@@orangeslash1667 yeah, but Namco doesn't develop those games themselves, in fact they're more closely related to the Bandai side from the company. Jojo and Naruto were developed by CyberConnect2, Dragon Ball FighterZ by ArcSys and Jump Force by Spike Chunsoft
@@pablocasas5906 Think that's because Namco is very bias for Soulcalibur and Tekken. The good news is that Outfoxes may have inspired Smash bros, which explains why Nintendo has a great relationship with Namco.
The reason for The Outfoxes having its own t-shirt in TSA is that Suda 51 is just a big fan of the game. The cabinet with the game was even installed in an old Grasshopper Manufacturers office
Yeah, it definitely looks like it's right up his alley. You could've told me this was a side project he did and it would probably take me a minute before I said 'hol up'
I know about this game because when The Force Unleashed 2 multiplayer was revealed to be a Platform fighter, the game's director made a big deal about how they werent trying to be like Smash but instead like The Outfoxies
I'd totally support an indie game replicating this one instead of being another "Smash-like" that tries too hard to be competitive that actual competitive players prefers to go play Melee instead and the more casual audience would simply ignore it.
Look up a game called "the showdown effect" and cry that you won't be playing it either. Game went so hard in this trope and was a blast to play. Seriously!
I was so bummed to see this isn't on Fightcade. This is exactly the kind of game my buddies and I could play for a whole night. I'm now a member of the "Waiting for a port" gang.
A lot of the magic of the late 80s and 90s gaming scene comes from that widespread free thinking or experimental approach, that existed simply because it was the infancy of modern gaming and many franchises. Everything was free form, "in the making", without guidelines or formulas to follow (which is only the result of repetition, therefore it couldnt exist so early). So there was a large room for imagination, reimagining things, and most importantly an the own incentive for creativity. Our traditional fighting game genre itself was a kind of experimental branching out the dominant beat em up genre in the 80s. We can even notice some traces of the arcade beat em up ideas in SF1 and FF1 and a little bit in AOF1 too, an interesting display itself of the transitional mindset inside the devs' heads time. Like we can easily comprehend these things in retrospect, we already got SF2 (it's already 30+ years old), but devs in the 80s and very early 90s werent sure of where they were even heading to. And even after SF2 in 91, who says that's the ultimate recipe that has to be followed? That wasnt a clear notion. And SNK, Midway and a few other important companies didnt think that way, which luckily for us created so much true diversity in the genre. And VF and TK arent a SF clone in 3d as well. And somewhere in that history this Outfoxies game could be placed, even if it was a rough experiment that sadly didnt go further. Btw experiments are bound to be rough by their nature, and only few ones are extremely effective, like SF2. To me Outfoxies can be still called a good representative of that early 90s creative developer mindset.
yeah, people will deny it but competitive gaming has sterilized and stagnated games. Everything feels like a chore to play since they are grindy f2p mmos that you pay $60+ for
80's and 90's gaming scene was due to a vastly different reason much more free form. As most games back then were rather derivative, with some outliers. The reason is marketing, both in how receptive consumers were as well as the state of gaming journalism (and the lack of typical influencers). Gaming journalism had to fill a decently large magazine either weekly or monthly and a shitload of opinion pieces and/or gossip didn't sell magazines, so lots of weirder games got a chance as well as much smaller games. While modern journalism is hyper focused on quick clicks while access has become free. You'd feel cheated if nearly all articles where gossip, clickbait or opinion pieces if you'd pay 5 guilder/pound/dollar/etc for a magazine. But what do you care if you get a bunch of gossip, clickbait and opinion pieces if it's free to access? Second issue is influencers, games can be a success or failure based on adoption by influencers and far from every games makes a good game to make video content from and influencers have a strong bias to the familiar. So the big things for marketing your game enforces established titles or otherwise familiar games. Games have also become much more expensive to produce making companies much more risk averse. It also doesn't help that modern "genre's" are essentially restrictive design templates (with some notable exceptions) and something that goes outside those paths are, again, hard to market and modern game design focuses heavily on genres rather than general practice.
These characters look so fun and creative for its time; game too. They even seem to have stages bigger Smash stages would be until Temple AND have stage transformations too. Truly ahead of its time. Shame that it didn't become popular because from the looks of it, I think it should have and gotten a sequel. Maybe something with 4 players or more moves or items
Competitive players today: "Can't play here, the water is covering my ankles!" Developers then: "F_you, I'm gonna throw a helicopter so you fall down in the shark tank!"
I'm being dead serious when I say I would LOVE to see ANY kind of tournament for this game! Don't care if they're pros or noobs, I just want to see this game in action.
