Last Bronx needs more lovin!

FEAR NOT MUSER...
I've said on here plenty of times in the past, Last Bronx is my favourite SEGA Saturn fighter for me. Whilst I would more or less agree with Oho (i.e. VF2 being superior on the whole) I actually prefer the pacing of the gameplay, characters, soundtrack, theme etc of Last Bronx. I actually like ALL the characters in it vs the likes of VF. As much as I do love and respect VF, I've always thought - up until VF4 - that their characters were quite honestly, a bit lame. After all, that WAS the idea though in its defense, a game where YOU played a 3D fighting game character. No complex storylines, fancy names, exuberant personalities etc. Simply: a 3D fighting GAME.

But, I tread dangerously on a previous, unfavourable subject re: complexity of characters and storylines in fighting games. Seems only I and one or two others enjoy that aspect to their fighters. I'm not dependent on it, but I do like it. Anyway.

VF2 wins out on gameplay. It's aged really well, even by comparison to LB (which plays a bit more old school, so to speak). But I like that fencing approach of LB > VF2's approach. Right or wrong. It's irrelevant, as I only ever play these sorts of games by myself nowadays. Joe & Yoko are my preferred's...

I've always had a soft spot for Last Bronx as the great characters, great graphics and style coupled with a VF2 style control system, tick all the right boxes as far as I'm concened. That said, I have always had one minor issue with the game, namely that the hits are far too damaging and thus the rounds tend to be over extremely quickly. It's certainly not a major game breaker, but it would have been nice to increase the energy bars to at least double what they are in default settings at the very least. Also there are nowhere near the same combo possibilities in Last Bronx as there are in Virtua Fighter 2, but at least the weapon based attacks are a pleasure to behold.

Anyway, my personal favorite characters are Yusaku (That three sectional staff is a truly epic weapon!!), Tommy, Yoko and Kurosawa.

---

As I've mentioned here in the past, I used to work for my mate who sold video games on Milton Keynes market back in the late nineties. Anyway, Last Bronx was one of the games that we used to regularly leave running to attract customers. We actually managed to sell the odd Saturn system or two on the strength of the intro shown above alone combined with some demonstration rounds. It was also quite facinating to see the interest the game attracted from the Playstation crowd in particular (we only ever sold Saturn, Playstation and N64 stuff), several of which were sorely disappointed when we told them it was a Saturn game. Generally it attracted 'WOW!!' comments all round.

I always thought it was strange that we managed to sell more Saturn stuff towards the end of its lifespan, than at any other point. Although in retrospect, we did have the likes of Last Bronx, Quake, Sonic R and Panzer Dragoon Saga to show off the system by then.

I loved Last Bronx back in the day. It was my preferred fighter for a time and its steep difficulty taught me the benefits of blocking and being strategic in fighting games. As others have said, the cool setting and storyline made the game more appealing and was a great touch after the bare bones arcade ports we'd received previously. Kurosawa was my favourite character because he was bad-ass, however, I've come to appreciate some of the game's other characters over the years. The game has a fantastic roster of interesting characters.

These days I'm less keen on fighters and so would choose Fighting Vipers over Last Bronx because it's more accessible, has an excellent soundtrack and the setting and storyline are more interesting than the generic fighting tournament common to the genre.

Nice find. But, no subtitles?