DF Retro: Final Fight - The Definitive Retrospective - Every Version Ever Made Tested!

[@silkweedX]

That intro is the reason the internet was created. Great job!

[@horus1981]

This was absolutely splendid to watch. Final Fight is one of my all time favourite games. I wish Capcom one day would make a new Final Fight game even if it means getting the guys who worked on Streets of Rage 4, this would be an incredible marriage.

[@Nirbion]

I only watched the intro and my god, this is genius. This is gonna be a TREAT

[@riaz8783]

Wait till you see the outro...

[@ClellBiggs]

Macho Man Rick Rude? lol, I watched too much wrestling when I was growing up. It's Macho Man Randy Savage and Ravishing Rick Rude btw.

[@kylemaguire3268]

Yeah, I caught that too.

[@lewwylately7467]

DF obviously aren't dirty marks like us lot 😂

[@DenkyManner]

I assume he meant Macho Man and Rick Rude but didn't say it clearly enough.

[@dark1x]

Audi meant Macho Man, Rick Rude (that's in the script) but just didn't quite vocalize it clearly (English is his second language anyways)

[@DjFlextacy]

Two of my fave wrestlers along with Mr Perfect & The Honky Tonk Man

[@balaam_7087]

I wish you guys would do a DF retro on Earthworm Jim games. There’s some distinct differences between various versions, and most push some cool techniques for the time. Here’s hoping for a future episode 🤞

[@luciousthomas6141]

I remember playing Final Fight in the arcade late 89 and was absolutely blown away by it and the first Turtles arcade game. Final Fight with the huge sprites and beautiful graphics changed video games forever and holds a special place in my heart even over Streets of Rage. I saw and played Final Fight for a few years even before Streets of Rage was even born! Hell the 7-11 down the street from my house had a little back space area where they housed a few arcade cabinets. Nowadays they just do lottery stuff back there, but back then they had a Final Fight arcade back there for awhile, the first Turtles arcade game for awhile, POW and many others! Final Fight was literally a game that I could walk in there and play almost every day! In fall 91 as young man in middle school a friend brought a Nintendo Power to school advertising the SNES and flipping through the pages and looking at the pictures I stumbled upon pictures of the SNES version of Final Fight and boy was I impressed! I found out it would only be 1 player and no Guy but I knew I had to have this game. So XMas 91 when I got my SNES that came with Super Mario World I received Final Fight as my first game bought separately for the system. And what a Xmas it was!

[@Deathtank75]

did you buy FF guy too?

[@luciousthomas6141]

@@Deathtank75 No I didn't. I didn't even know that game existed until years later.

[@h.m.5724]

I bet a million dollars you are lying for saying you played FF1 in 1989, if you said 1990 I would have believed you but '89 come on

[@luciousthomas6141]

@@h.m.5724 I'm actually glad you said that. It lets me know that my life was real good. See when I say things like I played Final Fight in 89 it means nothing to me because I was there. It just lets me know that I shouldn't take for granted the things I saw because others weren't as privileged. Coliseum Mall Hampton, VA, the arcade was called Sega's Timeout! Wish you were there young man!

[@ModernVintageGamer]

the best part of this video was 0:00 - 1:08:37

[@ZinhoMegaman]

And it's good to see you here MVG! Maybe one day we will see you here too, It would be the reunion of the legends of retro gaming, MLiG, DF, Game Sack, MVG and Retro RGB, one can just dream!

[@StylesThomas]

Right!?! Is this not the ultimate collab for a gaming-related KZbin video !?! Just have to get you and spawn wave in there for a section about emulation and sales 😊

[@stopthetories]

These are turning into full blown documentaries and I love it.

[@J.A.Z-TheMortal]

DF Retro of Final Fight? This is like Christmas in July!

[@duckhive]

You guys are the GREATEST!! Thank you. I was at the arcades in California when Final Fight broke out in 89. It was a great time to be a kid.

