GODDAMN PIERRE LE GODDAMN CHEF

When I was a kid, back in the days of the mighty SNES (and the slightly less mighty MegaDrive), the aquisition of a new game was a rare event indeed. New games usually only arrived at Christmas and on birthdays, but evey now and then I would be presented with a game out of the blue. Sometimes this turned out very well (like Megaman 3), but more often than not, the no-doubt well meaning family member had bought me an absolute dog, like Mindscape's 1993 debacle Pierre Le Chef is Out To Lunch. I hate this game deeply, but in the interests of therapy, I decided to have another go at it. If nothing else, this article can serve as a warning to anyone foolhardy enough to attempt to play this unmitigated dreck.


First of all, just look at the box art:


That is not the face of a man I want to spend my time controlling. That, ladies and gentlemen, is the face of a date rapist. Why isn't he looking at the anthropomorphic tomato he's trying to catch instead of staring out of the screen at me, the creepy bastard?
Anyway, the basic premise of the game is this: You play as a French chef, and you are dropped into a nightmarish environment of floating platforms, where you must capture various ingredients with a butterfly net and dump them in cage. It is never explained what terrifying cataclysm caused all of Pierre's ingredients to come to life, but I'm going to assume it involved the Large Hadron Collider.
You start off in Switzerland. Wait a minute, isn't that where the Large Hadron Collider is?


Get ready for Switzerland, indeed. So, the level starts, and you have to go and find your food-catching net. Oh, sorry, didn't I mention that you have to go and find all your items, including the THE GODDAMN NET at the start of every single stage? Well, you do. Once you have it, you can start catching the food: just make sure you don't touch the food, because it hurts you. Wait, what? What kind of chef gets hurt BY TOUCHING FOOD!? You would think such a condition might rule you out of the food service industry, but what the hell do I know? Right, food collecting. There's cheese and eggs and tomatoes and what I though was a boulder throughout my childhood but it turns out to be a potato. The world of food preparation truly is a mysterious one.


Once you've got the required amount of food in the cage, a magic door opens to take you to the next level. If you hang around once you've put some food in the cage, some other French prick turns up and lets it out again. In a shocking outburst of originality, he is called Le Chef Noir. If you do have the misfortune to play Out To Lunch, you will want to stab him in his smug French face. Just go to Tesco like everbody else, you pair of fucking dicks.


If you take too long to finish the level, the screen fades to black in a mushroom-shaped silhouette. I like to believe that this musroomy vortex is dragging Pierre into the furthest, darkest reaches of Hell, a place of unspeakable torment from which he will never escape.
You can also get a fruit bonus. I'm not going to make a joke about that, though.


The level design is like a greatest hits compliation of terrible game-making decisions. Now That's What I Call Frustrating Bullshit, if you will. There are invisible traps, identical walls that you may or may not be able to walk through, overly-slippery ice platforms... oh, and the music. The terrible, terrible music, music that will drill through your skull like a jet-powered termite and melt your god-damn brain, and not in a good way.


Eventually, you get to go to other countries. They are all equally terrible. This time, I only managed to get to Greece before I gave up. I vaguely remember France being the last level, and I think China and Jamaica were in there too. But if you're thinking of playing the game to see that, please don't: I don't want to be held responsible. Pierre le Chef? Pierre le Douche, more like. Catharsis is a beautiful thing.

PS: Up until today, I though the game was just called Pierre le Chef. It isn't.

PPS: Here's a gameplay video. Don't say I didn't warn you.

5 GREAT VIDEOGAME VOCAL SONGS THAT AREN'T "STILL ALIVE".

Apparently, some videogames have songs in them that have actual words. Words! Who knew. Here are five of my favourites, not including, you know, that one.

You're Not Here, Silent Hill 3

While not quite reaching the dizzy heights of excellence that it's precursor did, SH3 was pretty goddamn amazing, and the mirror room incident has probably scarred me for life. One of the things I like about it is the intro song, You're Not Here. Here's a video, complete with some pretty creepy lip-synching from Heather, the protagonist.

It manages to sound very much in the Silent Hill tradition whilst being a little different, and I'll give Akira Yamaoka much credit for that. He knows how to knock up a tune, that lad.

