It's like they used this game as a dumping ground for all the weird leftover characters designs they couldn't fit into any other games. I love it, everyone looks so absolutely ridiculous in the best way.

It's so dense, every single frame has so many things going on

If you like Tulks, you should play Knuckle Bash. Every character is a Tulks. It's a wrestling-themed brawler from the people who would go on to make Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon. Underrated gem, that one.

Winkysoft went out of business in 2015, but they worked on some of the early Super Robot Wars games, which probably explains some of the craziness here

Hey Matt, somebody actually took some of these sprites and made an Open BOR Beat 'em Up, called Neon Lightning Force. It's pretty good, maybe check it out for another OpenBOR Beat 'em Up video in the future.

I lowkey love this game for how insane it is lol. My favorite character was the ninja dude and the guy with the shades! Great to see Matt finally covering this because I honestly wish more people knew about this game😂

Sometimes I wonder if this game Undercover Cop and Captain Commando all take place in its own cinematic universe despite being made by three different gaming companies

Keep the obscure brawlers coming!

I came across this game while roaming the Fightcade romset I have access to one day and it was the best hidden gem I found in that session.

Hell yeah, glad you ended up making a video about it. This game is such a strange combination of fucking insane and bafflingly competent that it deserves the love, even all these years later. We've got Crocomire, Karnov, gay Captain Commando, the last boss from Sonic 2, a fucking Guyver... All the warriors are here, to commemorate this glorious trainwreck of an experience.

THIS IS EVERY ANIME OVA FROM LATE 80s EARLY 90S EVER FEAT: Muscle Mommies,Big BOOBA Ladies, and RoBo Chicks 10/10

11:11 wtf is going on at the background...? 🤣

Oh my goodness, this is the most radical of all beat em ups I've ever seen in the history of Flophouse. There's so much in this screen here, and I can't describe it.

Amazing that you made the triceraton reference, I was thinking he looked like War from tournament fighters/the Archie comics when I saw the game intro

The prequel to this game only have 3 playable character, standard beat em up stereotype characters And the rival/final boss of the first game is the main character of the sequel(girulian)

First guy: War from Tournament fighter using a Guyvver Unit (Oh man, there should be a Guyvver Beat-em-up) Second guy: distilled 1980's man Third girl: distilled 1980's shoulderpad woman Fourth guy: Shang Tscorpiung Fifth guy: a very precariously placed green rod Sixth robot: ♪ Spruce Goose Jaguar Spruce Goose Jaguar ♪ Seventh guy: Ninja by way of the band White Snake Eighth girl: Queen of the Harpies! QUEEN OF THE HARPIES!

I personally discovered this game a couple of years ago and it is simply crazy. There are so many moves packed in with each of the playable characters despite not having that many buttons to work with. It also has a weird cross of fluidity combined with stiffness with controls that I thought planted one foot with earlier beat'em'ups and one foot with the future of them. And, somehow, they were able to make a system work that required you to stand still to recharge your specials. And the timing of it all works so well haha.

2:43 Hot dawgin' and grand standin'

Unhinged is always a good descriptor for great games

This game is a little more complex than Matt may think: * The game has 3 buttons: Attack, Jump, and Special. Special is usually a projectile attack. * You can block by holding Attack and back, just like in D&D arcade. * If you use special attacks when you don't have enough meter, you'll use health instead. If you do so when you don't have enough health, then you will start charging up, leaving you vulnerable to attacks. * There are two desperation moves in the game: An area of effect attack done by pressing Attack and Special together that uses your health. The other one, which uses special energy only, is done by performing a hidden command exclusive to each character when their name is flashing. This "Desperation State" is triggered by dealing damage, and can be entered faster the less health you have.

This game has enough selectable characters and lots of moves for each one to fill the roster of a fighting game. That's just crazy for a Beat'em up.

Ah at long last you have played this game. Yeah I kinda consider this the best brawler ever made by a MASSIVE margin. I mean the whole Denjin Makai series is good, even the SNES one (Ghost Chaser Densei) which adds charge attacks. But 2 is my favorite. EDIT: I now have a desire to sell you on the other two. So, Denjin Makai 1 honestly has the best graphics of the series and a MUCH greater challenge, but no combo mechanics and the specials are way harder to do (hold attack, back, forward and release attack at the same time). It also has not only unique endings for every character but also endings for every PAIR of characters! Also the end boss theme is just straight up Eye of the Tiger. Also yeah, Girulian from the second game was the end boss of the first game. Also Zeldia used to be a Skullbyule-esque bio monster who hatches into an angel girl at the end. As for Ghost Chaser Densei? Only 3 playable characters, less enemies, worse graphics...but GREAT balance and the charge moves are fantastic and make doing specials much easier. Basically you hold attack, back-forward...KEEP IT HELD and it charges up the move and makes it stronger. Release the button to do the move. So MUCH easier to do specials, adds a lot to them, and there may even be some light juggles in that one. Ghost Chaser Densei also has a fan translation but it's kinda bad and just makes things more confusing.

