Kabuki Quantum Fighter ・ 地獄極楽丸
Developed by: Human Entertainment
Published by: Pack-In-Video (JP), HAL Laboratory (NA), Nintendo (EU)
Release date: December 21, 1990 (JP) | January 1991 (NA) | February 20, 1992 (EU)
Living up to the NESJunk name, I’ve been playing a lot of junk for the blog lately. It’s been a good day when a game gets a 5/10, and that’s no way to live. Feeling like I needed an injection of something both interesting and quality in my retro gaming life, I turned my attention towards a game that’s been on my radar for years, if only for its weird title: 1991’s Kabuki Quantum Fighter.
So what’s Kabuki all about? You’re gonna love this. Ninja Gaiden, Mega Man, and Sunsoft’s Batman had a baby, and the baby was an ancient kabuki actor who kills flesh-and-blood demons in a virtual hellscape with his hair. If that doesn’t get your blood pumping, I’m not sure we can be friends.
Kabuki Quantum Fighter tells the tale of Scott O’Connor, a man with many accomplishments under his belt. To name but a few:
- Managed to become a Colonel at age 25. This is especially impressive, considering soldiers must serve over 20 years before they’re eligible for the Colonel rank,
- Is a total wizard when it comes to computers, which was still a rarity in 1991,
- Has retained his youthful face, despite being a soldier since he was out of diapers. Once you look past the receding hairline, he looks like a 13 year old anime boy,
- Frequently helps little old ladies cross the street, probably.
Is there anything Scott can’t do? God, I miss the “one-man army” trope from movies and games back then. We didn’t know how good we had it in the 80’s. Or maybe we did. This game actually came out in 1991, so I’m talking out of my ass anyways.
So there’s a virus infiltrating the world’s computer systems, threatening nuclear meltdown across the planet. How does one stop a super virus when Norton and Mcafee didn’t exist yet? Easy: convert the colonel’s brain into raw binary code, and let him run around inside cyberspace to kill the virus with his bare, yet still somehow virtual, hands. Nobody in the war room had any better ideas. Nobody certainly had any more badass ideas.
Lucky for the blonde haired blue-eyed American/Irishman(?) Scott O’Connor, it turns out he has an ancestor who was a Japanese kabuki actor (??), so the spirit of said ancestor manifests when he’s in the computer (???) and gives him ninja-like powers (????). Kabuki actors aren’t ninjas! They’re thespians! This shit is crazy. I love it.
Kabuki Quantum Fighter is a Ninja Gaiden clone, but I don’t use “clone” in a disparaging manner here. If I was a video game from the late 80’s/early 90’s, I’d wanna be a Ninja Gaiden clone too. I don’t know if that makes any sense, but I meant it from, like, the depths of my soul.
Much like Ninja Gaiden’s Ryu, Scott is a nimble guy. He can climb up certain walls and railings, and can fling himself from bar to bar like the very best trapeze artists this side of Pacoima. He might not control as tightly as Ryu, but something Ryu doesn’t have a patch on is Scott’s default attack. Swords and shurikens are cool, I guess, but have you ever seen a game character attack by headbanging so hard that his hair whips enemies to the point of exploding?! If you’re still not sold on this game, you should check your pulse. You might not have one.
It’s always a pleasant surprise when a game has dope graphics to go alongside fun gameplay. As implied at the start of this review, it’s not every day you get to enjoy both of those elements at the same time when it comes to the NES. Scott’s sprite animations are lovely and fluid, and the environments are a HUGE standout. KQF boasts this awesome cyberhell/body horror aesthetic; the walls are dripping with melting faces, squirming intestines, ribcages used as platforms, clusters of eyes that watch you as you pass by…and need I remind you, alongside all of this is a kabuki with a huge, deadly bush of red hair that’d make most 80’s glam rock acts feel downright emasculated. It’s so damn cool. Strictly in terms of art direction, this has gotta be one of my favourite NES games to date.
Honestly, it’s tough to find anything negative to talk about here. The third level is the only thing I didn’t thoroughly enjoy about KQF; it’s this vertically scrolling stage with tons of tricky jumps, and strategically placed enemies that get in the way of said jumps. Falling doesn’t mean you die, but it means you have to climb your way back up, which is almost worse. It’s like Elec Man’s stage from Mega Man, but three times as long and aggravating. And also with a tight time limit. Not fun. But the rest of this game? So fun. Don’t let that third level stop you from enjoying everything bookending it.
Kabuki Quantum Fighter is crazy underrated in the grand scale of 8-bit games. Hell, I could have just left it at “Kabuki Quantum Fighter is crazy” and that would’ve been a sufficient review. If not for that painful third level, I’d give it an even higher score. But it’s still very much worth playing and experiencing; it’s a oddball Japanese game from a time where oddball Japanese games were at their finest. If that appeals to you, nothing else needs to be said. Don’t sleep on Kabuki Quantum Fighter, else Scott O’Connor might get you with an expertly aimed headbang to the jugular. And if you know what’s good for you, you don’t want that.
Final Score:
NESJunk 