suited to those who aren't too serious about the fighting genre, though there's at least some level of depth.

It also inherits its predecessors' rather simplistic fighting system, though this first Bloody Roar game for the Xbox can nonetheless provide some fast-paced button-mashing fun for a while. So Bloody Roar Extreme isn't exactly a fresh take on fighting games, though it looks good and controls well enough. The fifth game in the series, Bloody Roar Extreme, is mostly a straight port of Bloody Roar: Primal Fury for the GameCube, a game that's over a year old and is itself based on 2001's Bloody Roar 3 for the PlayStation 2. As if the idea of beating people up using exaggerated martial-arts combos weren't enough of a draw, the Bloody Roar games also let you transform into anthropomorphic animals that, according to the games' fiction, are even better than humans at beating people up using exaggerated martial-arts combos.

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