[@h.m.5724]

1990 not 89

[@davideselvi3906]

@@h.m.5724 it came out in '89

[@h.m.5724]

@@davideselvi3906 only the Japanese version came out in '89, infact at the end of the year. So the probability of you playing it that year is close to none

[@MarceloTezza]

John is learning! Look at how much more he is moving his head and hands! Man i cant wait for especial DF episode about witchard hand gestures mastering.

[@dark1x]

Slowly but surely, learning from the master.

[@MarceloTezza]

@@dark1x High hopes of hilarious episode of this!

[@mattdhargett]

Still no time stamps on the video, or links to Wikipedia pages and supporting documentation, despite it being the longest one yet. Where’s the learning?

[@GameslordXY]

@@dark1x The Grandmaster

[@dssembler7922]

Is that the guy with a toddlers face ?

[@ClockedIt]

Man, what a crazy quality episode! I'm glad you mentioned the Capcom Beat em Up bundle eventually at the end as I think it's a great conversation and certainly the best and easy version to get hold of right now. Loved the intro and the quality of this video was top notch. Great work all.

[@DonPedores]

That intro! Epic! And thanks for deep diving into one of the beloved series! Great episode as always!

[@ZinhoMegaman]

I was waiting to see if they would mention Pyron's color hack for Final Fight CD. He is my friend since 1994 when we got to be in the same class on school. And now seeing his name be mentioned by John himself is fucking awesome!

[@Syklonus]

The colour hack is an improvement, but it's doesn't make the graphics good. They're still pretty rough looking.

[@bishopwalton3122]

No mention of the aracde perfect 2 co-op sharp X68000 version

[@BluesElwoo2]

I had Final Fight CD back in the day. While I never thought it made it a better game than Streets of Rage 2 or 3, It was an awesome version of the game, and for the time, It felt like the best arcade port you could possibly get! Final Fight CD was really cool.

[@EposVox]

Amazing work

[@natejennings5884]

Sega Genesis = Streets of Rage 2 SNES = Final Fight 3

[@jimmykewley8386]

I fell in love with the original arcade release of this game aged 6 and still love it 30 years later. I guess Guy Cody and Haggar were my childhood sweethearts....

[@PixelShade]

These collab DF Retro just gets better and better! That intro and outro and everything inbetween ! You guys are the best!

[@viniciusrampazzo3606]

Possibly the greatest ever episode from the great DF Retro series! Would love to see you tackle the Tomb Raider series next (and don't skip on the N-Gage).

[@ryzmaker11]

A most excellent retrospective 👍 An interesting parallel can be made between Golden Axe on Mega Drive and Final Fight on SNES. Both are early titles on those systems but while Final Fight was severely lacking (only 2 selectable characters, no co-op, 1 stage was removed...) Golden Axe on the other hand features 2 player co-op, every stages and even adds some extras! Sure Final Fight is a more memory-consuming game (bigger sprites, more stages...) but it relied on a 8 meg cart whereas Golden Axe was released 1 year before and only relied on a 4 meg cart. It's rather crazy. Also 17:27 internal sound hardware FTW! Those Yamaha FM chips are so rad whereas MIDI modules tend to produce hit-or-miss results. And here are a few suggestions that could be interesting for future DF Retro episodes: - Shinobi - Puyo Puyo - Road Rash - Earthworm Jim Keep up the good work guys.

[@Dxtuned]

"Oh! My childhood..." - bless you guys at DF for bringing me back down memory lane in glorious technical detail

[@HorseheadNebula85]

Great work, John and team! You guys are my favorite channel on KZbin and I love seeing you guys evolve your production values over time. Keep it up!