Johnny No More, Rising Zan

Rising Zan is an obscure PS1 slash-and-shoot-em-up, in which you play a cowboy who learns how to be a samurai. Wait, why am I telling you this? It's all spelled out in the intro song!

Yeah, it's catchy. Now that I've watched it again, I shall be crooning Rising Zaaaaaaan at anyone I happen to come across, and you will too.

Ending Song, God Hand

God Hand is, along with Global Defence Force, one of the most criminally overlooked games for the PS2 and it remains a firm favourite of mine. Punching midget Power Rangers never gets old. Upon completing the game, you get the God Hand Ending Credits Song, and it is good:

It sounds like a lost '70 giant robot anime theme tune, and this is a wonderful thing. It also make reference to Mike Tyson's famous "My style is impetuous" rant (as do some of the enemies in-game). Oh Iron Mike, you crazy ear-biting scamp. Please don't eat my children.

Life Was A Bore, Outrun 2006

Oh man, this is a cheesy song. Cheesier than a giant sack full of cheese, floating in a sea of Dairylea. But I do love it so. This song's great strength is that it fits perfectly with the gameplay. No song better matches up with the feeling of powersliding around a mountain in a Ferrari, driving recklessly to impress a girl.

It does feature some legitimately excellent drumming, and I really like the guitar solo. So it's good cheese, like a nice chilli cheese. I also like Night Flight from the same game, but it loses out on a place here because it feature the lyrics "This is paradise / and it's very nice," which may well be the worst lyrics ever written.

King of King's Song, We Love Katamari.

It's just insane.

Another song that fits perfectly with the mood of the game, which in Katamari's case is the mood you get after eating peyote that's coated in candy-floss. It sounds like the theme music to the greatest 80's action film of all time, and I love it.

VIOLENCE FIGHT

Big men, big punches, big violence; it's Taito's 1989 arcade fighter, Violence Fight!

Let's just take a moment to take in that name: Violence Fight. The developers clearly sat down to decide on a name and said "well, the game's about fighting. Violent fighting, not that pussy-ass non-violent kind. We need a name that reflects both the fighting and violence aspects of this title. I know, how about Violence Fight?". Rejected titles include Face Puncher, Large Guy Battle and SlamCrunch: The Legend of Slam Crunchington. The more I think about the title, the more I am awed by its almost transcendent simplicity. Violence. Fight. Violence Fight. It's like a zen koan for emotionally subnormal people. I am enlightened.
So, a game about men fighting violently. But, I hear you scream, why do they fight? Is there a reason, a prime motivator? Well, of course there is, brought to us via the medium of some scrolling text in the attract mode. I'll quote it in its entirety, because it is a thing of beauty.

"In the early part of the 1950's in the USA, a game called "Violence Fight" was in vogue among mafia, reckless drivers and general businessmen. The "Violence Fight" was the game to struggle for "No. 1 Quareller" with fighters who were gathered from all parts of the USA speaking boastingly of their strength. And of course a lot of winning money as well as the honor were given to the "winner". Here in a downtown in L.A., a young fighter "Bat" and his manager "Blinks" seek for the winning money eagerly. As a matter of fact, can Bad take the no. 1 place of the USA?"
Wow. Now that is a good-sized chunk of Engrish right there, and some of my favourite ever found in a videogame. The audience of the Violence Fight must be a pretty mixed bunch. The Mafia I can understand being there; an underground fighting tournament sounds like a pretty Mafia thing to do. Then there's the reckless drivers. People who drive without due care and attention are well-know for their desire to watch brutal bloodsports. Perhaps reckless driving is a far more serious offence in Japan, you know, on the same level as organised crime. Oh, and then there's the general businessmen. Salarymen need violence too, and if anyone looks forward to seeing men speak boastingly of their strength, it's middle-management types. But who are the contenders in this battle to become the no. 1 quareller? Let's have a look at the fighters!


