Not really. My strikes were manual, so someone had to see it and make a decision. So it wouldn't have mattered if I put it in a corner or mirrored it or anything really. :/
Awesome video Kim!!!.....sucks that you wont be doing them here.....you forgot one that no one ever talks about......try looking into the psx version of champion wrestler......if you thought that gekitou burning pro was a Firepro clone......you'll love that one......
The All-Japan Pro Wrestling games on the SNES are titles I played a ton as a kid with friends, especially when the 4 player battle royale one was released. We kinda got sick of button bashing in the WWF games at the time.
The Animation on those older games are amazing. Wish somebody would make a New Wrestling game with these graphics, but more functional and actual movesets, would be great.
Big fan of your channel and I’m glad that you’ve decided to make more wrestling videos as your All Japan videos were great. Growing up playing mega drive and watching grainy copies of Kobashi and Misawa matches this is pure nostalgia for me. Great work.
Kim! If Genichiro Tenryu is one of your absolute favorites please check out a music video he did with the Japanese band Gacharic Spin called "Don't Let Me Down." It features him versus the band members in the ring and it's all sorts of silly Japanese goodness. I instantly recognized him in this video! If you are interested, I will DM you the links of it and the making of as they are not official posted in full length on YT.
Did you ever manage to combine them? I did, and not being a Japanese language speaker I couldn't have been prouder of myself if I'd cured a major disease.
i've honestly never paid much attention to pro wrestling over the years, with the exception of a somewhat passing interest in WWF in the '80s when I was in high school. But I think it's cool that two really intelligent and sophisticated UA-camrs whom I admire tremendously, Kim Justice and Jim Sterling, are both such devoted fans. I really enjoy these videos even though it's all new to me.
Maybe they need to make a sequel which features not only the stars of New Japan, Pro Wrestling Noah, All Japan, Stardom but also legendary wrestlers like Inoki, Baba, Misawa, Kobashi, Jumbo Tsuruta and many others.
Hi Kim! I love your videos. Would it be possible to include snippets of audio from games when you make specific reference to an audio feature, such as an effect or music? It would add even more to my expeirence.
VPW2 was amazing I still remember having a Misawa Kawada match that made my palms sweat and was about 50 minutes. It was a true 5 star in the dome. I also really enjoyed the NJPW games on the SNES. It was my first emulator experience, I was shocked to see some what of a entrance and a good wrestling game for the SNES.
That was one hell of a list. Out of all the games mentioned the ones that I've played are: VPW2, KoC2, and Wrestle Kingdom 2. With wrestling seemingly picking up momentum again and the fact that we're getting at least 3 wrestling games released this year it would be cool if we got just one more non Fire Pro puro game.
Thanks for this, Kim. I loved Japanese wrestling games in the 90’s and didn’t know of some of these. I hope you don’t mind me watching this stuff and for my own research.
That came closest to Super Fire Pro, for me. I owned the cartridge back in the 90's. It played as well as Fire Pro (initially) but did not have the wrestlers or depth to keep the interest up.
All i heard was firepro. And thousands of hours... yeah its real. I heard monsters and joshi, championship. Sorry i was thinking about firepro. I am sure the video was good, not firepro good, but better than 99.7% of youtube videos
I'm someone whose only played the western games (AKI, Smackdown and 2K series), with my only exposure to the Japanese games being in VPW2 and Fire Pro X and the GBA ports. I would totally check these out.
Hey Kim :) great video! Apologies if I missed you mention it but have you heard of Champion Wrestler on the PSX? this list is pretty banging so the chances are you have!
Excellent list of Wrestling games. I pretty much stopped playing them after WWF Wrestlefest in the arcades. I would love to see you cover the various Wrestling games on handheld devices. I loved HAL Wrestling on the GameBoy back in 1990.
