There’s something beautiful about the simple joy that comes from pressing a button and making an unrealistically toned character hit a character of similar or even more unrealistic proportions. If you want to experience it alongside friends, you’ve got beat ‘em ups; if you want to go against them, you’ve got fighting games and a whole mess of Mugen games.
Mugen is a game engine designed specifically to make a seeminglyendless stream of fightingcompilations. You can spend the rest of your gaming time only playing Mugen games and never run out, but you’d better make sure you play these titles.
Fou the Mage of the Sun and O Ilusionista
Current Version
Beta 3.1
TheKirbygames may be some of the most adorable (and easiest) platform games you’ll ever play. They tend to revolve around a little pink puffball that eats enemies, steals their powers, and then slays anything that moves.
But, where’s the visceral combat? Well, it’s right here inKirby The Dream Battle. This Mugen game takes advantage of the fact that Kirby has many distinct characters and enemies that are now being thrown into the arena. Master the different moves to become the cutest combatant champion ever.
1.2.1
When we think abouthorror moviemonsters, we typically think about how quickly they’ve killed their victims and how powerful they are against the average human body.
We never really think about them getting into serious fights, let alone with other horrors from the dark realms. It turns out that someone was thinking about it because now we haveThe Black Heart.
As a Mugen game, it makes an effort to create new characters in a traditional 2D fighting game. You’ll get to choose among several types of horrific entities as they test their mettle against other masters of fright.
N/A
Believe it or not, there have been numerousSonicgames that don’t involve the Blue Blur running so fast he gets impaled on spikes before you even realize what happened. There was even an official fighting game that involved characters made solely to fill out the roster, but the Sonic universe has grown since then and spilled intoUltimate Sonic Mugen.
This game combines the platforming style and movement of the original Sonic trilogy but turns stages into confined fighting areas. Choose your Sonic main and try to use your platforming skills to jump out on top.
The Famicom seems like a system that everyone seems to know about, but many have never actually played it, let alone owned it. The system (which became the NES outside of Japan) was a host to manyNintendoroyals, including Mario, Samus, and even the Black Mage from Final Fantasy.
Famicom Fighterscaptures the aesthetic of the limited visuals of the time, focusing mainly on simple movement and quick hits. This allows you to focus more on the actual fighting and the different skills of all the characters, which helps build an appreciation for their origins.
Ryon, Alexei, and Txpot
Beta 5
Pokemondominates a big part of competitive gaming, considering just how much it incorporates strategy and prompts players to consider every little thing to etch out a victory.
The turn-based style tends to slow things down a bit, but the fights can still be immensely tense, and that’s whatProject Catch ‘Em Allwants to show. It transforms the standard Pokemon perspective into a traditional one-on-one fighting setup.
Each Pokemon fighter still only has four moves to choose from, but now they have an Active-Time-Battle meter to worry about. This, combined with the animated sprites, makes for a whole new battle experience.
Internet culture (Japan)
Trial version 67
They say (just go with it) that the best way to learn about a different culture is to look at their memes. This is a known method, and some are using it to teach through Mugen games likeNijikaku.
At first glance, you may think you’re looking at an MS Paint Excel spreadsheet gone wrong, but that’s just the massive roster. Each fighter is based on a meme or a piece of internet culturecoming from Japan. Looking through all the content, you’ll see what kind of weirdness you’re in for, but fun fighting weirdness nonetheless.
Capcom IPs and various others
4th Beta release
In the past, you may have heard of a little fighting game series calledMarvel Vs. Capcom. As a premise, it sounds cool: let’s take some comics’ greatest heroes and villains and make them fight some of gaming’s greatest heroes and villains. However, Capcom has seemingly been looking for another rival, and that’s why we’ve come acrossCapcom Vs. The World.
Taking the stylized and rounded pixel-art styles from the other versus games, this Mugen title provides an unusual but dynamic roster for Capcom to fight. You’ve got characters from shows, movies, and even from the real world squaring up to represent The World.
3.1
Mega Manwas one of the earliest gaming series to be built around memorable boss fights, having a boss rush at the end, and then switching it up with every entry. There are so many Robot Masters that you can’t believe some are real (like Sheep Man), but that makes for a great roster, as seen inMega Man: Robot Master Mayhem.
The game is loaded with heroes, Robot Masters, and stages all across the series. You’ll be able to use some of the most iconic abilities that you’ve come to love and fear while playing. The fact that it’s rendered in the more detailed Marvel Vs. Capcom style is just icing on the Cake Man (not real… yet).
