Shaq-Fu

"SHAQ BRINGS HIS AWESOME SKILL AND SIZE TO A MULTI- WORLD FIGHTING GAME.
As Shaq, use your lightning-fast shuriken and other martial art techniques to prevail over 11 intensely evil warriors in the enforcement of justice.. Or choose any of the 12 warriors and fight head to head. Summon Voodoo's bone shattering earthquake, rebound with Rajah's shockwave sword or lash out with Sett's terrifying mummy wrap. Scores of secret power moves to discover and master."

Shaq-Fu appears in two versions for Amiga with the A1200 AGA version being played here as well as a version for A500 class machines. The only difference seems to be a very slight cutdown in character and background colours. The WHDLoad installed version is being played here as I could not tolerate the loading time and all the disk swapping involved while trying to record the game. The Amiga game is most like the Mega-Drive game but even on the 1200, the conversion seems to have reduced and/or different colours used.

The longplay is a run through story mode. You play as Shaq on a mission to rescue some punk kid nabbed by a mummified bad guy. There are not to many moves but all the basic ones are there that you would expect. There are two special moves but getting them out is seemingly random and more difficult than it should be. How hard is it supposed to be to do toward, back, toward + fire. There is a two button mode, but it is just easier to stick to one as that's how the game lists the special moves. The game will show you a special move instruction when you lose.

The game opens in an island and you get some options of where you want to to go fight. the map is split into three islands each with a set of fights. You can complete them in any order but each island needs to be complete before moving onto the next. It's worth noting that the order you play the stages has a night or day effect on how the stages are lit. The three hidden bonus stages have also been visited. Once completed I show the character bio screens and these were tricky to capture as they are kind of random and display after waiting a while at the title screen. The game does have a one player dual mode where you can choose your champion to to take on the rest of the competition without the story elements.

Shaq-Fu gets plenty of negative coverage but its far from the worst fighting game you can play and having a story mode to tie all the fights together is a good way to keep you playing, at least until you have beaten it. There just not many moves and it can seem quite unbalanced at times. There is a rage meter that fills the more damage you do and once the opponent is enraged, they will do more damage. It differs for each opponent. What makes the game stand out is how well the players are animated. Delphin has used the same rotoscope system they used for flashback to brink realistic movement to the players.

Overall, while the console games can be looked at like marmite, the Amiga version is not so great. It feels like it's running at half the frame rate and collision detection is seemingly random and often you don't need to connect. There are no animated backgrounds. As noted before, playing from floppy is intolerable and there is no music during the fights . The game is also messed up with player one and two swapped so you have to remove the mouse and put a joystick in (the whdload can fix this)

Edit: I've gone through the game again in order to show the alternate backgrounds. only Dragons pass didn't seem to have an alt. I've added this as a second video (Long Version)

00:00:00 Titles / Demo
00:02:06 Story Mode Intro
00:03:58 Yasko Mines (Diesel)
00:06:17 Lost Jungle (Voodoo)
00:08:27 Vagabond Temple (Rajah)
00:10:58 The Wasteland (Aurock)
00:13:17 Gargoyles peak (Mephis)
00:16:15 Bonus Fight 1
00:18:52 North Gate (Leotsu)
00:21:52 The Lab (Colonel)
00:24:22 Catwalk Falls (Kaori)
00:27:16 Bonus Stage
00:28:24 South Gate (Nezu)
00:30:30 Bonus Fight 2
00:33:08 Dragons Pass (Beast)
00:36:11 Tombstone Island (Sett Ra)
00:38:38 Ending / Credits
00:40:58 Character Bio's
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00:44:04 Vagabond Temple (Rajah)
00:46:00 Gargoyles peak (Mephis)
00:48:03 The Wasteland (Aurock)
00:49:56 Yasko Mines (Diesel)
00:52:30 Bonus Fight 1
00:55:27 Lost Jungle (Voodoo)
00:58:04 North Gate (Leotsu)
02:00:49 Bonus Stage
00:24:22 Catwalk Falls (Kaori)
01:05:00 The Lab (Colonel)
01:07:43 South Gate (Nezu)
01:10:23 Bonus Fight 2
01:12:44 Dragons Pass (Beast)
01:15:35 Tombstone Island (Sett Ra)
01:17:42 Ending / Credits