Ah ringside Angel, I still love that game - I have my physical copy still bought from a rental shop. It was the best wrestling game on the Megadrive I knew of for ages, Super Wrestlemania had a terrible PAL conversion making it unbelievably slow and sluggish. It took until Royal Rumble to come out for a game to actually be at the speed and playability of the Ringside Angel. I played the game so much I find out little details/bugs in the game - Guns Oyama could NEVER be knocked down with standing punches and kicks, meaning you could walk backwards and destroy her heath in seconds. Miyamore Yajima could never submit anyone as her submissions would not cause any damage, indeed if you played a two player match and left the controllers alone you would see the opponent GAIN health back despite having their bodies locked in her holds!
@@russcontini Yeah the insane throw could only be done in the last two divisions if I remember. All the wrestlers in grey had the chain, but strangely Miyamore also had it, it would only appear now and then in the "random" move box (top right of the screen) when using button C in a grapple. There was also the fact you could wreck the CPU after taking their health down enough, knocking them down in the right place, you can continually jump off the turnbuckle on them prone over and over. Glad to see another fan =)
I was fortunate to have owned Power Move Pro Wrestling in the late 90s when i was in my teens and it is the wrestling game that i have most enjoyed playing. Wish i still had it. I used to like Zombie, but changed up who i used to make it more interesting and used to have really good end sequences for everyone using about 3 of their moves.
“Hey, you know that big show that we hold every January 4 in the Tokyo Dome? We need to give it a name and thus, we shall call it… WRESTLE KINGDOM! We know that we have a series of games that are called Wrestle Kingdom and thus, we need to give our January 4 super show the name Wrestle Kingdom so that it would sound cool and it would be having that big time feel just like WWE’s WrestleMania or the deceased WCW’s Starrcade” -a snippet of a meeting between New Japan’s top executives regarding what they’ll call their big event that they hold every January 4 at the Tokyo Dome
Great stuff. If I can make a recommendation to you, Hybrid Wrestler: Togo Denshou for the Super Famicom from Technos (yes, the Wrestlefest devs!). It's based on the Pancrase promotion, from the days before it was a legit MMA outfit.
I recently played monster pro wrestling recently on my LDK console recently whilst surfing random games. Really enjoyed it despite it all being in Japanese ... It's nuts
Enjoyed the Toukon retsuden games on the ps1. On the first at least you had the option to run at 60hz or 30hz with better graphic detail. Very unusual for the time
As far as I remember the third game also had a 60FPS option, while in the second one it was a hidden option. Too bad that the match would be limited to two wrestlers without the Ref if you used 60FPS.
Okay, we need to raise some money to buy Kim a Sega Saturn and a copy of All-Japan Pro Wrestling Featuring Virtua. It’s a classic of the genre by the creators of the Giant Gram series on Dreamcast. There are also two Fire Pro Wrestling titles that are well worth playing, but AJPW is the king on Saturn. Its omission from any Western release was absolutely criminal.
Cuty Suzuki's Ringside angels was by FAR the best wrestling game available in the early 90's, it had tons more moves than any other game at the time, and I remember us working out the japanese scripts for the move names so we could select them on the selection screen, including some insane special finishing moves, for example throwing your opponent way up in the air and electrocuting them on the signs above! You could also use weapons like a chain produced from your tights. I think if you'd have spent more time figuring this stuff out you'd have been more impressed, it completely destroyed anything else at the time.
I came here to seek the answer to one question... ...is she going to mention _Rumble Roses?_ It's Japanese, it's not Fire Pro (but it wasn't Japan only, it's also a Konami game and was probably more a competitor to Dead or Alive than Fire Pro and that's before we mention _Rumble Roses XX)_
I want to play sooo many of these but I'm in the United States & would love English physical versions. 😔 is there anyway? Love the wrestling game videos KIM!
It would be so cool if we had a wrestling game where you could play with classic characters like Snake or Kratos for example. Konami had a very interesting idea there.
Giant Gram 2000 is still an amazing game that doesn't get enough love, including on this video! It's the only wrestling game I've played where characters feel and play different, with unique movesets that you have to learn the different commands for, much like Virtua Fighter or Tekken. As good as Fire Pro or Aki games are, once you've learnt how to play with one character you can play well with all. It also has unique moves as in ASPW3, such as Kawada Ganso Bombing Misawa.