Very glad you made the Elevator Action comparison, because The Outfoxies has always struck me as the consequence of someone asking “what if Elevator Action Returns had a versus mode?”. Great video as always
Outfoxies? Absolutely yes. One of the best random MAME games I came across back in the day. So wild and out there, especially for it's time. This game exudes the same type of exuberance that the best parts of Suda 51's work and things like JoJo's Bizarre Adventure does. Over the top, violent, lightly questioning you, but always with enough of a nod to say, "This is just a game. Don't be too serious." And that soundtrack? Sign me up.
This really reminds me of games like Towerfall and Duck Game. Even though I'm almost positive they had no direct inspiration from Outfoxies, I like to think that some of the game's DNA lives on in little indie side scrolling platform shooters where you and your friends use an arsenal of goofy weapons to out play each other
I love it when games get experimental and creative with their concepts, even when sometimes they don’t fundamentally work. But still, games like these are examples of the near unlimited possibilities and inspirations that developers can possess to apply some of the most insane concepts into their own titles.
I remember seeing this on MAME, there are so many hidden treasures still to find on MAME like this, surprised it never came out on the og wii shop, as that had some obscure arcade games, it sure does look like fun.
oh my goodness! I remember this game! I was drawn to it immediately as a child. I picked John Smith, then Dweeb and then proceeded to get mauled by the CPU Amazing video!! As usual
This game sounds like so much fun; heck, the homages to 80's action flicks and the casting (heck, though I doubt twin assassins were uncommon, I kind of get reminded of Black Lagoon in a way), I'm surprised we never got this game over here. (They could even have made a licensed reskin of it for a Black Lagoon fighter even)
Gotta be one of the best names a game has ever had... Great video! I think you really captured how cool this game is. If not a smash precursor, this is definitely a precursor to stuff like duck game. And given that Hal labs first got connected with Nintendo making a Famicom port of joust, joust is extremely important for the history of smash!
There's arguably a more important link between Smash and Joust. Mario Bros(not Super) was literally just Miyamoto making his own take on Joust, and he had to create a second Mario for it. Without Joust, Mario's not a brother, or even a plumber, he's just that guy that doesn't get along with apes.
Maaaaan, this was a deep cut for me! I always remembered the gameplay, but I could never remember the name for this game. I thought I just made it all up in my head. I remember growing up in the Philippines, there was a huge tournament scene for this game(at least in my province). I was too young back then but I would watch the older kids play until late in the evening. This takes me back.
Those sprites are cash money. I can't believe I've never seen this game before. There is so much for people to learn about from old media; I am glad that there are channels like yours highlighting the various small details and forgotten virtues of these games.
I remember discovering this game back in 2021, and it really opened up my eyes. Like many, I thought Smash Bros. was the creator of the platform fighter genre, but upon seeing this, my jaw dropped. Also, it's funny that Namco made this and then went to help develop Smash for Wii U/3DS years later.
Never heard of this arcade before and...it totally blew my mind off. IMO a total hidden gem and what a genius concept, so advanced for its time. If someone told me this was an indie game for the PS4 or PS5 I would've believe it for sure. And your comparisons to other games were totally spot on.
Just...wow. For over a decade in a half, people like me always thought the Platform Fighter genre was invented by Nintendo's popular Super Smash Bros. franchise. But no. It was actually Namco that did just that long before Nintendo popularized it by having characters from their properties throw fists at each other.
Kunio was also the first to have an arena fighter too. Even up to 4 players. And it featured ring outs. It's hard to say which one is the more obvious inspiration. Kunio is a very popular series and I wouldn't be surprised if it inspired the gameplay for Smash too.
Outfoxies is truly a weird game, it truly feels like a parody of 80s action movies, and while the character illustrations have a manga style, the in-game graphics have a very western look to them. Namco made a ton of interesting games when they were direct competitors to Sega jn the arcades during the 90s. As far as being the first platform fighter, I think The Outfoxies places more emphasis on actual platforming and exploration than Smash, but I can totally imagine Sakurai playing this game, alongside The King of Fighters '95 and '96, and inspiring the creation of Smash 64
Wow, I completely forgot about this game! Played it once on an emulator at a friend's house late at night and chalked it up to a weird dream. The Smash DNA is definitely present.
Just recently went through all your videos. Great work on all of them. I really admire your dedication to properly playing and sharing these obscure games with everyone. Especially enjoyed the Buriki One and Fighting Game Magazine video. Look forward to more.
I just wanna say thank you for covering more obscure/niche or generally lesser known games. I never like it when people scoff at a game, or ignore the game just because of either lack of nostalgia or just because they don't know or for the fact it isn't popular. And this game here I will DEFINITELY be enjoying! This game looks SICK.
I feel the truest successor to The Outfoxies isn't smash, but Superfighters Deluxe that is the only game that nailed the balls to the wall outlandiness and action combat of that game
Bit of a fun fact: During when the first Namco games Xevious and Pac-Man were released for Arcade Archives the CEO of Bandai Namco actually stated that one of the games they wanted to see was The Outfoxies.