[@gabrielgoldsztajn3265]

Wonderful. Absolutely brilliant. The intro and outros were hilarious, and one can clearly see you were having fun doing them. As for the retrospective itself, it was as entertaining and full-featured as all you guys have led us to expect. This is definitely within Top-5 DF Retro territory. Maybe even Top-3. Thank you all so much for making this episode. 👏🏻👏🏻💪🏻💪🏻

[@dnakatomiuk]

Final Fight, Streets of Rage, Double Dragon, Turtles back in time god I loved those games I loved the 80s 90s era of ganing

[@RobotPlaysGames]

This is next level, guys. Y'all just keep getting better and better! I'm still holding out hope for a graphics technology explainer series, though.

[@WrightOffsGaming]

Many thanks for this amazing vid, this is some of the best content I've seen on KZbin for ages. Richard leadbetter's cameo at the end is just fantastic.

[@riverutz]

I remember i was so good at this game I needed 1 coin to beat it. I was playing with Cody. With Cody u could press punch and then move the stick left and right. Basically the enemy gets stuck in your punches. This move worked on all enemies and bosses as well.

[@dreamcastfan]

I do that too! It works with Guy as well. These days I’m lazy though and use an auto-fire board with my JAMMA cab so I don’t have to hammer the punch button.

[@PadPoet]

Works with all characters but it's better to do it with either Cody or Guy. Haggar only has 3 hit in his combo. You basically start punching them and before the last hit that sends them bouncing back you hit punch in the opposite direction and the combo resets and starts again. This trick is used in many TAS runs to drain bosses life in an instant.

[@ajsingh4545]

Yeah that is tough to believe. The arcade game was super cheap with too many enemies to crowd you. Sega CD with the color correction patch is the most balanced and the best version for me.

[@riverutz]

I'm no bullshitter man! Believe me. Pretty sure the game was on hard since countless of enemies where present in some scenes attacking you from all directions. U have no idea how many ppl were spending coins on that game. There was even a line at that arcade. When someone was playing Final Fight people gather around it :D. I wasn't good at Final Fight from the start. I spent a lot of time and money trying to learn every move from the enemy and bosses, how many are going to appear in a particular scene and when to use my melee weapons and stuff. After that I became good. But mostly I beat the game using the punching strategy. Actually only 4 or 5 ppl from my arcade managed to beat the game. Me and 2 others could beat the game with 1 coin.

[@dazrael5658]

Autofire is a legit way to play it, the game centers in Japan have cabs with autofire circuits. I used autofire with Guy for the infinite punch.

[@E_Sunbro]

That intro was sick. I love that this series continues to up the production values. Also, that was Macho Man Randy Savage. YEEEUUUHHHHH! Rick Rude was somebody else.

[@aggroordievideos]

There is a lot of content like this on KZbin. But digital foundry just has something special. Please more stuff like this. Very well done! Not that I don’t like the other stuff the channel is known for, I love that too. This look back in video game history is just as important though as theses games are the foundation for where video games are going. This is what a game design doc is all about! Great job.

[@sadstormtrooper]

Listen to reason, man. Shows a pic of Bubsy. LMAO!😂

[@kilik1979]

Another fabulous video, Mr. Linneman. Thank you, so much, for all the time and effort you put in these videos. They are, for me, often the highlight of my week.

[@davidconnorsands]

These "retro" spectives are the beeessssssttt! Thanks so much as always. Keep up the great work, everyone! Love the collaborations and voice acting too!! Hilarious!

[@retractingblinds]

Really good video John, love it when you look at titles like this. Everyone had something great to contribute too, a rarity for big collab episodes! Your best work yet.

[@pyxelpub8251]

FINALLY! I've been waiting for another classical DF Retro vid. Please priorities these over the rest of the retro vids, John, these are why many of us watch the channel. Keep up the great work!

[@retrosoul8770]

Wow you outdid on this one John, and bringing in MLIG and other guests, a true collab. Outstanding work and effort, this is why you're one of my most favorite tubers. I have this on PS2s Capcom classics collection vol 1, I've only beaten it once and I've been telling myself that I need to play it a bunch more since.

[@BenzaieLive2]

Missing the Tom Of Finland ref for Haggar hurt my feeling :(

[@speedy8893]

Amazing work John and Audi!!! Thanks to everyone else who contributed as well. One of the best DF Retro episodes yet.