I never had a N64, so I can't say much about Virtual Pro Wresting/No Mercy or the Yuke's NJPW games there (Shin Nihon Pro-Wrestling: Toukon Honoo Dou BRAVE SPIRITS and Shin Nihon Pro-Wrestling: Toukon Honoo Dou 2 - The Next Generation). But after abandoning not only Yuke's games but mostly most western wrestling games (well, there weren't that many left beside the Yuke's games) I pretty much only got the previous japanese titles up until the the 6th console generation. But my personal favorite of them all is King of Colosseum II and the IMO best PS1 wrestling (that also was the engine base for King of Colosseum) AJPW: King's Souls (Zen-Nihon Puroresu: Ouja no Kon). I spend hundreds of hours playing King of Colosseum Red and Green, translating parts of the movelists (which are still at GameFAQs) and later playing King of Colosseum II and All Star Pro Wrestling III again for hundreds of hours. There are still a couple of wrestler edits for the Square-Enix game online, that I made back then. On the SNES I haven't played that much beside Fire Pro Wrestling. But I know about the AJPW games there, but didn't like them that much. And I'm talking about Zen Nihon Pro-Wrestling (later turned into Natsume Championship Wrestling), Zen Nihon Pro-Wrestling Dash: Sekai Saikyou Tag and Zen Nihon Pro-Wrestling 2: 3-4 Budokan. The Classic Gameboy title Zen Nihon Pro-Wrestling Jet also looks very good for a wrestling title on that system. But there's also the really weird Zen-Nihon Pro Wrestling: Fight da Pon!, which is essentially a game using board game and playing card mechanics. And talking about these card mechanics. I always found the Wrestling Angels series interesting, but this playing-cart-gameplay was very off-putting (and confusing for someone who doesn't speak japanese). But there's also the more traditional Onita Atsushi FMW game but I didn't find that very appealing either. Also worth mentioning is Zen Nihon Joshi Puroresu: Joou Densetsu: Yume no Taikousen (PS1 aka AJPW Womens: Legend of Queens), another Joshi title which had fantastic animations. But somehow I don't like gameplay that much, that is centered around various dizzy stages of your opponent. This always felt really silly and I didn't like that in Yuke's NJPW Toukon Retsuden games either (which I all played). One of the few japanese titles that I've never played were the Puroresu Sengokuden games on the PS1with Puroresu Sengokuden: Hyper Tag Match, Shuukan Puroresu Kanshuu: Pururesu Sengokuden - The Real Pro-Wrestling World and Puroresu Sengokuden 2: Kakutou Emaki. Interesting are also some of the really bad games like Zen Nihon Joshi Pro Wrestling: Queen of Queens (All Japan Women Pro Wrestling: Queen of Queens) for the PC-FX, which is one of the rare games using FMV for all the gameplay, which absolutely sucks.
As someone familiar enough with pro wrestling but who has probably played all of 10 minutes of wrestling games that All Star 3 from Square Enix really looks appealing. I think if I were to ever try one that would be it.
Virtual pro-wrestling is my favorite wrestling game om N64. Fire Pro series is my favorite wrestling series altogether though. I always felt King of Collisseum was way better than No Mercy.
VPW2: Oudou Keishou is the best AKI engine game period. Even better than No Mercy. The mma style grapples, the combo editor, the mask editor makes this the most customizable AKI game and the roster is amazing.
Maniac Pro Wrestling reminds me a lot of (WWF) MicroLeague Wrestling. That game used captures from actual matches and was a blast when I was a kid. Incidentally, I agree about FirePro. I'd rather not know how much of my life has been sunk into that series
You should check out the long running Wrestle Angels series. I never got into the gameplay (RPG style turn-based with playing cards), but these look like interestling games.
I would love to play ASPW 3, really! But I'm having a little bit of a problem. I can't seem to finding it online for download, I play using a psx2 emulator and the last time I found this game it didn't work, the game was really, really, really slow and I couldn't find any way to fix that, so ended up deleting it. Now I know it was big mistake! If someone can provide some information on how can I find this game and how could I emulate withoud problems I would really aprecciate! Thank you!