The Outfoxies! I used to work at an arcade when I was younger, and I recall that this was either on a Neo Geo cartridge or "multicade" machine that sat right next to N.A.R.C. It had such a unique look, and I really dug the 80s Blockbuster action movie cliche character types. Thank you for the little trip down memory lane!
@@GuileWinQuote I don't want to dox myself, but yeah, it was in the US! I can't remember too many details about the cab, just that it was probably a multicade.
Reminds me a lot of "The Showdown Effect", complete with the action movie homages and tongue in cheek tone, though it seems The Outfoxies outdoes it in several ways, those stages are nuts, the amount of interactibility and the size of the stages is seriously wild.
Okay the only reason why I know about this game prior to watching this video is this Tim Rogers video he did where he reviewed Pac Man. And in it he went on a tangent ranking some of the cooler names of arcade games at the time. And one of his runner ups was The Outfoxies and he said in such a dramatic movie-trailer ish way that it’s like burned in my memories forever. Anyway I’m happy there’s a video on this game I’ll probably enjoy it and learn something new! Thank you 💜
When I opened my YT and the feed throws me this video first result I said 2 things. 1 Finally this guy got on this Jewel let's fuckin go!. 2 This algorithm knows me better than my mother bruh.
Such an interesting premise for a game, I'm kinda surprised that "rich guy sends a bunch of wacky assassins after each other" isn't a more common set-up for games' plots, or at least I can't think of any example right now. Closest thing that comes to mind is Batman Arkham Origins and how it's all about half a dozen assassins trying to murder Batman in the same night, but the tone is completely different and the story is about defending oneself instead of actively going for the kill.
It's a very interesting premise, recently finished the anime black lagoon and this plot idea, competing with different pirate crews for the same job where none of them are really virtous, all just after the same pay its interesting. There are some cool games like Hitman, Sid Meir's Pirates, mount and blade, that scratch that itch but you never have to Compete against the other assasins or criminials in that way for a quest, like a race. Would be fun, reminds me a bit of the first oblivion thieves guild quest actually
@@spyczech oh yeah, Black Lagoon definitely got quite a bit of mileage out of the idea of criminals competing with each other for a payday. My favorite scene that reflects how that city operates is when Rock buys a bag of fruit from some innocent looking local just to find out a few minutes later that the fruits are inedible and he got scammed, he's not even angry, he's just like "I should've known".
@@axelprino Hah that scene is awesome, I thought it might have been just me but ive seen others say too they thought he bought potatoes or an Taro like equivelent common thailand he didn't know about. Either way, its great characterization for Rock
It's impossible for any creature in this planet to convince me that the twins didnt inspire SSB's Ice Climbers as a fg concept. There's was nothing like that in the fg world at the time.
There's plenty of other things that could have inspired the Ice Climbers, from Nakoruru and her hawk in Samurai Shodown, to how Sonic and Tails work in Sonic 2. Hell, even in this game, Eve and her lizard work as much like the Ice Climbers as Danny and Demi do.
I been trying to remember the name of this game for over 10 years! Thank you for making this video! I played it randomly with a friend one day. Had us dying laughing in multiplayer!
Well damn. Now that I know there's a shirt for Travis to wear of this cast, I feel like I need to just gird my loins and grind through Travis strikes again.
I'm glad you covered this game! The only other channel that I saw bring this up was SNESdrunk and that was a few years ago lol Happy to see Outfoxies get attention
Also still can't wrap my head around how they Danny & Demi were conjoined twins unless one is trans, cause you can't have a M/F conjoined twin situation biologically.
There could always be hope we could see this game on current-gen consoles. The game studio "Hamster" releases classic arcade games on consoles as part of Arcade Archives, and they've released several that were Japanese exclusive. I wonder if there's a way we can tell Hamster that we want a port of this for consoles.
I just want you to know, our college recently got arcade machines, so when I saw this video I immediately went to play it with my friends. We had a blast; I'm much better than them at Street Fighter 3 (pretty much the only game people have been playing so far), so we were looking for more of a "party game" we could all enjoy. Cheers for the recommendation, looking forward to spreading this among the rest of the regulars around school!
We were also commenting on how fun this would be if they revived it for modern platforms, with updated animations and a 4-player free-for-all mode. It would be interesting to revisit this after so much time as design practices have evolved. I bet you could fix a lot of things that made the original feel awkward to newcomers, like adding higher contrast/outlines to characters to make it easier to keep track of them, or tuning maps to make their gimmicks more obvious on first pass.
Nice video! Fun fact by the way: In the original Japanese version, Danny and Demi were twins created in a laboratory by a mad scientist, and they were always normal twins instead of conjoined twins that had to be seperated.
Talking about the first games that got ignored, you might want to look at Ragnagard, the Neo Geo game that predates Guilty Gear featuring guard cancels, air dashes and much more.
