Killer Instinct Gold

Review

by Colin Williamson

Rareware's Killer Instinct 1 and 2 hit arcades with a bang, totally redefining the button-mashing fighting game genre. The KI games were brawlers where the lowliest of players could string together a ludicrous number of "combo" moves by randomly flailing upon the buttons. Now, Nintendo has lumped both games together into Killer Instinct Gold, a remotely amusing 2D fighting game.

The cast of the game includes the cookie-cutter ninja guy, the slow but powerful barbarian, and the top-heavy femme fatale, all on their way to beat up Gargos, a big evil gargoyle fellow. There are plenty of Street Fighter-style special moves, and "humiliation" moves to end a round in style. The combo moves have remained intact, and a huge portion of the game is spent seeing who can nail the first twenty-hit attack on their helpless opponent, while a gravelly-voiced announcer repeatedly screams "Awesome comboooo!" in the background.

There's honestly not much depth to the gameplay - the main lure in the arcade was the graphical content, which featured nicely-rendered sprites (similar to those in Donkey Kong Country), along with a pumping techno soundtrack. The N64 version doesn't look quite as smooth - the animation has been scaled down to fit within the cartridge, though the backgrounds look extremely smooth.

All in all, Killer Instinct Gold is fun for the casual game player, though those accustomed to the depth of the Virtua Fighter titles should stay far, far away. Still, if you're looking for Mortal Kombat on speed (with a hyperactive Barry White as the announcer), you really can't get much better than this.