Beat-em-up games have always been a cornerstone of the arcade experience, as well as consoles from the Eight-Bit Nintendo Entertainment System to the 16-Bit consoles that redefined the industry and put games in more homes than ever before.
From Double Dragon on the Nintendo Entertainment System, to Streets of Rage on the Sega Genesis or Final Fight on the Super Nintendo, the beat-em-up genre has always had a dedicated fanbase. But by the time of the Sega Saturn and Sony PlayStation, the genre was in dire need of a new series- something fresh. One that not only took advantage of new software capabilities, but one that was also fun. Sarah Jane Avory and Robert Cirillo’s Fighting Force was exactly that. A 3D beat-em-up experience with something for everyone that was inspired directly by Sega’s Streets of Rage series, it was a million-seller that satisfied a huge need in the industry at the time.
That need was to take advantage of new 3D technology and give gamers more than a 2D, side-scrolling beat-em-up. As good as Streets of Rage and other similar games of the era were, the recipe was lather, rinse, repeat. What Avory and her team did with Fighting Force was take the elements that made great beat-em-ups great, solid control, cool characters and world interactivity and turn it on its head. Not only are Mace Daniels, Hawk Mason, Ben (Smasher) Jackson and Alana McKendrick all cool characters that play differently, but the world in Fighting Force is incredibly interactive. Pretty much everything in the game can be used as some sort of weapon. While hitting fire hydrants in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles beat-em-ups was fun, Fighting Force takes it to the next level as car tires can be used to beat down opponents, as well as ashtrays. At the time, this was revolutionary stuff. Over 20 years after its original release, Fighting Force is still fun. It still gets the job done.
The same thing goes for the game’s control. A simple pair of three-hit combination for both kicks and punches made it easy to play, especially with friends, while the game’s throw mechanic spiced up combat and made it more than a button-mashing experience. There was even a bit of strategy needed as the effort was always not to get cornered or surrounded by opponents. Like any game in the beat-em-up genre, it’s hard to avoid repetition, but Fighting Force again made itself different by allowing the player, at times, to pick which level they could advance to. While many of these gameplay trimmings seem trivial now, at the time, they helped define Fighting Force as the go-to beat-em-up on the Sony PlayStation.
However, it was never Avory or her team’s wish to end up on Sony’s 32-bit powerhouse. A self-proclaimed “Sega Girl,” Avory wanted the game to be the next addition to the Streets of Rage franchise, on the Sega Saturn. Previously working on Sega CD and Sega Saturn games such as Shellshock, Thunderstrike 2, Soulstar and Jaguar XJ220 before Fighting Force, Avory had an affinity for Sega consoles and preferred to work on their hardware. Working primarily on shooters and racing games as well prior to Fighting Force, Avory was excited at the opportunity to work on something much different. Alongside Roberto Cirillo, who did the game’s art, Avory had all the pieces in place to give Sega a much-needed sequel to Streets of Rage.
“The game Fighting Force initially came from an idea I had a long time ago. You see, I’ve always been a Sega fan, from playing all the great arcade games when I was younger,” Avory said. “Oh, I can still remember playing Space Harrier at Great Yarmouth arcades; my two brothers and I used to go there every summer to check out all the latest games. So, anyway, when Sega released the Megadrive (Genesis), I used to play those games too. One of the games was Streets Of Rage (SOR), a game my brother and I could play co-op together. Oh, I loved that game, especially as a two player cooperative. Together, we spent many an hour playing SOR and its sequel.”
As fate would have it however, Avory would have an opportunity that every game developer dreams of- to work on a project straight from their heart.
“One time at work (I used to work for Core Design Ltd.), the boss booked a conference room at a local golf club for a brainstorming session where everyone could sit around a massive oval table and pitch any game ideas we had. Being a fan of SOR and with the 3D polygon era of games upon us, I had the idea of making a fighting game of a similar style to my beloved SOR, only as a 3D polygon game.”
Regardless of her love for the Streets of Rage franchise however, Savory’s heart as a game developer was formed somewhere else entirely. As a matter of fact, she’s probably the last person you’d ever expect to design a fighting game.
“I have to admit, I hadn’t actually planned on being the one writing the game. You see, at the time I had a deep interest in flight simulators, so my main programming interest lay in developing 3D flight games, especially combat helicopters,” Avory said. “For this reason I started the ThunderHawk (ThunderStrike in US) series for Core, having joined the company with a working 3D engine of my own. But after completing Firestorm: Thunderhawk 2 for the Saturn and PS1, I was free to work on the new fighting game, so along with my artist and good friend, Roberto Cirillo, we began work on the game.
“Originally, with the game to be a 3D version of Streets Of Rage, the idea was to produce a Sega Saturn game. So from some tricks I learned while writing Thunderhawk 2 for the Saturn, and the new game not requiring an expensive to render undulating 3D polygon landscape, I decided to use the 3D playfield hardware for a flat terrain with polygon characters and objects drawn on top. That is why all of the game takes place on a flat plane (although there are areas where we cheated to give the illusion of height, namely the elevator sections). But after a short while, and with the rise of the Playstation, it also made sense to write a Playstation version.”
However, with Sega not onboard for a 3D Streets of Rage, Avory and Cirillo got to put their own stamp on the game. What started as an extension to one of the greatest beat-em-ups of all-time became an exciting new fighter with a story, characters and gameplay all its own. At the same time, it’s hard to separate the two. Like Madonna to Lady Gaga, SOR and Fighting Force come from a similar place and create the same type of experience. Fighting Force just did it with better technology.
“After the SOR idea was dropped, we didn’t need to change the game much; to start with it hadn’t originally been designed to be SOR, just something of a similar vein, although Roberto did model and texture some of the SOR characters,” Avory said. “Instead, the revised plan was to release both a Saturn and a Playstation version.”
But as development on the project began to take shape, Avory and Cirillo saw Fighting Force begin to forge its own identity. Although they were forced to alter the original design, mainly due to business decisions and Sega’s inability to maintain a profitable position in the 32-bit console wars, these moments went a long way in establishing Fighting Force as something unique. They also had a direct impact on Avory as a developer.
“At first it was just myself and Roberto working on the game, but others were brought onboard to help,” Avory, who is currently Senior games programmer at Frontier, Cambridge and one of the AI programmers for Elite: Dangerous, said. “Another programmer took over the Saturn version when I switched over to code the Playstation version. I remember not being too happy about leaving my beloved Saturn to work on its rival, but I saw the swap as a fresh challenge, so it didn’t take long for me to learn to program the Playstation’s MIPS CPU and Geometry Transformation Engine [GTE]. But with the rise of the Playstation, after a while it was decided to drop the Saturn game completely and instead focus all our efforts on the Playstation version. A sad day for me personally when I now look back, for it marked my departure from ever programming a Sega console again.”
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