Battle of the Ports - Muscle Bomber / Saturday Night Slam Masters (マッスルボマー) Show

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One of the only wrestling games I actually like on this week's Battle of the Ports.
Time Code
00:22 - Arcade
02:21 - Super Famicom
04:11 - Mega Drive
06:01 - FM Towns
07:55 - All versions side by side
Enjoy!

[@Larry]

Absolutely loved this game as a kid, spent many a night playing the 4 player mode. But always thought it was a shame Capcom didn't also include Zangief in the game, especially as he and Haggar were tag team partners in the lore. Also the UK SNES version is unbelievably rare, possibly as it was exclusive to Beatties of all places.

[@RetroCore]

Beatties? Bloody hell, I'd forgotten all about that shop. Why on earth would anyone give Beatties an exclusive game? Didn't they want to sell many copies?

[@orderofmagnitude-TPATP]

Definitely edgy one.... it would of been magic with zangief and hagger against each other... - serious missed opportunity there... maybe it was a different team/division in capcom to street fighter? - (altho wasn't final fight meant to be street fighter 89/2?) Shame the sequals were more like street fighter series with left and right only instead of the 2.5d playing field....

[@vasili1207]

You ain't got 4 friends stop lying Larry

[@vasili1207]

can I be your freind got any pictures of your mrs?

[@phantomgamer4463]

Well Birdie and Zangief was mention. On Titanic Tim Biography is mention that Birdie was his Tag Team partner befor he join the first street fighter tournament. Zangief was mention on Biff Quotes and he got cameo appearances on *Ring of Destruction:Slam Master 2* Although the slam master series is a prequel of final fight and street fighter, its been years befor haggar becom mayor of metro city.

[@vasileios6301]

Fantastic Snes port,was very happy with it back then.

[@rajeshthakur5783]

Only snes best

[@rorydropkick]

I absolutely love this game because of the gameplay and I've always wanted the arcade poster because of the Tetsuo Hara art. They had the awesome 4 player cabinet at my college and I used to play it between classes all the time.

[@SebasHCG]

the musics on FM-Towns is awesome !

[@RetroCore]

I really like the FM Towns music as its basically the same as the Arcade but with much better instruments.

[@SebasHCG]

@@RetroCore ya it's why i say this is amazing ! i ripped this in a Muscle Bomber Compilation Soundtrack years ago ;)

[@braikingboss9137]

It's an amazing port of the arcade!!! And yes the music sounds fantastic, unfortunately I hate the fact that the fans don't have animation and are just static..... And no 4 player option..

[@SPac316]

Also noticed in the opening scene of the SNES and Gen versions, the dude's nipples were removed. lol! Good video, I loved this game as a kid. Never knew there was an FMTowns port.

[@RetroCore]

I never noticed that but I can bet i would have if it was female wrestlers 😋

[@awar2847]

Absolutely loved this game when i was a kid, as always keep up the good work. love your videos.

[@Fellanation]

SLAMMIN Awesome video as always dude always feel I learn something with these-Russell

[@RetroCore]

That's great to hear, Russell.

[@SomeOrangeCat]

Oh man! This was THE wrestling game back in the day!

[@RetroCore]

Too right. Forget all of those WWF games. This was the one which was playable and fun.

[@SomeOrangeCat]

@@RetroCore Yeah, its hard to look at the roster of those old WWF games without going "Everyone pictured here is either dead, or ended up some kind of pitiful disgrace. That's a mood killer..." Also gotta give props to the Western name of the game. "Saturday Night Slam Masters" just rolls of the tongue so perfectly. Like, you could almost hear Mean Gene Okerlund saying it.

[@soulagent79]

My favourite SNES wrestling game. I used to like this much more than the rather disappointing WWF and WCW games.

[@geoserenity]

ah, always love to see the fm towns

[@Simplyclouds2]

The art style in this game is great. So Capcom.

[@SynthatronPrime]

Nice video as always!

[@topofbones]

The most interesting of this game is the Battle Royal mode. Curiously the machine with less speed and more problems to manage lots of sprites in screen (slowdowns) is the only port that have it. Thumbs up for SFC!!

[@RetroCore]

Yep, the SFC version is impressive. 4 characters plus the referee and animated crowds. Such a shame the FM Towns port is a joke compared to the SFC version.

[@luisreyes1963]

I heard a rumor that if you had a perfect run twice on Saturday Night Slam Masters, you get to fight the wrestler portrayed in the title screen, Ortega.

[@RetroCore]

Ah, I don't know bout that.