This looks so fun, what? How did we not get 1000 sequels for this?! Here's hoping like, some indie company gets hold of the rights and makes a new one, like what happened with blaster master. Also, I didn't expect to see TSA mentioned lol.
A game that predated Smash Bros. Now that’s something I am learning new everyday I watch your content dude. Surprised nobody ever mentioned this game before.
To me, this is an evolution of Joust. It's like debating what the first rap record was, there's a couple correct answers. Both are fun, interesting, educational debates. Edit: 3:20 ICE CLIMBERS!!! This is definitely the Sugar Hill Gang/Grandmaster Flash & The Furious 5 of platform fighters.
Damn this is so creative, unique, intriguing, graphically impressive and exciting all together! A fever dream if I ever saw one! Port it please Namco! NEED TO PLAY! 🙌🙏💯
Used to play this coin op at a bar, my grandpa would take me with him, give me some euros to play and watch soccer on the TV or simply pass his time waiting while I played this! Great game and great memories from a great grandpa!
The fact that this was never ported in any of the like 40 god damned Namco Museum variations is a mortal sin.
Sometimes it seems Namco believes their only classic games are Pac-Man, Dig Dug, Pole Position, Mappy and Galaxian/Galaga
@@pablocasas5906 those games are fire though 😂🔥
@@pablocasas5906 Now days there are many fighting games that are published by Namco like Naruto, DBZ, and Jojo's Bizarre Adventure.
@@orangeslash1667 yeah, but Namco doesn't develop those games themselves, in fact they're more closely related to the Bandai side from the company. Jojo and Naruto were developed by CyberConnect2, Dragon Ball FighterZ by ArcSys and Jump Force by Spike Chunsoft
@@pablocasas5906 Think that's because Namco is very bias for Soulcalibur and Tekken.
The good news is that Outfoxes may have inspired Smash bros, which explains why Nintendo has a great relationship with Namco.
The reason for The Outfoxes having its own t-shirt in TSA is that Suda 51 is just a big fan of the game. The cabinet with the game was even installed in an old Grasshopper Manufacturers office
Yeah, it definitely looks like it's right up his alley. You could've told me this was a side project he did and it would probably take me a minute before I said 'hol up'
That's so sick
Gotta love that the score penalty for damage taken is a "Hospital bill".
This actually looks crazy! I never seen this game before.
New video idea for the channel? 👀
What's up Justin? Love your videos. You should definitely play this one. It looks fun
It’s fun but don’t expect it to be like Smash or a traditional fighter. It’s more focused on shooting one another.
@@magicjohnson3121 good enough, to be honest
this game does look pretty bad ass
I know about this game because when The Force Unleashed 2 multiplayer was revealed to be a Platform fighter, the game's director made a big deal about how they werent trying to be like Smash but instead like The Outfoxies
I like the movement in this game. An indie fighting game developer should make a game that "pays homage" to Outfoxies.
I'd totally support an indie game replicating this one instead of being another "Smash-like" that tries too hard to be competitive that actual competitive players prefers to go play Melee instead and the more casual audience would simply ignore it.
there is a game called superfighters deluxe which is the closest game i know, and it has online
Conceptually at least Duck Game is pretty similar
Look up a game called "the showdown effect" and cry that you won't be playing it either. Game went so hard in this trope and was a blast to play. Seriously!
"Entercats" would be the Outfoxes spiritual successor title.
I was so bummed to see this isn't on Fightcade. This is exactly the kind of game my buddies and I could play for a whole night. I'm now a member of the "Waiting for a port" gang.
Just play it on mame
Just find it elsewhere. Don't wait for it. Lol
Fun fact: the composer for this game, Masahiro Fukuzawa, went to compose the soundtrack for none other than Akatsuki Blitzkampf!
WTF!!!!
That's absolutely wild, TY for letting us uncultured fools know
I don't know what that is
A lot of the magic of the late 80s and 90s gaming scene comes from that widespread free thinking or experimental approach, that existed simply because it was the infancy of modern gaming and many franchises. Everything was free form, "in the making", without guidelines or formulas to follow (which is only the result of repetition, therefore it couldnt exist so early). So there was a large room for imagination, reimagining things, and most importantly an the own incentive for creativity.
Our traditional fighting game genre itself was a kind of experimental branching out the dominant beat em up genre in the 80s. We can even notice some traces of the arcade beat em up ideas in SF1 and FF1 and a little bit in AOF1 too, an interesting display itself of the transitional mindset inside the devs' heads time. Like we can easily comprehend these things in retrospect, we already got SF2 (it's already 30+ years old), but devs in the 80s and very early 90s werent sure of where they were even heading to.