[@IkariMetalSlugger]

The definitive version is the Sega CD version purely because of that soundtrack.

[@shootermcgavin1208]

The Arcade version is the definitive version. The remixed tracks ARE good but the attack speeds are slower and the picture is kinda grainy looking due to the S-CD palette limitations and there are still less enemies on screen than the arcade.

[@IkariMetalSlugger]

@@shootermcgavin1208 I'm very much aware of the difference in attack speeds, the less enemies on screen, some censorship still remaining, etc. But a good soundtrack is crucial to a good beat em up game and the OST in the Sega CD version just adds so much more to the experience. It's still a very good version all things considered. The things you mention aren't really things I feel have a big negative impact on the game and are pretty minor. It's still very playable and enjoyable.

[@shootermcgavin1208]

Ikari Metal Slugger Definitely! It’s the best home version out there. I actually play the SNES version with the S-CD soundtrack via the MCU1 chip.

[@pilouuuu]

They should remake the arcade version with the Sega CD soundtrack.

[@ajsingh4545]

Sega CD is also definitive for me because it's m9re balanced and fair. The arcade game is a coin muncher first and foremost . it floods the screen with way too many enemies for a single player to the point it becomes cheap. Also Sega CD has extra mode and voiced intro and ending. With the color correction hack, it's the definitive version no doubt.

[@magburner]

6:39 Come on, that slip is almost unforgivable, it is the Macho Man Randy Savage... OOOO YEAH!!! RIP

[@arcverson4963]

This is my second favorite video in this channel beaten only by the the Final Fantasy 7 one. John never fail to deliver, good job yet again.

[@xcidgafhamas]

They just opened an arcade here in Amsterdam and Final Fight is really popular with children.

[@ureeb5829]

I've always been major fan of the series since day one. I haven't even started watching this one yet and I'm already excited for the amazing retrospectives you do. These videos take me back to those times. Thank you and keep on staying retro.

[@25hztolife86]

Seen it done by other KZbinrs but you do it the best. Your inclusion of FF2 and FF3 was magnificent.

[@rob_i208]

14:50 Probably an oversight for the console, but I imagine arcade operators requested the highest difficulty being the default so they didn't have to remember to keep setting the machine to max difficulty. I don't think it was ever a big secret that arcades, especially when first released, were set to max difficulty to take your quarters. Only the old cabinets in the back, which perhaps the operators liked to play themselves, would be set to a reasonable difficulty.

[@joystick8384]

Just wanted to say outstanding work as ever, DF Retro. You guys are the high watermark of retrospectives!

[@Zinfidel1]

Stayed up late the other night playing Final Fight: Double Impact via PS Now. It includes Magic Sword, a game no one ever talks about but is a blast! Seriously! I've had Double Impact downloaded on PS3 for several years but never really played it. Grab a mug of ale, play Magic Sword.

[@segat-800]

Man you really went beyond the call of duty for this episode. It was fantastic and the little skits were the icing on the cake.

[@Lewdology]

President Leadbetter at the end sealed it. Beautiful work everyone.

[@ZpinalX]

DF Retro deserves it's own channel.

[@montygill2835]

Final fight, Double dragon, Shadow warriors, arcade games were brilliant

[@bonjovi7399]

Then 3D games and the advances game storage with CD-ROMs came along and destroyed them. Everybody wanted to play the new 3D games and you could get them in the home now. We realize now that early 3D games were are barely playable while a good sprite base game is infinitely more playable. Id rather play Space Invaders, Pac-Man or Donkey Kong than any early 3D game.

[@emuboy85]

It's been a gloomy day in London and I have been trying to get out of a bad mood all day but the intro made me smile, thank you! now back to the video :D

[@TilSkywalker]

Here I am, watching a 1h video about a game I didn't even know before, that's only something that John and his gang can achieve! It is so amazing to get a look at the past of gaming that I missed due to not being around yet/ too youngf, in such wellcrafted, lengthy videos!