I've been watching this Reddit thread www.reddit.com/r/Roms/comments/d2abik/all_star_pro_wrestling_3_ps2_iso_link/ There was an updated link yesterday!
Not really a wrestling person (though this was still a fascinating video regardless), but All Nippon Pro Wrestling Featuring Virtua on the Saturn is unique in that it features Virtua Fighter characters!
Fantastic video Kim! Too bad the recent Fire Pro is rubbish and getting worse with ludicrously overpriced monetization. Fire Pro R is the pinnacle. Will have to check a bunch of these out.
It feels pretty good to be back. www.patreon.com/kimblejustice
welcome back Kim :D
Can't you do what botchamania does and make the video at the corner of the screen?
Not really. My strikes were manual, so someone had to see it and make a decision. So it wouldn't have mattered if I put it in a corner or mirrored it or anything really. :/
Awesome video Kim!!!.....sucks that you wont be doing them here.....you forgot one that no one ever talks about......try looking into the psx version of champion wrestler......if you thought that gekitou burning pro was a Firepro clone......you'll love that one......
Your wrestling videos are on archive.org/ . So can't you just upload it there or on Dailymotion, I can't support your Patreon as I'm merely 14.
The All-Japan Pro Wrestling games on the SNES are titles I played a ton as a kid with friends, especially when the 4 player battle royale one was released. We kinda got sick of button bashing in the WWF games at the time.
I picked one up, or at least the Westernised version of one on Wii U Virtual Console. It's fun.
@@jazzygeofferz is that the us natsume wrestling version?
@@Larry it is. Names have been changed to protect copyright, but it's still quite obvious who they're supposed to be. Not a bad game either.
That first one looks like a JRPG inspired game. Which honestly sounds amazing.
Me in 1992 only playing the WWF and WCW games: “There aren’t any decent Super Nintendo wrestling games”.
Me now: 😳
Had to wait for 1995 and Wrestlemania the Arcade Game
So true...I enjoyed Royal Rumble and RAW but damn if I only knew what Japan had...
1:38
I didn't know the Great Muta was part of the nWo!
The most impressive for me is all star pro wrestling 3. The best one is virtual pro wrestling 2
I hope you will dive into all the aki wrestling games
We found a New Japan Pro-Wrestling: Toukon Retsuden 4 arcade machine in Tokyo. Great fun
At what arcade?
@@robertobravo5732 at the retro arcade near Antonio Inoki's restaurant
@@JB-gj5io ty
The Animation on those older games are amazing. Wish somebody would make a New Wrestling game with these graphics, but more functional and actual movesets, would be great.
Big fan of your channel and I’m glad that you’ve decided to make more wrestling videos as your All Japan videos were great. Growing up playing mega drive and watching grainy copies of Kobashi and Misawa matches this is pure nostalgia for me.
Great work.
Kim! If Genichiro Tenryu is one of your absolute favorites please check out a music video he did with the Japanese band Gacharic Spin called "Don't Let Me Down." It features him versus the band members in the ring and it's all sorts of silly Japanese goodness. I instantly recognized him in this video! If you are interested, I will DM you the links of it and the making of as they are not official posted in full length on YT.
need some kinnikuman in here!
I've played the RED and GREEN versions of King of Colosseum, it was so much fun!
Did you ever manage to combine them? I did, and not being a Japanese language speaker I couldn't have been prouder of myself if I'd cured a major disease.
Darth Perkins You meant to say "Did" but yes, I combined them
@@theprowrestlingguy6851 Fixef it.
Darth Perkins Ah, there you go! :)
i've honestly never paid much attention to pro wrestling over the years, with the exception of a somewhat passing interest in WWF in the '80s when I was in high school. But I think it's cool that two really intelligent and sophisticated UA-camrs whom I admire tremendously, Kim Justice and Jim Sterling, are both such devoted fans. I really enjoy these videos even though it's all new to me.
If you're ever interested in learning more then I'd recommend the How2Wrestling podcast.
Do a video of wrestle kingdom 2. Most underrated wrestling game. I wish someone remake it.
I’m still playing it on Japanese import.