[@MahmoudEhab2023]

Well mark you have done what did your fans wanted next week's battle of the ports's choice is yours until then good work mark and keep it up! 😊

[@thrillington2008]

I first had a taste of Saturday Night Slam Masters on SNES and really enjoyed it it's a wrestling game done right at the time

[@bananarama6808]

I wish they released part 1 and 2 on a collection and made a part 3 with abogale Hugo and others!

[@MahmoudEhab2023]

You know my first time playing this game was on the snes then explored the megadrive and i really enjoyed that 4 player battle mode but which one was great in the end the snes...because the good side is the 4 player mode and the arcade's experience the bad side is the animations and also the sound samples from the arcades are totally missing seriously great job with that mark and keep up the awsome work really thank you ❤❤❤

[@Charlie-Cat.]

GREAT FREAKIN GAME this is Mark. I love Muscle Bomber/Saturday Night Slam Masters. Such a great game that I have all home versions of it ( even FM Towns) and played the arcade version constantly. I was always Mike Haggar and thought he had the best finisher out of them all. Now as far as Slam Masters II, I didn't like that version since it was trying to mimic a fighting game rather than wrestling. So I was bummed out on that version. Glad this one is showed Mark. Keep up the great work as always. Anthony..

[@RetroCore]

I'm surprised Capcom didn't release the Updated version on the Mega Drive as it was released much later.

[@MrNightshade2010]

Retro Core do they have decent emulation for the FM towns? I think that's like the only system ever made that I've never played in any form .....

[@NightSprinter]

Makes sense Haggar was in the game, as it was his career prior to becoming Metro City NY mayor in Final Fight. All part of the Street Fighter lore that Larry mentioned. Plus, I've noticed with a lot of ports to the FM Towns of games with a lot of background animation (including Super SF2), that the backgrounds in these ports seem to have little to nothing moving. I wonder if despite the far more powerful 386-DX33 in the machine (at least, the initial versions, as apparently later ones were capable of running Win95?), if its graphics card just wasn't as capable as the Sharp X68000?

[@RetroCore]

The FM Towns isn't as capable as the X68000 for sure but is should be able to animate backgrounds. I think this was just a very lazy port. The lack of game options also kind of backs this up.

[@NightSprinter]

@@RetroCore Aye, I hear ya on that. Even when some ports offered something unique (like SSF2's "Color Edit" mode on the FM Towns), it just sometimes doesn't make up for it lacking in other areas.

[@daviddyer3543]

@@NightSprinter Did they make devkits for the FM Towns?

[@RedRanger2001]

Ortega (the guy in the title screen) looks like Jeff Bridges from The Big Lebowski doing Hulk Hogan...

[@ricosimon1057]

Time to celebrate the 30th Anniversary with most games with Saturday Night Slam Masters, Super Street Fighter 2, Sonic CD, Batsugun, Ray Force, Ridge Racer, Gaiapolis, etc.

[@dreamcastfan]

The music in the FM Towns version is awesome, even if the rest of the port disappoints.

[@RetroCore]

So true. If we could use the FM Towns music on the SNES port via the MSU flash cart, that would be perfect.

[@dreamcastfan]

Retro Core Oh man, I hadn’t thought of that, that would be really awesome!

[@ravelinoadityaa.k.amasamun7721]

@@RetroCore It's Happening

[@ravelinoadityaa.k.amasamun7721]

@@dreamcastfan It's Happening

[@solarflare9078]

Your verdict on the Mega Drive version's sound is going to be a hard disagree for me. It's the best sounding version in my own opinion, and tbh, it might be Capcom's best sounding Mega Drive game, especially since they got a CPS-1 veteran to make the music there.

[@RetroCore]

We all have our options and that's cool.

[@daviddyer3543]

Hmmmm...why was the name of this game outside Japan changed to "Saturday Night Slam Masters"? Because 'Muscle Bombing' (?) is illegal...or some people wouldn't get the idea of 'The Body Explosion'?

[@RetroCore]

American idea I guess. Saturday Night Slam Masters sounds like a "Rad" TV show. I do prefer the name Muscle Bomber myself.

[@SomeOrangeCat]

Saturday Night Slam Masters actually sounds like a TV wrestling show. Its got a certain appeal to it.

[@phantomgamer4463]

I just call it Slam Master

[@Octopuswithcorn]

Other arcade wrestlers worth trying are Taito's Champion Wrestler (Which predates this by 3 years) Human's Blazing Tornado (Which later had a JP only Saturn port that changed the grappling to be more like Fire Pro), and Sega's Giant Gram 2000

[@pjomayo]

WWF Wrestlefest.