[@SamPendleton]

Streets of Rage is a better series by far, but the original Final Fight (arcade) is the GOAT classic beat-'em'up game.

[@WickedRibbon]

Stunning work!

[@Reggiamoto]

It's impressive how you manage to fascinate me for a series of a genre I usually don't care about. Just watching this almost makes me want to gives Final Fight a try.

[@canaldomacedo]

Dude, 1h+ of pure gold. thank you very much.

[@EddiXP]

Great video as always John. You've inspired me so much !

[@swooperd]

Simply incredible stuff. The Mega CD port is my personal favourite, so glad it got well honoured here.

[@filmotecaonline3977]

I had this music in my head since last month, and could not figure where I heard it. Now I see this video, it's the music for the first level in Final Fight... Last time I played this game was around 1999.

[@WeatherMan4Ever]

Very good presentation of every port of Final Fight! Well done!

[@lucasl3657]

Fantastic work, John. A beloved series worthy of such a great video.

[@pobbityboppity1110]

I'm five minutes in, and goddamn, John and his team need to be commended for making such a polished, watchable video. John has really come a long way since he made his first DF videos. Great work everyone!

[@rodrigokloss2621]

Appreciate to hear a westerner say Japanese names almost exactly like it should be pronounced

[@_kikaso]

Such a great film. Between this and Analog Frontiers 2 from MLiG, this weekend is all about retro documentaries. Thanks for this fantastic work!

[@xxFORDIExx]

Awesome video. Discovered John through the almighty Cane And Rinse Video Game Podcast. This is a sure fire channel added to my favourites. Classic Brawler broken down superbly by John. Top Quality.

[@iPlaySEGA]

Nice Retrospective as usual! Oh and i liked FF Revenge! XD

[@benvanasdale6273]

I love this channel so much. John, you and the rest of the DF crew have become some of my favorite creators over the years. That intro was legendary lol

[@ozaryana]

The amount of work & editing hours that was put into the making of this video is amazing. The sound the (arcade)game makes when insert coin is very satisfying haha.. damn I miss my childhood.

[@lazerpipe]

Awesome video! Thanks for all the hard work everyone put in to make it happen :) I love video game history!

[@SameNameDifferentGame]

No surprise here, but great work as always, John (and everyone else). Fantastic.

[@morganmcgill3169]

One of the best DFretro episode. Thanks guys.

[@RazorEdgeBullie]

That opening was some next gen awesomeness! Holy fuck, boys!

[@ChaosAngelZero]

Oh, it's that one game from Hi Score Girl. Cool. 🤣 Seriously though, Double Dragon Neon and God Hand music plus good old Matt? Amazing video! 👍

[@darcrequiem]

I'm 45 seconds in and I've already clicked thumbs up do to this top tier intro. Good work guys. I love DF Retro.

[@GeminiJay654]

What a thorough examination of the series as a whole. I'm FLOORED! Such humor too. The best DF episode yet!

[@DraganBlom]

To take away a little of John's Monday blues, great video guys, it's a work of art which I enjoyed every minute of. More is the only way to go from here on 🙂

[@GameplayandTalk]

You guys really outdid yourselves on this one!

[@psygnozis]

*Cadillacs and Dinosaurs* is the best beat 'beat em up' game from *CAPCOM* and the soundtrack is cool.

[@MarceloTezza]

True! And Blanka is in the game!

[@johnnyfoxx9379]

It's my favourite beatem up of all time!

[@ajsingh4545]

It just plays like final fight, dead ass

[@NYCJoeBlack]

Those games and I believe a lot of KONAMI arcade games such as Crime Fighters and Crime Fighters II have never been released to a home or handheld system one physical media and that is disappointing!