And even after SF2 in 91, who says that's the ultimate recipe that has to be followed? That wasnt a clear notion. And SNK, Midway and a few other important companies didnt think that way, which luckily for us created so much true diversity in the genre. And VF and TK arent a SF clone in 3d as well.
And somewhere in that history this Outfoxies game could be placed, even if it was a rough experiment that sadly didnt go further. Btw experiments are bound to be rough by their nature, and only few ones are extremely effective, like SF2. To me Outfoxies can be still called a good representative of that early 90s creative developer mindset.
+
yeah, people will deny it but competitive gaming has sterilized and stagnated games. Everything feels like a chore to play since they are grindy f2p mmos that you pay $60+ for
80's and 90's gaming scene was due to a vastly different reason much more free form. As most games back then were rather derivative, with some outliers. The reason is marketing, both in how receptive consumers were as well as the state of gaming journalism (and the lack of typical influencers). Gaming journalism had to fill a decently large magazine either weekly or monthly and a shitload of opinion pieces and/or gossip didn't sell magazines, so lots of weirder games got a chance as well as much smaller games. While modern journalism is hyper focused on quick clicks while access has become free. You'd feel cheated if nearly all articles where gossip, clickbait or opinion pieces if you'd pay 5 guilder/pound/dollar/etc for a magazine. But what do you care if you get a bunch of gossip, clickbait and opinion pieces if it's free to access? Second issue is influencers, games can be a success or failure based on adoption by influencers and far from every games makes a good game to make video content from and influencers have a strong bias to the familiar. So the big things for marketing your game enforces established titles or otherwise familiar games.
Games have also become much more expensive to produce making companies much more risk averse.
It also doesn't help that modern "genre's" are essentially restrictive design templates (with some notable exceptions) and something that goes outside those paths are, again, hard to market and modern game design focuses heavily on genres rather than general practice.
I feel like outfoxies inspired duck game. That's as far as it's reach ever got
These characters look so fun and creative for its time; game too. They even seem to have stages bigger Smash stages would be until Temple AND have stage transformations too. Truly ahead of its time. Shame that it didn't become popular because from the looks of it, I think it should have and gotten a sequel. Maybe something with 4 players or more moves or items
4 players Outfoxies would be pure chaos.
@@ikagura and BEAUTIFUL
Competitive players today: "Can't play here, the water is covering my ankles!"
Developers then: "F_you, I'm gonna throw a helicopter so you fall down in the shark tank!"
Competitive players today: Great, now my whole body is covered in water.
I'm being dead serious when I say I would LOVE to see ANY kind of tournament for this game! Don't care if they're pros or noobs, I just want to see this game in action.
IIRC, the MiKaDo Japanese FG channel had some hour long tournament videos uploaded but it’s been a while time since I’ve seen any new ones.
ruclips.net/video/7qVPrnN5sgI/видео.html
You asked and I delivered 😊
You're seeing it in action in this video!
Very glad you made the Elevator Action comparison, because The Outfoxies has always struck me as the consequence of someone asking “what if Elevator Action Returns had a versus mode?”. Great video as always
I was so confused looking at the last level 'cause i was thinking "where's the rocket?" when i realized that was from elevator action returns, lol.
Outfoxies? Absolutely yes. One of the best random MAME games I came across back in the day. So wild and out there, especially for it's time. This game exudes the same type of exuberance that the best parts of Suda 51's work and things like JoJo's Bizarre Adventure does. Over the top, violent, lightly questioning you, but always with enough of a nod to say, "This is just a game. Don't be too serious." And that soundtrack? Sign me up.
This really reminds me of games like Towerfall and Duck Game. Even though I'm almost positive they had no direct inspiration from Outfoxies, I like to think that some of the game's DNA lives on in little indie side scrolling platform shooters where you and your friends use an arsenal of goofy weapons to out play each other
Ah yes, the best fg content creator out with a new video, indeed tis a moment for awakening babe
I love it when games get experimental and creative with their concepts, even when sometimes they don’t fundamentally work. But still, games like these are examples of the near unlimited possibilities and inspirations that developers can possess to apply some of the most insane concepts into their own titles.
Lol he didn't even want to give the monkey a banana unless he was the last one standing
Bro you are a life saver, I was literally trying to remember this game this morning at work
I remember seeing this on MAME, there are so many hidden treasures still to find on MAME like this, surprised it never came out on the og wii shop, as that had some obscure arcade games, it sure does look like fun.
I love the stages on this game and how interactive they are.
I miss that kind of stuff
oh my goodness! I remember this game!
I was drawn to it immediately as a child. I picked John Smith, then Dweeb and then proceeded to get mauled by the CPU
Amazing video!! As usual
This game sounds like so much fun; heck, the homages to 80's action flicks and the casting (heck, though I doubt twin assassins were uncommon, I kind of get reminded of Black Lagoon in a way), I'm surprised we never got this game over here. (They could even have made a licensed reskin of it for a Black Lagoon fighter even)
Gotta be one of the best names a game has ever had...