[@DragonSlayerKyo]

Awesome vid. Who ported the game to FM Towns? Certainly it had far better specs than even the cps board, so it could have easily handled the animated crowds.

[@RetroCore]

I'm not sure. I don't think it was Capcom though.

[@NeoGunloc]

One of my favorite games of all-time, can you tell ? ;)

[@johns6265]

Interesting, the Super Famicom and Megadrive versions feature completely redrawn graphics in places. It's most apparent on the shirt ripping title screen where it's a character that looks similar but is redrawn from scratch with an altered colour palette. Which means one of them is a port of a port, probably the Super Famicom version came first, then that got ported to the Megadrive.

[@Tempora158]

Unlike the arcade game which was drawn by Capcom artists, Capcom got Tetsuo Hara back to do the in-game artwork for the console releases, which is in addition to the character design and promotional artwork he already did for the arcade game. This is corrected with Super Muscle Bomber where his artwork is actually used in the arcade game.

[@AllieRX]

I'd love to see you do a BOTP on WWF WrestleMania: The Arcade Game someday.

[@RetroCore]

Ah, I really don't like that game but if there's enough interest I will cover it.

[@SoftBank47]

For what Saturday Night Slam Masters is, it’s a great arcade wrestling game. But I’ve been immensely spoiled by Fire Pro Wrestling for years, so it’s hard for me to go back, lol.

[@BlockABoots]

Odd that the Sharp system didnt get a port seeings as it shares the similar chipset as the arcade

[@RetroCore]

That is odd. You'd think it would have as well seeing the FM Towns got one.

[@MrNightshade2010]

i skipped this back in the day because the reviews said it wasn't a real wrestling game,,, it was just final fight in a ring did sega even have an official multitap device?

[@RetroCore]

It's better that the WWF games in my opinion. The. MEGA Drive had an official multitap released or at least here in Japan they did. I'm guessing they also released it in the West.

[@NoSpamForYou]

Yes, I have an official Genesis multi-tap. But the Genesis SNSM port is 2 player only

[@lordkaicer]

If I remember this game also had a second version with Duo in the name and didn't have the single match option.

[@RetroCore]

There are a few sequels but none ever got a home port sadly.

[@DJZeeJay]

The SNES port was top notch, even if there were some cuts made here and there.

[@SameNameDifferentGame]

Love this game, but continue to be disappointed Capcom never ported Muscle Bomber Duo or Ring of Destruction to any home consoles.

[@terrythe2dmaniac71]

Amazing video for an equally amazing game, I always looked at the magazine photage and thought the FM towns version to be the ultimate version of this game for the home market kind of like the way the Sharp x68000 had all the arcade like ports in the early 90s, even with emulation as my collection lacks this expensive computer I thought it was cool, thanks for the great info as usual you rock 👍💕💕

[@RetroCore]

It's a real shame about the FM Towns version. That should have been the ultimate port.

[@Tempora158]

@@RetroCore Aren't we overestimating FM Towns' ability to move a lot of large sprites around? The 3DO is newer hardware and even it couldn't do SSF2T with arcade quality sprites without reducing the background animations.

[@CriminalCrimson]

Oh god, casuality i heard this week the FM Towns soundtrack and is very good! I liked it a lot. So, this one is an special game of my childhood. Even 1 months since ive heard this game has a FM Towns port lol. Super Famicom has the best port!

[@UserSeven]

I remember reading back in the day about Gunlock being Guile brother. I’m really surprised capcom hasn’t put Muscle Bomber and it’s sequels in any of there classic collections yet.

[@RetroCore]

Yeah, it is an odd one. They should do that since none of the following games ever got a home port.

[@angelriverasantana7755]

This game is good, but I'm more attached to the sequel because it sticks closer to a traditional fighting game with the elements of wrestling being intact (Like grapples, high impact finishers and Irish whips) And also, what ARE some of the few wrestling games that you like? Mine are the Fire Pro Wrestling games, the N64 AKI developed wrestling games, WWF SmackDown, New Japan Pro Wrestling: Toukon Retsuden 3 and Slam Masters 2, Toukon Club and Tecmo World Wrestling are honorable mentions, but they're too hard And hey, haven't you noticed that the console releases have the Tetsuo Hara artwork for the intro and character select screen? Looks better than the arcade and FM Towns artwork

[@ExtremeWreck]

Hulk Hogan would play this game to death!!! It looks too good to not be played like nothing, & it shows here with its true awesomeness of its type!!!

