The Most Poorly Designed Fighting Game Of All Time

Shaquille O'Neal has a really weird fighting game.
Shaq Fu is a 2D fighting game published by Electronic Arts featuring the player as Shaquille O'Neal who fights his way through combatants in another dimension to save a young boy named Nezu.
This is the story of the worst fighting game ever made.
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#fightinggames

[@Minebot45]

What really gets me is how Shaq was apparently a huge fan of fighting games and was thrilled to get his own. I'm sure he's just as upset as everyone else that this game sucks as much as it does, although likely not to the extent of wanting every copy destroyed.

[@keemo5820]

Yeah wanting to destroy every copy is WILD

[@jayripp84]

His shoes sucked to

[@deuceydeuce22]

Naw I liked it music was unique too

[@ManinTidyWhities]

Street Fighter 6 introduces character creation. Now we can all be Shaq, and he is clearly made for that game's setting

[@DanielRitchie-qo4mv]

Exactly. I think that would have been a better move. Going to the creators of Street Fighter, and seeing about them making a Shaq character for the games. He would fit that world well and would be fun to see.

[@crash7800]

I worked at EA in Redwood City around 2012. There was an office where the Shaq Fu art was very prominently featured. Asking around, I found out it belonged to someone who worked on it and was still at EA. He did not entertain any irony or memeing about it. He was proud of it and did not appreciate any BS about it. Good for him.

[@armorbearer9702]

Has anyone tried to mod Shaq-Fu? I am surprised some dedicated fan has not tried to rebalance the game.

[@angelriverasantana7755]

I've seen miracles with Sailor Moon S, Super S and Clay Fighter Tournament Edition, so I feel that it'd make sense to do that

[@crewgunnight8987]

Cause they are living in Uranus😂😂

[@xanderac]

At least the mugen version of Shaq will always be amazing

[@Boobusmcscoobus]

Man the day I get strike/throw mixed by Shaquille O’Neil is the day i give up

[@jonaspledge]

No one will ever destroy my copy of ShaqFu!

[@KuzuTomoki]

If there were ever a game to mod, this would be the game. Release the Shaq-fu balance patch!

[@DiaSynapsid]

Fix the blocking issues. Fix the buffering. And then we will get the neutral based fighting game with Shaq that was meant to be.

[@MtnSmithy]

For what it's worth, playing Shaq Fu with friends makes for a pretty entertaining time.

[@csolisr]

Imagine somebody taking the time to rebalance the game and releasing a tournament edition ROM hack

[@Chiisaru]

Someone should invite Shaq to a real good fighting game. The guy seems like a great dude to end up with his videogame legacy as only bad games.

[@Yutappy99]

What are you talking about? Shaq fu sounds like the greatest thing ever! Now I need to find myself a copy and play it!

[@coleycole5344]

Shaq-fu was awesome back in the day. These people are looking way too deep and analyzing too much. It was even on Nintendo GameBoy.

[@alexishosie100]

Love the Battleblock Theater music you guys used as light background noise

[@gabvillagepanda]

If I had a nickel for every time Shaq was at the center of a bad video game, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.

[@thadex454]

What a weird game

[@alt0248]

Aw yeahhhh, my favorite fighting game to bring along to the locals

[@BBHood217]

Shaq Fu's gameplay may be bad, but at least the game wasn't super offensive like the later beat-em-up.

[@PandaVsGames]

I never knew the backstory for the shaq fu games, now im informed! great vid

[@IgorNV]

Ahahaha love that AVGN clip hahaha that's where I first found out about this game

[@hyperssr]

3:03 TOKYO MIRAGE SESSIONS SHARP FE SPOTTED LETSGOOO BEST AKSHON VIDEO OF ALL TIME

[@opo3628]

I got this game as a birthday present. I was secretly disappointed, but I still played it. And I have to admit -- while it certainly wasn't my favorite game ever, I ended up not hating it, either.

[@Silanda]

I think there were a lot of developers back in the '80s and '90s that would try to create games in genres that they didn't really understand, but were caught out by how good games in those genres had deep mechanics despite seeming deceptively simple. If you think about it, in '94, not many people outside of top competitive players really understood the intricacies of games like Street Fighter 2. Outside of Japanese guide books there weren't really a lot of good resources on the topic available either Shaq Fu was probably a case where this happened. Delphine deliberately chose to go with small sprites so they could use the rotoscoped animation techniques that they'd developed for Flashback, but they didn't seem to appreciate how having lots of animation frames could impact gameplay and would need some kind of mitigation. At the time they said that MK and SF2 had unnecessarily big sprites too, which again suggests that weren't thinking about it in terms of things like hit boxes, hurt boxes, etc, just that smoother animation = better. I can't forgive them for the jumping though. If they'd fixed that, the game would probably have felt a lot better. They must have noticed how bad it was.

[@Addictedtocollecting01]

This is the most complete history of Shaq Fu..

[@Dillarune]

shaq deserves better, we need 1 more shaq fu game thats actually good

[@isaacn4487]

great topic idea, and amazing editing too. v good job guys :)

[@ODDiSEE_]

I almost want to learn how to program fighting games just to try and fix shaq fu.