Great video! I think you really captured how cool this game is. If not a smash precursor, this is definitely a precursor to stuff like duck game.
And given that Hal labs first got connected with Nintendo making a Famicom port of joust, joust is extremely important for the history of smash!
I actually didn't know that....wow! The rabbit hole gets deeper, lol
that's a fun bit of trivia. the NES version of Joust is terrific, put a ton of hours into that!
Duck game was immediately what I thought of!
I love Joust, it's so good
There's arguably a more important link between Smash and Joust.
Mario Bros(not Super) was literally just Miyamoto making his own take on Joust, and he had to create a second Mario for it. Without Joust, Mario's not a brother, or even a plumber, he's just that guy that doesn't get along with apes.
This guy who hired 7 hitmen then avoided paying the other six, he'll definitely pay me...
Maaaaan, this was a deep cut for me! I always remembered the gameplay, but I could never remember the name for this game. I thought I just made it all up in my head. I remember growing up in the Philippines, there was a huge tournament scene for this game(at least in my province). I was too young back then but I would watch the older kids play until late in the evening. This takes me back.
which province?
Those sprites are cash money. I can't believe I've never seen this game before. There is so much for people to learn about from old media; I am glad that there are channels like yours highlighting the various small details and forgotten virtues of these games.
I remember discovering this game back in 2021, and it really opened up my eyes. Like many, I thought Smash Bros. was the creator of the platform fighter genre, but upon seeing this, my jaw dropped. Also, it's funny that Namco made this and then went to help develop Smash for Wii U/3DS years later.
Never heard of this arcade before and...it totally blew my mind off. IMO a total hidden gem and what a genius concept, so advanced for its time. If someone told me this was an indie game for the PS4 or PS5 I would've believe it for sure. And your comparisons to other games were totally spot on.
Dancing Eyes was supposed to get a remake on PS3 but was canceled. That's the real tragedy here.
Tragic. It isn't the greatest Qix-em-up, but any Qix-em-up cancellation is reason to grieve.
Just...wow. For over a decade in a half, people like me always thought the Platform Fighter genre was invented by Nintendo's popular Super Smash Bros. franchise. But no. It was actually Namco that did just that long before Nintendo popularized it by having characters from their properties throw fists at each other.
Kunio should be known for being having the first round based vs. platform fighter.
Outfoxies is a more obvious inspiration and a really cool game.
Kunio was also the first to have an arena fighter too. Even up to 4 players. And it featured ring outs.
It's hard to say which one is the more obvious inspiration. Kunio is a very popular series and I wouldn't be surprised if it inspired the gameplay for Smash too.
This game looks amazing!! Reminds me of a 2D Power Stone... before Power Stone even existed :o
This was one of the games I remember discovering in my earlier days of MAME. So damn good. :)
Outfoxies is truly a weird game, it truly feels like a parody of 80s action movies, and while the character illustrations have a manga style, the in-game graphics have a very western look to them. Namco made a ton of interesting games when they were direct competitors to Sega jn the arcades during the 90s.
As far as being the first platform fighter, I think The Outfoxies places more emphasis on actual platforming and exploration than Smash, but I can totally imagine Sakurai playing this game, alongside The King of Fighters '95 and '96, and inspiring the creation of Smash 64
Wow, I completely forgot about this game! Played it once on an emulator at a friend's house late at night and chalked it up to a weird dream.
The Smash DNA is definitely present.
Just recently went through all your videos. Great work on all of them. I really admire your dedication to properly playing and sharing these obscure games with everyone. Especially enjoyed the Buriki One and Fighting Game Magazine video. Look forward to more.
Thank you for watching 🙇🏼
I loved this game as much as Virtua Fighter when I was in a high school.
I just wanna say thank you for covering more obscure/niche or generally lesser known games. I never like it when people scoff at a game, or ignore the game just because of either lack of nostalgia or just because they don't know or for the fact it isn't popular. And this game here I will DEFINITELY be enjoying! This game looks SICK.
I would love to see this brought back with the budget of smash and a lot of sick new things it has limitless potential
Thanks for highlighting this one. Had somehow never even heard of it. Awesome.
Love to see a 4 player sequel some day.
I feel the truest successor to The Outfoxies isn't smash, but Superfighters Deluxe that is the only game that nailed the balls to the wall outlandiness and action combat of that game
Bit of a fun fact: During when the first Namco games Xevious and Pac-Man were released for Arcade Archives the CEO of Bandai Namco actually stated that one of the games they wanted to see was The Outfoxies.
The Outfoxies! I used to work at an arcade when I was younger, and I recall that this was either on a Neo Geo cartridge or "multicade" machine that sat right next to N.A.R.C. It had such a unique look, and I really dug the 80s Blockbuster action movie cliche character types. Thank you for the little trip down memory lane!
