„King Bruce Lee, the Master of Karate“ – this was once sung in a distinguished, low voice by Piotr Fronczewski, under a pseudonym of “Franek Kimono”. Isn’t the topic of karate/ninja/kung-fu/China played out? As it turns out – not at all!
“Waaah! The mean boys from Blapsville stole my toy robot!” – this sentence motivates our main character to fight with ubiquitous evil. The Master of Awesome, who we impersonate, has to confront Chinese thugs to get back a little boy’s stolen toy (the boy’s name, by the way, sounds quite Polish – Podznofsky). The fight takes place in a town densely populated by ninja warriors – Blapsville – and the quest into its very core may prove difficult for even the Master of Awesome.
Alf Yngve, known for his SEUCK creations, creates this particular story in his game “Kung-Fu Maniacs”. Made in Sideways SEUCK, it guarantees some quite difficult fun. As it usually is with this type of productions, it’s easier to lose a life here than to get it. The Master of Awesome is exposed to attacks from everywhere, so slow reactions will lead to quick demise. Considering the fact that the game was made in SEUCK, there are times when not everything works as fast as we would like it to – therefore these slow reactions can be quite numerable.
The game has really nice graphics. Travelling through different levels of the city looks very appealing, the sprites are simple but clear. It’s one of characteristics of Alf Yngve’s productions – clear simplicity, which makes everything look proportionate and solid, nothing is mixed up. It’s a huge plus of this difficult game.
During the game we can hear a very suitable, good music. It’s a standard thing in Yngve’s games because he is often assisted – also here – by Richard Bayliss.
A considerable innovation differentiating “Kung-Fu Maniacs” from other SEUCK productions is the variability of weapons. Gathering a certain amount of points gives us the possibility to use long-range weapons – an energy ball for instance (at least it sort of looks like that). Before that we can only use kicks and punches and they are both inefficient and quite risky.
The game has a funny ending but unfortunately, it can be seen by the chosen ones. Should I tell you how it looks? To tell, or not to tell, that is the question… Alright, I am going to tell you! The game ends with a lofty speech made by the Master of Awesome, who tell us about the necessity of peace-making, avoiding resolving conflicts with force, etc, etc, some political blabber, which as usual does not reflect reality. The listeners know this all because as we get to see, very meaningful “z z z” quickly appears on the screen and the orator is then smashed by a huge “The End”.
The author predicted that after around 5th time we beat “1.000 Kung-Fu Maniacs”, we might get a bit bored, so on two disks there is not only the main game but a few mini games. We already know one of them from SEUCK Compo 2015 – “Snatch McBlagger”, in which a likable robber with a moustache breaks out of prison. Apart from that there is a classic, very nicely done military shoot’em up, called “Flying Cobra”. Made in an eastern style theme, there is another addition –“Nervana” – which unfortunately doesn’t really work well; the computer gets overloaded and as a result we can neither move nor shoot and therefore – we die all the time.
Because the game I am reviewing is called “Kung-Fu Maniacs Trilogy”, I suppose we will need more than one part of it… And the author also didn’t overlook that matter – on the second disk there is the second part of the game. This time it’s even more difficult and has a different, closer camera – the sprites are not so small. The enemies shoot at us so fiercely and out punches are so imprecise, that we end up without any lives much quicker than in the first part. Nevertheless, the very neat and solid looks of the game are worth a praise.
I won’t say anything more but I definitely will encourage you to play “Kung-Fu Maniacs Trilogy” and to check if everything that I wrote here is true. So, may the Force be with you! Ooops… wrong franchise…