Maybe they need to make a sequel which features not only the stars of New Japan, Pro Wrestling Noah, All Japan, Stardom but also legendary wrestlers like Inoki, Baba, Misawa, Kobashi, Jumbo Tsuruta and many others.
Hi Kim! I love your videos. Would it be possible to include snippets of audio from games when you make specific reference to an audio feature, such as an effect or music? It would add even more to my expeirence.
Billiant, as a long time fan of Japanese wrestling this is an amazing video. Love your stuff bud
21:02 omg does anyone else that Mick Foley/Cactus Jack cutout in the crowd or is it just me?
VPW2 was amazing I still remember having a Misawa Kawada match that made my palms sweat and was about 50 minutes. It was a true 5 star in the dome. I also really enjoyed the NJPW games on the SNES. It was my first emulator experience, I was shocked to see some what of a entrance and a good wrestling game for the SNES.
This is why youre awesome. Youre one of the few to cover this
That was one hell of a list. Out of all the games mentioned the ones that I've played are: VPW2, KoC2, and Wrestle Kingdom 2.
With wrestling seemingly picking up momentum again and the fact that we're getting at least 3 wrestling games released this year it would be cool if we got just one more non Fire Pro puro game.
New Japan has done great business over the last ten years, sort of a wonder that there hasn't been a genuine NJPW licensed game in so long.
@@NexebNoXV finding a good developer and publisher can be pretty difficult.
One wonders if NJPW might try to bring in Yuke's now that their deal to make WWE games is over
@@NexebNoXV I'd be down for that
I would LOVE an ultra realistic NJPW game, in both look and in action.
Thanks for this, Kim. I loved Japanese wrestling games in the 90’s and didn’t know of some of these. I hope you don’t mind me watching this stuff and for my own research.
The legend , the dearest Kim makes a wrestling related video :D.
The zen nippon pro wrestling 2:3-4 budokan is also a great game! Just imagine if the roster is bigger and has an edit mode
That came closest to Super Fire Pro, for me. I owned the cartridge back in the 90's. It played as well as Fire Pro (initially) but did not have the wrestlers or depth to keep the interest up.
I’m surprised to not see AJPW Featuring Virtua on the Sega Saturn in this countdown.
Nice to see you going back into wrestling content Kim! hopefully you can make more wrestling videos :)
WCW vs the World is a super underrated game and also that Giant Gram 2000 had some top notch animation! Excellent video 👍
Best intro on UA-cam.
All i heard was firepro. And thousands of hours... yeah its real. I heard monsters and joshi, championship. Sorry i was thinking about firepro. I am sure the video was good, not firepro good, but better than 99.7% of youtube videos
I'm someone whose only played the western games (AKI, Smackdown and 2K series), with my only exposure to the Japanese games being in VPW2 and Fire Pro X and the GBA ports. I would totally check these out.
Hey Kim :) great video! Apologies if I missed you mention it but have you heard of Champion Wrestler on the PSX? this list is pretty banging so the chances are you have!
Excellent list of Wrestling games. I pretty much stopped playing them after WWF Wrestlefest in the arcades.
I would love to see you cover the various Wrestling games on handheld devices. I loved HAL Wrestling on the GameBoy back in 1990.
Ah ringside Angel, I still love that game - I have my physical copy still bought from a rental shop.
It was the best wrestling game on the Megadrive I knew of for ages, Super Wrestlemania had a terrible PAL conversion making it unbelievably slow and sluggish. It took until Royal Rumble to come out for a game to actually be at the speed and playability of the Ringside Angel.
I played the game so much I find out little details/bugs in the game - Guns Oyama could NEVER be knocked down with standing punches and kicks, meaning you could walk backwards and destroy her heath in seconds. Miyamore Yajima could never submit anyone as her submissions would not cause any damage, indeed if you played a two player match and left the controllers alone you would see the opponent GAIN health back despite having their bodies locked in her holds!
how about Megadeth Saito and her chain? and the crazy throw up to the rafters move? bloody loved this game.