Wow, were you in the US? I'd love to know where it was at stateside!
@@GuileWinQuote I don't want to dox myself, but yeah, it was in the US! I can't remember too many details about the cab, just that it was probably a multicade.
This game has an appearance in Travis Strikes Again: No More Heroes as an official in game t-shirt
Reminds me a lot of "The Showdown Effect", complete with the action movie homages and tongue in cheek tone, though it seems The Outfoxies outdoes it in several ways, those stages are nuts, the amount of interactibility and the size of the stages is seriously wild.
I actually played this at the Galloping Ghost some years back. Fun, but too crazy for me as a first play.
I have never heard of this game before this video, but I am 100% checking it out now. this looks sick
I can’t belive Namco worked on two Smash game and didn't include a single Outfoxies reference.
Woah this looks amazing!!
... and the Twins are the only ones who can carry two different weapons.
Makes sense, if everyone uses one per pair of hands. Figures two pairs equals two weapons
Cool use of their nature as a two-in-one as well
There should be an Outfoxies stage in a future smash game! Anyone else agree?
Okay the only reason why I know about this game prior to watching this video is this Tim Rogers video he did where he reviewed Pac Man. And in it he went on a tangent ranking some of the cooler names of arcade games at the time. And one of his runner ups was The Outfoxies and he said in such a dramatic movie-trailer ish way that it’s like burned in my memories forever.
Anyway I’m happy there’s a video on this game I’ll probably enjoy it and learn something new! Thank you 💜
I remember finding this game in mame ages ago. I've ran sets at my local FG casuals from time to time.
When I opened my YT and the feed throws me this video first result I said 2 things. 1 Finally this guy got on this Jewel let's fuckin go!. 2 This algorithm knows me better than my mother bruh.
Great video as usual! This really is content you can't get anywhere else. Loving your output
Thank you for watching 🙇🏼
Oh how cool is it that you talked about this game! It's so much fun although it's very unbalanced (Dweeb is ridiculous and the whip is broken)
I didn't knew this exist and I have zero idea how a game from 1994 looks THIS fluid 0_0 I'll check it out!
Such an interesting premise for a game, I'm kinda surprised that "rich guy sends a bunch of wacky assassins after each other" isn't a more common set-up for games' plots, or at least I can't think of any example right now. Closest thing that comes to mind is Batman Arkham Origins and how it's all about half a dozen assassins trying to murder Batman in the same night, but the tone is completely different and the story is about defending oneself instead of actively going for the kill.
It's a very interesting premise, recently finished the anime black lagoon and this plot idea, competing with different pirate crews for the same job where none of them are really virtous, all just after the same pay its interesting. There are some cool games like Hitman, Sid Meir's Pirates, mount and blade, that scratch that itch but you never have to Compete against the other assasins or criminials in that way for a quest, like a race. Would be fun, reminds me a bit of the first oblivion thieves guild quest actually
@@spyczech oh yeah, Black Lagoon definitely got quite a bit of mileage out of the idea of criminals competing with each other for a payday. My favorite scene that reflects how that city operates is when Rock buys a bag of fruit from some innocent looking local just to find out a few minutes later that the fruits are inedible and he got scammed, he's not even angry, he's just like "I should've known".
@@axelprino Hah that scene is awesome, I thought it might have been just me but ive seen others say too they thought he bought potatoes or an Taro like equivelent common thailand he didn't know about. Either way, its great characterization for Rock
It was awesome seeing you on Matt's channel! 2 of my favorite dudes on youtube together!
It's impossible for any creature in this planet to convince me that the twins didnt inspire SSB's Ice Climbers as a fg concept. There's was nothing like that in the fg world at the time.
I don't know about Ice Climbers, but they remind me a LOT of Hansel & Gretel from Black Lagoon.
@@drumcanjones Same !!!
There is Chili and Pepper from Battle Monsters, but I don't know if that was before or after this game.
There's plenty of other things that could have inspired the Ice Climbers, from Nakoruru and her hawk in Samurai Shodown, to how Sonic and Tails work in Sonic 2.
Hell, even in this game, Eve and her lizard work as much like the Ice Climbers as Danny and Demi do.
Here me out, I think the inspiration for the ice climbers playing style was from the game ice climbers 🤯
Literally if Black Lagoon plot was a battle royale.
How?
It'd be nice to see the Twins go against the Ice Climbers.🤩
all the characters in this are so fun looking, I love the girl with the iguana
Her design is giving me gender envy, the sick piercings and the cool lizard sheesh
I been trying to remember the name of this game for over 10 years! Thank you for making this video! I played it randomly with a friend one day. Had us dying laughing in multiplayer!
I don't know the rules about "western release", but I live in Italy and it was in the Arcades.