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There's Bat Blue, the obligatory all-rounder with a nice line in lemon-yellow jeans. I'm telling you, yellow jeans are going to be the next hot fashion trend. You laugh now, but you'll all be wearing them. Other than his trousers, Bat is painfully generic. Then there's Lee Chen, kung-fu master with the deadly ken(hands) that he learned in his child age. He's good a jumping and kicking, but you already knew that because he's a kung-fu master. Lee Chen is painfully generic. On the bottom right is Ben Smith, an ex-marine boxer. As a boxer you'd think he'd be good at punching, but no; speed's his bag. Ben Smith is painfully generic. Wait, did I already say that? Finally we have Lick Joe. Yes, Lick Joe. I know it's only a small mistranslation between the L and the R, but goddamn if it didn't make me giggle like a fucking idiot. He's a pro-wrestler, or rather a former pro-wrestler, having been kicked out for killing 13 of his opponents. 13! The governing body that oversaw wrestling in to '50s needs to get its act together. It took 13 deaths for them to ban Lick Joe? Okay, one death is a tragic accident, two is a macabre coincidence, but three? Three should have been the point when they sat him down and said "look, Lick, we're sorry, but you're A MASS MURDERER and therefore we must regretfully revoke your wrestling licence. Turn in your leotard and hair-grease". I like the fact that his description says he killed them "during playing," like he's a fucking bear or something and he accidently mauled them to death. Well, due in no small part to his many murders, as well as his hilarious name, I shall be playing as Lick.

That actual gameplay is fairly standard: it's just PitFighter with enormous sprites. Really, they are some very big sprites, which might explain the rather small roster of opponents. There's a punch buton, a kick button and a jump button, and pressing P or K with jump executes a special punch or kick. And, uh, that's it. You just have to beat up the other guy, best of three rounds. Violence Fight is painfu... never mind. The immedate problem with Lick is that, despite being a professional wrestler, there are no grapple moves. Ah. I mean sure, he's beefy, but beef alone cannot win this... VIOLENCE FIGHT!! Um, sorry about that. Anyway, he's got a drop kick, and the drop kick is always the most effective move, so I'll stick with that. Me and Lick, baby, going all the way to the top. With repeated mashing of the drop kick buttons, the first fight is soon passed. Between fights, you get a nice shot of your chosen fighter with their manager:

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Jesus Christ, it turns out that Lick transforms into Pat Butcher between fights. That is a scary prospect. Bat's manager appears to have taken time off from tying damsels to train-tracks to do a bit of managing on the side, and Lee Chen's manager has really nailed the "stereotypical Chinaman" look there. At least Ben gets a woman manager, even if her hair is made of spaghetti. And before anyone asks, I have no idea what "Sammy You!" means. Send your suggestions to the usual address.
So the fighting continues, until the message "BONUS STAGE!" appears. Oh goody, a bonus stage! What'll it be today? Smashing a car, punching fish out of waterfall? Oh, I see, I'll be fighting a tiger. Aww crap.


I endangered his species, ha. Sadly, the tiger is not an unlockable playable character.
Eventually some non-playable bosses appear. First up is Ron Max, a bald redneck who likes to headbutt you in the gut. Drop kicks settled his hash, I can tell you. Once he's defeated, it's time for the final boss, and I pity the fool who has to go up against...


...Mr. T! Yes, in one of the most blatant examples of this kind of thing I've ever seen, the last boss is Mr. T Tony Won, and what a cheap bastard he is, battering you with a chain while the crowd throw bottles at you. Those reckless drivers sure can get rowdy. Even the patented "mash drop kick" technique struggled here, so I had to resort to trapping him in a corner and chopping him to death. And with that, the Violence Fight is over... Or is it?! No, it's not. After Tony Won, you have to fight a clone of yourself, with the game telling you "Don't you remember me? I'm your younger brother!" which if you ask me is how all videogames should end. Strangely, your younger brother, being just a clone of you, is actually far easier to beat that Tony Won, what with them not having all that chain-whipping bullshit on their side. It's actually quite a nice change, and I think more games should make the second-to-last boss the tough one, and make the final boss a pushover. I mean really, how often is the person at the top of the command structure the toughest guy in the whole organization? I know I'd rather fight Hitler one-on-one than the whole of the SS.
The ending is rather downbeat, in that it essentially say "Congratulations, champ! Now prepare for a life of greater struggle for diminishing returns as young upstarts dedicate themselves to kicking your ass and taking your crown!" (I may have paraphrased, but not much.)
In the end, Violence Fight is generic. Real generic. The characters are generic (or Mr. T), the stages are generic, the music is so generic I'm not even sure I remember hearing any and the gameplay is wildly innovative. No, I'm kidding, it's really generic. Do yourself a favour and give Violence Fight a miss, unless, like me, you find the name Lick Joe hilarious. Because, you see, it sounds like a command! Lick Joe!

