Superior Soldiers, known in Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

 as , is a fighting

Fighting game

Fighting game is a video game genre where the player controls an on-screen character and engages in close combat with an opponent. These characters tend to be of equal power and fight matches consisting of several rounds, which take place in an arena. Players must master techniques such as...

 arcade game

Arcade game

An arcade game is a coin-operated entertainment machine, usually installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars, and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games, and merchandisers...

 developed and published by Irem. It was created during the fighting game trend of the 1990s that began with Capcom

Capcom

is a Japanese developer and publisher of video games, known for creating multi-million-selling franchises such as Devil May Cry, Chaos Legion, Street Fighter, Mega Man and Resident Evil. Capcom developed and published Bionic Commando, Lost Planet and Dark Void too, but they are less known. Its...

's Street Fighter II

Street Fighter II

is a competitive fighting game originally released for the arcades in . It is the arcade sequel to the original Street Fighter released in and was Capcom's fourteenth title that ran on the CP System arcade hardware...

. Several graphic designers of this and several other Irem titles later moved to Nazca

Nazca Corporation

was a Japanese video game company that developed video games for the Neo Geo. The company was formed in 1994 by a group of employees from Irem who were tired of the company's inactivity...

, and designed the graphics of the Metal Slug and The King of Fighters franchises for SNK

SNK Playmore

SNK Playmore Corporation is a Japanese video game hardware and software company. SNK is an acronym of , which was SNK's original name. The company's legal and trading name became SNK in 1986....

.

Plot

The game takes place on an Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

-like planet in the same universe of R-Type

R-Type

is a side scrolling shoot-em-up arcade game produced by Irem in 1987. The player controls a space fighter named R-9a "Arrowhead" to defend humanity against a mysterious but powerful alien life-form known as "Bydo", which was later discovered to be not entirely alien in origin...

, another arcade game by Irem. The date is August 1999. 90% of the human population died by an unknown energy later named "Force". Cities and other places became severely damaged. The 10% later became cyborg

Cyborg

A cyborg is a being with both biological and artificial parts. The term was coined in 1960 when Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline used it in an article about the advantages of self-regulating human-machine systems in outer space. D. S...

s to protect themselves, as well as to create a new humankind.

Gameplay

Superior Soldiers is space-themed and plays similarly to other 2D versus fighting games during its release, which the player's character fights against his or her opponent in best two-out-of-three matches in a single player tournament mode with the computer or against another human player. The player has a character roster of seven playable fighters to choose from, and one unplayable boss, each with their own unique fighting style and special techniques. Players also can perform dashing and charging attacks. One unique feature this fighting game introduced during its release was the ability to perform large jumps in an X axis. In one player mode, after selecting a character, the arcade randomly selects an opponent. The opponent order goes randomly and always leaves the final boss last.

Characters

There are eight characters in the game. (known outside of Japan as Starsaber; however the back of the North American arcade flyer spells his name as Star Sabor.) (known outside of Japan as Cattydox) (known outside of Japan as Busido) (known outside of Japan as Reptilian) (known outside of Japan as Satinsect) (known in North America as Skull Reaper) - The antagonist of the game. Only playable using a code.

Regional differences

Besides the names of several characters, the North American version, Superior Soldiers lacks other things that are seen in the Japanese version, Perfect Soldiers. The Japanese version has an announcer shouting the name of the game at the title screen, as well as names of "who VS. who" at the VS. screens in Engrish

Engrish

refers to unusual forms of English language usage by native speakers of some East Asian languages. The term itself relates to Japanese speakers' tendency to inadvertently substitute the English phonemes "R" and "L" for one another, because the Japanese language has one alveolar consonant in place...

. However, the well-known "Winners Don't Use Drugs

Winners Don't Use Drugs

Winners Don't Use Drugs is an anti-drug slogan that was included on all arcade games imported into North America for 11 years from 1989—2000. The slogan appears on a screen that is shown during a game's attract mode....

" screen and new color graphics were added to the North American version.

External links

• Perfect Soldiers at The Large Cult Fighting Game March
• Superior Soldiers at arcade-history
  • Perfect Soldiers at arcade-history