This is maybe too deep a Banpresto lore cut but; I wonder if "Girulian" is a proto-version of Banpresto's multi series, dimension hoping, OC Character Gilliam Yaeger. First off that name. Girulian smacks of "bad engrish romanization" of Gilliam to me. That might be confirmation bias though. But I looked up at the screen and saw this purple suited dude with sunglasses and said to myself, self, this dude gives me Gilliam Yaeger vibes except for the hair. I wonder if there's a connection? Then I looked up at his name and... hey, like I said, maybe confirmation bias. But even the hair thing. Gilliam might not be THE Banpresto version of Quattro Bajeena, but he is ONE of them. So proto Gilliam having Char's hair make sense. I think he explicitly changes it when he goes undercover later on anyways, opting for the long purple haired look he's more famous for. Purple, the fashion sense shared by both Girulian and Gilliam. COINCIDENCE?! Yeah maybe. But I also think the Triceraton guy looks like an Einst, an Einst Knochen specifically but again a proto-version, so.... perhaps we've just hit a really very specific sub-sub-fandom lore seam here with this game :P

This is one of the few brawlers where the character sprites are larger than most enemies.

This game brings back so many good memories of fiddling on the Button bashers on MAME. This, Metamoqester, and Night Slashers made up so many fun nights of just beating up monsters. That and Monster Maulers...truly fun as heck games.

Few games did as much for sidescroller beatemup mechanics as this game.

This game looked so nuts I literally just picked up the PCB off eBay! 🤣 Thanks Matt! 🤣

I thought I knew beat-em-ups but clearly I was wrong. This is amazing. 😆

Looks sick, would probably be a lot of fun to work on a similar project!

You mentioned Undercover Cops (arcade version). Yes! Would love to see you play that, it has some crazy bosses/enemies from what I remember

I still play this from time to time. Pretty cool beat em up.

Kurokishi looks like Maki from Final Fight 2

Iyo was only Denjin Makai character who never came back and replace to Skullbyle

Funny thing is I don't play a lot of brawlers so Banpresto is just the Super Robot Wars company to me

Yo this game is gorgeous how did it never get brought over here.

Man this one has been a staple in my retroarch library since like 15 years ago when I discovered it in mame

Your editor really has food on the mind.

It would be a matter of time if he gets to play Ninja Baseball Bat Man!

Now this is podracing

I suggested this a while back and I'm glad you finally got to check it out!

yo Matt tell Steve Kick to remaster and port this or go to hell!

This is trully a hidden gem! I knew about this series because of the Snes port, but I only played Guardians because of Mame.

Guardians started life as Denjin Makai II, but meddling from publisher Banpresto forced the dev team to completely change major aspects of the story. The villain from the last game became the protagonist of this game with no explanation, and many of the characters got strange redesigns (Kurokishi apparently means "Black Knight," which doesn't match her current design). Eventually the story was cut entirely and the name was changed to Guardians. Guardians was cancelled very late in development, then later Banpresto decided to revive the project but spent as little as possible getting the game ready for release. That's why the sound design is so lacking - that part of the game was added at the last minute after the game had already been cancelled. Many of the developers, unhappy with the state of the game on release, used joke aliases in the credits and some of them even left the company. There is a dip switch marked "unused" in the manual that changes the title back to the original Denjin Makai II. This also unlocks the true hardest difficulty of the game where enemies deal 1.5x damage. I always wonder which version the developers wanted people to play.

This was my first new game played on Mame long ago and it was an absolute joy. I’d love to see this revived if they could keep the tone intact and go absolutely ham.

No one is ready for Miss Thickums

Wish we could have seen more of the cool harpy lady

We never get the juicy goods. This probably would of been my favorite brawler

Damn I heard of many an obscure good beat m up, I dug some out myself, but I hadn't seen this one yet. Very nice.

Okay I'd thought I'd seen every arcade brawler out there until now. I need this to be on the Arcade Archvies!

Seems like it is emulated very well now. I remember the character/level select screens looked al messed up. What emulator are you playing on?

Those gator guys remind me of the kid from lil gator game

I could see myself playing as either the dinosaur guy or the angel lady in this game.

Oh no. Someone read my mind and made a beat-'em-up out of it! 😂 But seriously, Ima play this! 👍

This game crazy combo potential. You can even do unique double special with second player. In coop enemies will be juggled to death

METEION!?

I love Denjin Makai

Man that was some Bravoman levels of wacky in terms of design lol

There is an even wilder sequel

I actually have this and didn't know it. That's because I have way 2 many games

Damn, this game looks awesome. The first character you picked might as well be straight from Guyver.

Sooo great

Third comment. Even though the game lacks story, boy... this beat em' up is SICK. It's really sad that it never received a console port. Unlike the previous title that recieved a japanese exclusive port on the Super Famicom.

aw hell yeah

How can i get this game, I’m so miss this game

I would buy that. More I say!

How did you get a good version of this rom?!

There is only one word to describe this game. Unhinged. And I love it.

I don't think this blonde woman fits to the Night Slasher game so I also don't know why they replace the asian girl for her.

for 1995 this is really unimpressive by arcade standards of that time. This looks more like something you'd find on the 16 bit nintendo or mega drive. That being said, I kind of like this one, it has personality. I don't think I ever saw this one in the arcades either

Great game