ALIEN SPRITES 1986-94

It's a bug hunt! Yes, in a similar vein to my Batman Sprites article, here's a rundown of some of the many pixellated representations of H. R. Giger's most terrifying creation.

Alien 3, 1992, NES, Probe

Sleek and midnight blue, the Alien from the NES version of Alien 3 actualy looks pretty darn good. Despite the limited graphical capabilities of the NES, they really captured the look of the "Dog" alien from the film. Although, now that I look more closely, it looks like it has a pistol on the tip of its tail. As if Ripley didn't have enough to deal with.

Alien vs. Predator - The Last of His Clan, 1993, GameBoy, Activision

What a cheerful-looking acid-spitting nightmare from space! He looks like he's fairly skipping through the levels in search of his prey. He really doesn't look all that threatening, sort of like a Muppet Babies: Alien Edition version of the Xenomorph, his pixellated face betraying the merest hint of a smile.

Aliens, 1986, Arcade, Konami

I wonder why the bright pinky-purple Xenomorph didn't catch on? Possibly it's his odd stance, looking like he's praying to some Alien god, possibly asking to be granted a second leg so that he might chase down his prey more effectively. Actually, he looks like he's performing injury-prone English rugby bloke Jonny Wilkinson's famous pre-kick pose:


If I knew anything about rugby, I'd make some kind of pun here. Instead, I'll point out that the Alien's tail doesn't look like it's in the best condition. It's all... pink. And floppy. Eww. To make you feel better, here's a picture of the awesome-looking Powerloader from the same game:

Bay twelve, please!

Alien 3, 1993, MegaDrive, Probe

The MegaDrive Alien looks strangely muscular, with big beefy thighs and no neck. He's the steroid-abuser of the Alien world. I bet he picked on the Chestbursters at school, stealing their dinner money and flushing their heads down the toilet. What a prick.

Alien vs. Predator, 1993, SNES, Activision

A very skeletal-looking Alien here. Maybe the developers thought that Aliens weren't scary enough, so they made them undead. Undead Aliens. Yep. He's a bit of a pixellated mess, to be honest. I think it's the strange stiff-armed pose that makes me not like him so much. He looks like his arms are made of coathangers!

Alien vs. Predator, 1994, Arcade, Capcom

The greatest of all Alien-based videogames, Capcom's AvP is a true classic. Just look at that Alien! A true masterpiece of spritework. Everything about it is perfect. I... I think I'm in love. Seriously though, the graphics in AvP are pretty much perfect. I only wish more games looked like that. What you can't see is that they're equally well animated, scuttling around on the floor like they bloody well should. In fact, see for yourself. !WARNING! Video contains dangerous concentrations of BAD-ASSERY.
Well, that's all for today; it's time to take off and nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

SILENT HILL 2'S SECRET HIDDEN CODE!

Silent Hill 2 is the best videogame ever made. There, I said it. It's out there now. You can deny it all you like, but I know I'm right. One of the reasons it (and the first three Silent Hill games in general) is so great is the attention to detail, the little bits of graffitti, the hidden messages in the Coin puzzle... What's that, you say? You didn't know there was a hidden message in the Coin puzzle? Well, there is; I present it to you now for your edification.
Near the start of the game, in the Blue Creek apartments, there is a puzzle in which you have to insert three coins depicting a Prisoner, and Old Man and a Snake into a desk to get it to open. Here's some pictures of the three coins (pictures from the Silent Hill Wiki).