@@russcontini Yeah the insane throw could only be done in the last two divisions if I remember. All the wrestlers in grey had the chain, but strangely Miyamore also had it, it would only appear now and then in the "random" move box (top right of the screen) when using button C in a grapple.
There was also the fact you could wreck the CPU after taking their health down enough, knocking them down in the right place, you can continually jump off the turnbuckle on them prone over and over.
Glad to see another fan =)
Really enjoyed this. I’m going to check these titles out. Keep up the great work Kim!
I was fortunate to have owned Power Move Pro Wrestling in the late 90s when i was in my teens and it is the wrestling game that i have most enjoyed playing. Wish i still had it. I used to like Zombie, but changed up who i used to make it more interesting and used to have really good end sequences for everyone using about 3 of their moves.
I love the music in the intro, it’s sounds kind of familiar
“Hey, you know that big show that we hold every January 4 in the Tokyo Dome? We need to give it a name and thus, we shall call it… WRESTLE KINGDOM! We know that we have a series of games that are called Wrestle Kingdom and thus, we need to give our January 4 super show the name Wrestle Kingdom so that it would sound cool and it would be having that big time feel just like WWE’s WrestleMania or the deceased WCW’s Starrcade”
-a snippet of a meeting between New Japan’s top executives regarding what they’ll call their big event that they hold every January 4 at the Tokyo Dome
3:50 All these games are basically Pokemon style battle games but with monster wrestlers instead of Pokemon.
Had loads of fun playing ringside angels on the megadrive. Figuring out finishers was incredibly hard though with no internet guides available
Hey Kim where did your FF7 videos go?
I was watching your review or playthrough and now I cant find it anywhere
Great video! Haven’t seen a lot of these before, cheers Kim 👍
Great stuff. If I can make a recommendation to you, Hybrid Wrestler: Togo Denshou for the Super Famicom from Technos (yes, the Wrestlefest devs!). It's based on the Pancrase promotion, from the days before it was a legit MMA outfit.
Awesome to see you here!
I always enjoy videos of games i didn't know anything about, Some of these look cool
I recently played monster pro wrestling recently on my LDK console recently whilst surfing random games. Really enjoyed it despite it all being in Japanese ... It's nuts
Enjoyed the Toukon retsuden games on the ps1. On the first at least you had the option to run at 60hz or 30hz with better graphic detail. Very unusual for the time
As far as I remember the third game also had a 60FPS option, while in the second one it was a hidden option. Too bad that the match would be limited to two wrestlers without the Ref if you used 60FPS.
Any day you do a wrestling video is a very good day
Honestly, can't decide which show is my fav, this or gamesack.
Surprised the Zen Nippon series wasn’t mentioned in the Super Famicom part. Definitely should check them out if you haven’t
Okay, we need to raise some money to buy Kim a Sega Saturn and a copy of All-Japan Pro Wrestling Featuring Virtua. It’s a classic of the genre by the creators of the Giant Gram series on Dreamcast. There are also two Fire Pro Wrestling titles that are well worth playing, but AJPW is the king on Saturn. Its omission from any Western release was absolutely criminal.
Great roundup - well done Kim!
Did you consider Queen of Queens on the PC-FX? It's amazing.
Very interesting topic. Great stuff as usual Kim.
Cuty Suzuki's Ringside angels was by FAR the best wrestling game available in the early 90's, it had tons more moves than any other game at the time, and I remember us working out the japanese scripts for the move names so we could select them on the selection screen, including some insane special finishing moves, for example throwing your opponent way up in the air and electrocuting them on the signs above! You could also use weapons like a chain produced from your tights. I think if you'd have spent more time figuring this stuff out you'd have been more impressed, it completely destroyed anything else at the time.
Without fail, every time I see the thumbnail for this video I think the guy on the left is old Marty Janetty. Every. Time.
I came here to seek the answer to one question...
...is she going to mention _Rumble Roses?_
It's Japanese, it's not Fire Pro (but it wasn't Japan only, it's also a Konami game and was probably more a competitor to Dead or Alive than Fire Pro and that's before we mention _Rumble Roses XX)_
I did a video on Rumble Roses actually! Unfortunately it fell victim to the great Wrestling purge after those strikes.