[@reignick1133]

Hulk Hogan? The character on the title screen Ortega (who only appears in game in the sequel) is based upon the Person who Hulk stole his gimmick from: Superstar Billy Graham

[@ExtremeWreck]

@@reignick1133 Now that's cool! Too bad he didn't appear in it :(. Probably licensing issues.

[@reignick1133]

@@ExtremeWreck He does appear in the sequel and is quite a good character in such.

[@ExtremeWreck]

@@reignick1133 Wow! They did get the license in the sequel!!! THANK GOD

[@Fortuna1]

Interesting, the "genesis" version not was included in japan, only has european and american release The snes version was my favorite game

[@RetroCore]

The Mega Drive wasn't a big seller in Japan unlike the Saturn was. I guess that's why it didn't see a release over here.

[@afropowa1598]

If you own the FM Town, will you please do a whole episode on it? I really enjoy your "Vol:19 - Sega Dreamcast," thanks!

[@RetroCore]

I do own a FM Towns II. The next Retro Core system focused episode will be the Master System but after that i will cover the FM Towns.

[@zeromusura3497]

Muscle Bomber rocks, capcom golden ace years!

[@enigma776]

What do you use to emulate the FM Towns?

[@RetroCore]

I used a real FM Towns II machine for this footage. There is an emulator out there but I can't remember the name. I'm sure a Google search will bring it up though.

[@Mr.madmight266]

I do like how they included Haggar in this game but that's not the reason i wanted to play it. the real reason was that i played an Open BOR made Final Fight fan game that had Astro/Scorpion as a playable character, and i liked him so much that i wanted to check out the game he originally appeared in. I also think that the SNES version defines a Capcom game with those SFX that sound just like the ones on Super Street Fighter 2 for the SNES and the instruments that makes me remember Megaman X3, i think it's pretty good.

[@RetroCore]

I was never a fan of Capcom's SNES sound engine. To me it was always too tinny with a lot of reverb.

[@Mr.madmight266]

@@RetroCore Yeah i know but to me it sounds ok enough.

[@gabrielloko30000]

4vs play on the SNES....Is fucking perfect!!! I tried with my friends and was so awsome!

[@AllieRX]

Sad that this wasn't included in the Capcom Belt Action Collection/Beat 'Em Up Bundle.

[@DanielAyy]

The games included there are beat em ups while this is closer to a fighting game.

[@UserSeven]

At least we got 2 games I’ve been waiting to play for a long time Armoured Warriors and Battle Ciircuit. I wish they included Red Earth and Cyberbots.

[@RetroCore]

I agree. The Capcom Beat'em up collection is poor. They could have added many other cool games to it.

[@SidOfBee]

SNES Port wins hands down. Also, never mind no 4 player in the Genesis/MD version... There's also no referee!

[@orderofmagnitude-TPATP]

Shame the sequals went more like street fighter series with left and right only....as opposed to the 2.5d style.

[@phantomgamer4463]

The sequel is complety opposite of Street Fighter

[@Seth-nt9bf]

FM Towns of all versions the worst?! THAT is a lazy port! Seriously.

[@RetroCore]

I agree. The FM Towns port should have been Arcade perfect but sadly is not.

[@GeovaneSanciniSR]

the home ports were the thing, especially, because until then, wrestling games in console were a shit load of fuck (with few exceptions)

[@hoofstermon2982]

Needs zangief

[@lamiatorchani7648]

More accurately the game runs on CP System Dash

[@bhirawamaylana466]

I see now, so this is the game based on where Haggar wrestling King at Street Fighter x Tekken trailer, man I miss Street Fighter x Tekken it's good game even though have many flaw and I still hoping Capcom and Namco will make sequel.

[@RetroCore]

I'm not sure. I've never seen Street Fighter VS Tekken. I didnd even know it was a thing. Man, I'm so out of touch.

[@bhirawamaylana466]

@@RetroCore then please watch this 7 year old trailer kzbin.info/www/bejne/nZndc4Ska7Z8bNU the ring used in that video look similar with this game ring, they even use Haggar briefly at video right after he defeat by king with German suplex at Wrestling match.

[@RetroCore]

Do it does. Thanks for the link.

[@phantomgamer4463]

The CWA stage appears on SFV story mode the its been mention tgat biff and gunloc will make appearance for the next season story.

[@pablodaniel-retrogamer716]

Super famicom

[@captaincommando2602]

Super Famicom port wins.