What you may have noticed is that there is some writing around the edge of the coins. Taking a closer look, it looks a lot like Greek, right? Well, that's because it is, kinda, Windows generally comes with a font installed called "Symbol Font", and if you write out the alphabet in the Symbol font, it looks like this (capitals on the top, lower case on the bottom):
So, the symbol font essentially replaces letters with their nearest equivalent in the Greek alphabet, which is what is used around the edge of the coins. So, if we take the Prisoner coin (the one with the woman on it) and write down the Greek letters that appear around the edge, we get this:

If you highlight the Symbol font text and change it to a standard font like Times New Roman, a message appears! The message on the Prisoner coin says "tatsuki ga kyonen no junigatu ni umaremasita", which, even I can see is Japanese. The letters in brackets in the image above are letters that are sometime included in the word, but not in this case. Either way, the words mean the same thing. And, with my limited knowledge of Japanese, I'm pretty sure the sentence says "Tatsuki was born in December of last year."
So there you are. A hidden message in the Prisoner coin, presumably to commemorate the fact that one of the developers had a child during the production of Silent Hill 2.
As for the Old Man and Snake coins, they have the same set of writing around the edge, which reads:

Looking at that, I would say "Eiichi Toshiko Rinta Asuma Zate Tugiha" is a list of names. There is an "Eiichi Ito" listed in the credits as an item designer, and I assume he would have been the person responsible for creating the coins. Beyond that, I don't know anything about this mysterious message.
So, there you go. Silent Hill 2 is even deeper than you thought. If you have any information on the mysterious messages, or you just want to tell me that my translation is horribly, horribly wrong (a fairly likely scenario), then send me an email at vgjunk@hotmail.co.uk.

CRIME FIGHTERS

If you're the kind of person who craves accuracy in all things, even videogame titles, then look no further than Konami's 1989 side-scrolling beat-em-up Crime Fighters. Try and guess what it's about!
As the title implies, you play as a guy who fights crime. That's fight in the most literal sense: you find some crime, walk up to it and punch it in the face. No arrest targets or rehabilitation here, it's just face-punching, groin-kicking and stomach-knifing. You play as an undercover cop who, given that this is a side-scroller from the late eighties, is almost certainly called either Billy or Jimmy, a man given the task of rescuing a bunch of women that have been kidnapped. It follows the standard beat-em-up template; walk across the stage, beat up some guys, get to the boss, next stage. Crime Fighters differs slightly in some regards, however. For one thing, there's no jump button. For someone like myself who completed the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade game through near-constant use of the jumping kick, this takes a while to get used to. You have a punch and a kick button, and pressing them together makes Billyjimmy perform a jumping knee attack or a backwards sobat-type thing. The game also makes the most of the kick button by letting you kick downed enemies; in fact, the first time you knock down an enemy the game places a large "KICK!" icon over the poor sod. This game really wants you to kick people while they're down, and I certainly got some pleasure from doing so. Perhaps all these videogames have made me a sociopath after all.

Crime Fighters also has punks. Lots and lots of punks. The majority of enemies are punks, and they menace you while performing cool punk actions like strutting around with their hands in their pockets and constantly fixing their hair. What did videogame developers of this era have against punks, anyway? Almost every side-scroller from this time (the ones set on modern-day Earth, anyway) features punks as enemies. I can only assume that the developers, influenced by various American media, realised that a "punk" is someone who you might well have a street brawl with, but they didn't know it was a more general term that means a scummy person and not just someone with a love of the music of the Sex Pistols or Rancid. So, thugs in Crime Fighers, Streets of Rage, Final Fight, etc are depicted as mohawk-sporting, leather-jacket-wearing, punk-music fans, as opposed to just "Street-punks". Also, giving them mohawks and safety-pin piercings makes them more visually interesting than if they were just slightly dodgy-looking geezers, the kind of men who try and sell you stolen kitchen appliances in run-down pubs. Of course, I might be reading too deeply into the popularity of punks as enemies in this period. Perhaps these days, all the cannon-fodder enemies would be chavs.