[@bromthyrant3391]

But after Alien vs Predator

[@awesomereviews1561]

I remember the first time I saw this game in the arcade. I was blown away by the graphics and the audio

[@StylesThomas]

Wow I can't believe Digital Foundry, My Life In Gaming, and Matty McMuscles collaborated on a video... These are like my three favorite KZbin channels. Great work guys I feel like this video was made for me 😂💙

[@markjames5535]

Richard's Bad Dudes inspired message at the end was a brilliant touch. World class delivery.

[@DSt3alth]

Bloody brilliant! That intro took me back to my mega-CD days lol. Brilliant episode! Best reviewers of video games bar none.

[@tcbvgames]

4:31 Huge Final Fight apologist here, thrilled to watch this video for the SECOND time... I saw Streets of Fire last year, and the anecdotal Final Fight connections are tenuous. The "urban gang kidnaps women in red dress" trope supposedly inspired Double Dragon years earlier, but the movie's characters, story, and visual language have very little to do with either game. Maybe the devs saw the film, when the games were first being designed, but Streets of Fire feels like more of a footnote in Final Fight's history, rather than a significant inspiration. (For a stronger homage to Streets of Fire, watch the concert opening to Bubblegum Crisis.)

[@Syklonus]

Streets of Fire seems like it has FAR more i common with Streets of Rage than Final Fight. The night streets with Neon just screams SoR.

[@tcbvgames]

@@Syklonus The neon urban nightscape appears in even older Walter Hill films, like The Warriors. But it's pretty conventional for the era. Even Michael Mann was doing it in films like Manhunter and Thief, which also came out in the early 1980s.

[@ThresherMaw]

I think this was the fastest I've ever liked a video. That intro was so good 😂

[@chonglee323]

How can you guys so a Final Fight video which has FFRevenge, but not a DF Retro on Virtua Fighter? Please look into the ports too! Saturn VF1, Saturn VF2, and Dreamcast VF3 are all fascinating! VF2 is the most miracle arcade port!

[@Scaflown83]

Holy shit, this is some outstanding work! Absolutely brilliant. It's a shame that few people have watched it. Damn KZbin!

[@bobsaget9182]

The real shame is that people actually think this video is good even though it didn't mention the best version of FF.

[@Dex99SS]

Dude, lol ... "Audi, CD-i enthusiast, avid klax player" ... lololol ... and that freaking ending. Man. This just make my viewing weekend for sure!

[@Bemijaminji]

Great video! The only thing missing would be a mention of the great MiSTer core of Final Fight and other CPS1 games.

[@Victor-cf9fx]

This was the best DF Retro so far. It's amazing how the quality constantly and consistently goes up. Congratulations to all involved, it was spectacular.

[@SefJam]

This is awesome the ultimate team up of great video game content creators on KZbin discussing one of the most beloved beat em ups of all time.

[@METR0lD]

This episode was epic. DF Retro is seriously some of the best content on KZbin.

[@wendellsilva682]

Final Fight was my favourite arcade brawler. I spent a fortune on quarters playing this. Thanks for this video!

[@CyberKiller]

The most entertaining DF Retro episode so far! Awesome work!

[@adriianeut]

lmao John at the end. I loved the whole video. you all explained it very well. I loved the inclusion of 'Glad I am' as well. dat OST hits the spot!

[@SlyBeast]

You really outdid yourself on the intro, John!

[@TheGrimmy11]

I was pleasantly enjoying this until "Macho Man Rick Rude" where I froze and the Ironside siren from Kill Bill played in my head.

[@atolm1]

OMG so excited to watch this, but what would make it better would be Linneman in suspenders :p

[@anonymoose15]

27:00 recommendation for best version of Final Fight 1 (for arcade perfect, it's Double Impact) 37:11 Final Fight 3 (official timestamps still show it as being under Muscle Bomber)

[@danieljones4577]

never really played final fight games yet i somehow managed to watch this whole feature length episode simply because i really enjoy digital foundry's amazing work on youtube, keep up the awesome work

[@Houldey]

Fantastic video, made me pause it at one point to load up MvC3 and mash a bit with haggar lol.