Well damn. Now that I know there's a shirt for Travis to wear of this cast, I feel like I need to just gird my loins and grind through Travis strikes again.
This was such a fun game. The Twin's death animation creeped me out the first time I played though.
I'm glad you covered this game! The only other channel that I saw bring this up was SNESdrunk and that was a few years ago lol
Happy to see Outfoxies get attention
Missed you, so glad to see you uploading again
I love The Outfoxies, still waiting for it on Arcade Archives.
Also still can't wrap my head around how they Danny & Demi were conjoined twins unless one is trans, cause you can't have a M/F conjoined twin situation biologically.
I've seen this game mentioned in other videos briefly but I never realized how actually cool it was until I saw this video. Good video man!
good point to bring it up! the OutFoxies is like a lost genre-hybrid of it's own, one might also mention Power Stone 2
This game looks super fun can't wait for a port of the game
MAME is your friend
Where has this absolute gem been all my life?!
There could always be hope we could see this game on current-gen consoles. The game studio "Hamster" releases classic arcade games on consoles as part of Arcade Archives, and they've released several that were Japanese exclusive. I wonder if there's a way we can tell Hamster that we want a port of this for consoles.
I just want you to know, our college recently got arcade machines, so when I saw this video I immediately went to play it with my friends.
We had a blast; I'm much better than them at Street Fighter 3 (pretty much the only game people have been playing so far), so we were looking for more of a "party game" we could all enjoy. Cheers for the recommendation, looking forward to spreading this among the rest of the regulars around school!
We were also commenting on how fun this would be if they revived it for modern platforms, with updated animations and a 4-player free-for-all mode.
It would be interesting to revisit this after so much time as design practices have evolved. I bet you could fix a lot of things that made the original feel awkward to newcomers, like adding higher contrast/outlines to characters to make it easier to keep track of them, or tuning maps to make their gimmicks more obvious on first pass.
what the hell!?!? this is the coolest shit! why have i never heard of this!?!?
Nice video!
Fun fact by the way: In the original Japanese version, Danny and Demi were twins created in a laboratory by a mad scientist, and they were always normal twins instead of conjoined twins that had to be seperated.
Wow had no idea, will definitely look into this!
Isn’t Eve a porn star as well?
Ngl I'd love a smash game where all the competitive stages were more wacky, if the genre is gonna be weird they should play into it
Talking about the first games that got ignored, you might want to look at Ragnagard, the Neo Geo game that predates Guilty Gear featuring guard cancels, air dashes and much more.
That'll definitely happen!
This looks so fun, what? How did we not get 1000 sequels for this?! Here's hoping like, some indie company gets hold of the rights and makes a new one, like what happened with blaster master. Also, I didn't expect to see TSA mentioned lol.
A game that predated Smash Bros. Now that’s something I am learning new everyday I watch your content dude. Surprised nobody ever mentioned this game before.
I can't believe they never brought this over. It looks awesome. Another similar game is Power Stone
Danny and Demi kinda remind me of the "Vampire Twins" from "Black Lagoon" minus the messed up stuff about the vampire twins. lol
Holy crapola how have I never heard of this?! So awesome
The scaling effects and the stage design and the lore, bananas cool stuff
To me, this is an evolution of Joust. It's like debating what the first rap record was, there's a couple correct answers.
Both are fun, interesting, educational debates.
Edit: 3:20 ICE CLIMBERS!!!
This is definitely the Sugar Hill Gang/Grandmaster Flash & The Furious 5 of platform fighters.
i just want to say i've been really enjoying your videos lately and thank you for making them :)
Thank you for watching!!!! 🙇🏼
Damn this is so creative, unique, intriguing, graphically impressive and exciting all together! A fever dream if I ever saw one!
Port it please Namco! NEED TO PLAY! 🙌🙏💯
One of the greatest soundtracks in all of video games.
This game looks super fun
And the story is like future diary but good
Oh, wow never heard of this its so crazy cool! It really does look like if elevator action returns was versus game, which is amazing!
I remember this being outright stated as the inspiration for a certain game but I can’t remember what it was. May have been the Metal Gear devs iirc.
Another comment said it was Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
@@RadikaRules ahhh thanks!
I absolutely LOVE your videos, im a fan for life.
Thank you for watching 🙇🏼
Definitely waiting for this to hit the Arcade Archives.
A buddy sent me this video, and after seeing it in action, i've been playing all night.
Such an awesomely fun game. I need this cabinet someday!
This reminds me of that one flash game, "Superfighters"
This game looks so damn good
This needs a port this is the OG. Smash owes most of its fame to this game. Pleases port it..
Most of it's fame? No
@@Kotasake I meant it was one of the first games to pit you against other players in an environment.
Used to play this coin op at a bar, my grandpa would take me with him, give me some euros to play and watch soccer on the TV or simply pass his time waiting while I played this! Great game and great memories from a great grandpa!