[@TheOmegaRiddler]

I remember hearing about Shaq Fu being so bad from ScrewAttack, that they got their hands on enough copies to put one in each urinal at a ScrewAttack Gaming Convention.

[@-goodwin]

Shaq know his stuff 🔥

[@iAmCyberwaste]

Shaqtin' a Fool, in video game form.

[@murrfeeling]

I recall Shaq fu being pretty mid-tier for its day. Just one of a flock of cash-grabby tournament fighters which clogged the shelf of your local rental shop next to Power Instinct and Ultraman: Toward the Future. I'd rank it higher than Street Fighter... one. (The first Street Fighter from 1987 was not that good, more of a proof of concept.) Now Rise of the Robots, despite having a more conventional sci-fi setting, played like trash, ran like trash and, depending on which port you had, looked and sounded like trash. There's probably a handful of scam games on Steam that are worse, but I cannot overstate how little Rise of the Robots had going for it. Ports of Pit Fighter also ran like a cancerous lung, though the arcade version might have been ok.

[@tjiani111]

Battleblock theater OST just hits!

[@joeabernathy5402]

"Of all time"... really? Criticom, Ballz, Rise of the Robots, Iron and Blood, and Pit Fighter would all like a word. That's just off the top of my head. Hell, Id even argue the original Mortal Kombat is mechanically worse than Shaq Fu.

[@stevencisneros9306]

If Shaq-Fu was made into a 3D fighter, it would be amazing tbh

[@tiagoh.4120]

As a kid i had a blast playing this game with my brother and my cousin. Maybe it was because i was just a kid but it was actually fun and i liked the characters and simple mechanics of the game.

[@SeleniumOfficial]

I’m impressed you knew Shaq’s DJ name

[@IkeOkerekeNews]

Most "bad" games are not as bad as people say.

[@coleycole5344]

Right. I distinctly remember everybody loving Shaq Fu back in the 90's.

[@IkeOkerekeNews]

​@@coleycole5344 Yep! People certainly loved the game!

[@metayoshi1712]

What I don't get is that even if you do crazy stuns in the game, it fires off as no damage at times. 🧐 (SNES version) Either way.. the cat girl is probably one of my favorites to play as.

[@comwolf2146]

Was that the frieren battle music around 10:20 or am I going insane?

[@Jekyll_Jackal]

Was that before or after Shaq was rapping with Michael Jackson?

[@coleycole5344]

Before

[@willzimmerman3299]

It was bad, but I still played it a bunch when I was a kid...and I still listen to the soundtrack every now and then

[@rmdashrfv]

Um. I loved that fucking game so ...

[@keemo5820]

let ArcSys remaster ShaqFu imo, it looks so nice and smooth

[@LafanSaberX]

NGL I use to do air combos in this game , I was nice son

[@sheldoncooper8199]

No its NOT Rise of the Robots, Brütal Paws of Fury and Clayfighter 63 1/3 are All worse.

[@ishitmypantsinacarwheniwas7]

wait is there a soundtrack for this video?

[@anotherhumanbeing3300]

How has nobody told me Michael Jordan is in a Metroidvania

[@lordbobby198]

4:11 the dedication tho

[@otisboyd-wl3do]

6:36 SARA ANDJACKYBRYANT VIRTUA FIGHTER NOT TEKKEN

[@odracircomix7359]

IT REALLY ISN'T AND MATT MC MUSCLES PROVED IT WITH HIS SERIES THE WORST FIGHTING GAME.

[@SerbianSpark19]

We need shaq fu 3 and it needs to be goon on level of mvc3 and guilty gear strive imagine tag team fighter with shaq

[@Ramsey276one]

1:35 okay Thanks for that XD

[@TradingFeline]

Battle Block Theater background music I hear

[@666slateran666]

And dj diesel is his greatest accomplishment

[@TrillArtTV]

Man I use to play the hell out of that game 😂

[@Gentledegenerate]

This game isn’t bad and I’m standing on it 😭

[@GregHuffman1987]

less shaq more fu

[@fhjunior6183]

Thanks for the vid

[@MegaMrJIN]

This is NEVER the worst game ever. I've seen games waaaaaaaaaaay worse than THIS. Y'all need to shut up.

[@GreatSighForward]

I actually played this game and actually liked it but I was a very easy to please little kid at the time

[@spycookie6174]

Hear me out... Shaq Fu 3

[@Game_Hero]

Some people only live to watch the world burn

[@darkkothor]

What is the music in the end ?

[@amia7z]

glorious king shaq fu

[@Ramsey276one]

2:32 the one I didn't play... Q_Q

[@firstnamelastname3414]

Cover the finals

[@faisfaizal5194]

Really pondering to that chinese audience huh

[@codegee]

Ooo this game.

[@Killergamer-oz4sw]

Has ares vr come out yet orrr

[@NotJollibee]

does this include the reboot beat em up?

[@otisboyd-wl3do]

Big black shaq

[@shinister9720]

Obamna

[@dylan4413]

Soda

[@otaking3582]

Shaq Fu >>> NBA2K

[@JonCom3dy]

This game sucks. But this game is awesome.

[@dylan4413]

Yap yap yap

[@arc-sd8sk]

3rd

[@jneumann341]

You don't need to condemn Chris brown jokes. Most people aren't that sensitive.