I've never played it but there is this Joshi Game called Stardust Suplex that looks fun!
I so wish I could get a hold of some of these
I want to play sooo many of these but I'm in the United States & would love English physical versions. 😔 is there anyway? Love the wrestling game videos KIM!
There was one aki based wcw game for ps1 called wcw vs the world. it oddly enough has sting in his crow gear almost a year before he did it.
What consoles is the square enix game on? Is it only PS2?
Yes
Joshi rules and I want to try the konami one keep the great content Kim cheers from Uruguay
who the heck is that vp2 model that looks like an old stickman supposed to be?
Giant Baba. It's very accurate!
my god closed captions are great on this one
YAY A NEW KIM VIDEO!
awesome vid quite shocked theres no mention of the fmw game on snes
I considered it but decided to hold it for now. Plenty more games out there. That and it's more of a fighting game than a proper wrestling one
@@Kim_Justice true but it is an interesting curio of a game
It would be so cool if we had a wrestling game where you could play with classic characters like Snake or Kratos for example. Konami had a very interesting idea there.
Senator Armstrong, and Pyramid Head could be tag champs.
Where is the misawa documentary?
Giant Gram 2000 is still an amazing game that doesn't get enough love, including on this video! It's the only wrestling game I've played where characters feel and play different, with unique movesets that you have to learn the different commands for, much like Virtua Fighter or Tekken. As good as Fire Pro or Aki games are, once you've learnt how to play with one character you can play well with all. It also has unique moves as in ASPW3, such as Kawada Ganso Bombing Misawa.
I never had a N64, so I can't say much about Virtual Pro Wresting/No Mercy or the Yuke's NJPW games there (Shin Nihon Pro-Wrestling: Toukon Honoo Dou BRAVE SPIRITS and Shin Nihon Pro-Wrestling: Toukon Honoo Dou 2 - The Next Generation). But after abandoning not only Yuke's games but mostly most western wrestling games (well, there weren't that many left beside the Yuke's games) I pretty much only got the previous japanese titles up until the the 6th console generation. But my personal favorite of them all is King of Colosseum II and the IMO best PS1 wrestling (that also was the engine base for King of Colosseum) AJPW: King's Souls (Zen-Nihon Puroresu: Ouja no Kon). I spend hundreds of hours playing King of Colosseum Red and Green, translating parts of the movelists (which are still at GameFAQs) and later playing King of Colosseum II and All Star Pro Wrestling III again for hundreds of hours. There are still a couple of wrestler edits for the Square-Enix game online, that I made back then.
On the SNES I haven't played that much beside Fire Pro Wrestling. But I know about the AJPW games there, but didn't like them that much. And I'm talking about Zen Nihon Pro-Wrestling (later turned into Natsume Championship Wrestling), Zen Nihon Pro-Wrestling Dash: Sekai Saikyou Tag and Zen Nihon Pro-Wrestling 2: 3-4 Budokan. The Classic Gameboy title Zen Nihon Pro-Wrestling Jet also looks very good for a wrestling title on that system. But there's also the really weird Zen-Nihon Pro Wrestling: Fight da Pon!, which is essentially a game using board game and playing card mechanics.
And talking about these card mechanics. I always found the Wrestling Angels series interesting, but this playing-cart-gameplay was very off-putting (and confusing for someone who doesn't speak japanese). But there's also the more traditional Onita Atsushi FMW game but I didn't find that very appealing either.
Also worth mentioning is Zen Nihon Joshi Puroresu: Joou Densetsu: Yume no Taikousen (PS1 aka AJPW Womens: Legend of Queens), another Joshi title which had fantastic animations. But somehow I don't like gameplay that much, that is centered around various dizzy stages of your opponent. This always felt really silly and I didn't like that in Yuke's NJPW Toukon Retsuden games either (which I all played). One of the few japanese titles that I've never played were the Puroresu Sengokuden games on the PS1with Puroresu Sengokuden: Hyper Tag Match, Shuukan Puroresu Kanshuu: Pururesu Sengokuden - The Real Pro-Wrestling World and Puroresu Sengokuden 2: Kakutou Emaki.
Interesting are also some of the really bad games like Zen Nihon Joshi Pro Wrestling: Queen of Queens (All Japan Women Pro Wrestling: Queen of Queens) for the PC-FX, which is one of the rare games using FMV for all the gameplay, which absolutely sucks.
I would like a Fire Pro game for Android. Do you think they will get one?
Make a video about all super famicom wrestling games please?
Would be cool if you had a look at the original xbox japan only puro game 'The Wild Rings', basically 8 man AKI like wrestling game.
By the time you said that Cutie Suzuki cover wasn't all that cool I was already on ebay looking for one
As someone familiar enough with pro wrestling but who has probably played all of 10 minutes of wrestling games that All Star 3 from Square Enix really looks appealing. I think if I were to ever try one that would be it.
Virtual pro-wrestling is my favorite wrestling game om N64. Fire Pro series is my favorite wrestling series altogether though. I always felt King of Collisseum was way better than No Mercy.
Gouraud shading on sprites?
I really should set up Giant Gram 2000 in my Sega Naomi arcade cabinet again
VPW2: Oudou Keishou is the best AKI engine game period. Even better than No Mercy. The mma style grapples, the combo editor, the mask editor makes this the most customizable AKI game and the roster is amazing.
Maniac Pro Wrestling reminds me a lot of (WWF) MicroLeague Wrestling. That game used captures from actual matches and was a blast when I was a kid.
Incidentally, I agree about FirePro. I'd rather not know how much of my life has been sunk into that series
THE KING OF COLOSSEUM 2 was the best wrestling game ever despite the blocky graphics.
Try all Japan pro wrestling featuring virtua on the Saturn.
Thanks Kim. Lets see what you got (grabs lunch)
I own Hammerlock wrestling, and I only played it once or twice, since I just found it really difficult to get into....
Awesome. Thanks, Kim. Japanese wrestling and video games. Perfect!
24:49 now that's fucking stupid. Why can't every wrestler do any move off the ramp? Feels more like a downside to me.
Of course you wouldn't forget Virtual pro wrestling 2.
The Wrestling Kingdom games are vastly underrated and the second one had fantastic graphics, better than some ps3 games
Maniac Pro Wrestling reminds me of captain tsubasa games on the famicom. They're weird RPGs.
You should check out the long running Wrestle Angels series. I never got into the gameplay (RPG style turn-based with playing cards), but these look like interestling games.
I would love to play ASPW 3, really! But I'm having a little bit of a problem.
I can't seem to finding it online for download, I play using a psx2 emulator and the last time I found this game it didn't work, the game was really, really, really slow and I couldn't find any way to fix that, so ended up deleting it. Now I know it was big mistake!
If someone can provide some information on how can I find this game and how could I emulate withoud problems I would really aprecciate!
Thank you!
I've been watching this Reddit thread www.reddit.com/r/Roms/comments/d2abik/all_star_pro_wrestling_3_ps2_iso_link/ There was an updated link yesterday!
Not really a wrestling person (though this was still a fascinating video regardless), but All Nippon Pro Wrestling Featuring Virtua on the Saturn is unique in that it features Virtua Fighter characters!
Virtual pro wrestling 2 is my favorite and in my opinion greatest pro wrestling video game
Virtual pro 2 is probably still the greatest ever made. I still have it but no 64 lol
Fantastic video Kim! Too bad the recent Fire Pro is rubbish and getting worse with ludicrously overpriced monetization. Fire Pro R is the pinnacle.
Will have to check a bunch of these out.
If you actually want to see what a 3D Fire Pro game would be like, Kim, check out 'Iron Slam 96' on PS1...it literally IS.
Natsume Championship Wrestling was soooo good
All star pro wrestling 3 and King of colosseum 2 might be the best sim pro wrestling games
The first two PC engine games remind me of JRPG games.
17.52 1st Japanese dreamcast import I bought.
Why did you stop uploading wrestling videos? I am sure you made 3 videos and deleted them later
kim the announcer is the best part of power move