Anyway, Crime Fighters has eight stages, and here's a quick rundown of them all:
Stage One: Subway

You start off in a subway station, fighting, you guessed it, punks! The backgrounds are nicely detailed and full of graffitti, and theres a large sign featuring a topless woman and the slogan "Are You Covered? Downtown Insurance Co.", which I can't believe has never been used in the real world. Eventually a train rolls in, and the boss gets out. Yes, you guessed it, he's a punk! A super-punk, no less, with a mohawk to challenge the very mohawks of the Gods. He swings a club at you until he gets dizzy and stops, giving you the perfect opportunity to batter him.

Stage Two: Subway Train

Ah, the subway train, a beat-em-up stage almost as ubiquitous as a lift full of enemies. The graffitti theme continues inside, as well as some animated posters, all of which appear to be advertising swimsuits. That's some pretty advanced technology just to sell a few bikinis. Some of the punks have weapons, mostly limited to lead pipes and knives, which are used with a particularly brutal-looking stab in the guts. There's also a big guy who swats you into the background, causing to flatten into the wall with an accompanying Looney Tunes-esque sound effect, and the vicious shankings and slapstick violence make for fairly disturbing bedfellows. The boss is a Jason Vorhees rip-off in a hockey mask who tries to cleave you with his mighty axe, only for it to get stuck in the floor and give you the opening you need to kill him.

Stage Three: City Streets.

The first thing I noticed was a sign in the background advertising something called "Krakus Ham" (only $1.49!). I have no idea what krakus ham is, but I'm sure it's delicious. There's a cinema; I can't read what's playing, but it does say there is "parking at Wilshire and Crescent", which I guess means that Crime Fighters is set in Los Angeles. You can get a gun from one of the enemies here, and it's much better than trying to shiv people, what with the ropey collision detection and all. Our hero sees a woman in the doorway of a stripjoint, goes over to try and (one assumes) simply say hello and pass the time of day, but a large man opens the door and flattens you against the wall. The boss is a large biker-type fellow who is drinking petrol straight from the pump, which sure is one expensive beverage. Just have a Coke, my good man! The petrol doesn't seem to have done him any good, and he's easy enough to beat.

Stage Four: Underground Construction Site

A fairly bland stage, this. There are punks, and steamrollers, and more punks. Yawn. The boss is cool, though: he's a chainsaw-wielding psycho who seems to be a combination of Jagi from Fist of the North Star, Mad Max and Leatherface. He's an arse to fight, though, as he repeatedly leaves his chainsaw in just the right position so that you get hit as soon as you stand up. This is deeply frustrating, and sadly it becomes something of a common theme with the bosses from now on.

Stage Five: Rooftops

Up amongst the neon signs, you get attacked by some kung-fu fighters, who have lots of moves and are rather more difficult to beat that the enemies previously fought. There's a sign for Begue Fashion, which I guess is a spoof of Vogue, but I did a Google search for "Begue" to be sure. It turns out Miss France 2008 was called Valerie Begue, and the Google search suddenly became much more interesting. A dominatrix attacks! Yes, it's not a side-scrolling beat-em-up until there's a dominatrix of some type involved, and this one is particularly whip-happy. Suddenly, it occurs to me that all the neon signs are pointing inwards, away from the street and towards the rooftops: surely that's the stupid way round. Konami finally stop pretending to have any shame, and the boss is a completely undisguised Freddy Kruger. Their only concession to it being a homage and not a rip-off is his lack of a hat and no stripes on his jumper. Luckily, Fakey Freddy doesn't have any magical dream-powers, and he's easy enough to beat.

Stage Six: Back Streets

Another slightly tedious stage. The most striking thing about it is the sheer amount of times you get to stab punks. The boss is a boxer with some super-fast punches, as well as the previously-mentioned ability to hit you before you can get up properly

Stage Seven: Docks

Tired of stabbing punks, our hero moves on to kicking dogs in the face. Truly, a hero for our times. The stage is short, and most of it is taken up by the boss, a large G.I. who must have really mastered C.Q.C. (counter-balance the knife, etc, etc,) because it's nigh-on impossible to hit him without getting hit several times yourself. He's a contender for "most irritating boss" title at my own personal Bad Videogame Moments awards ceremony, the trophy for which is in the shape of a joypad being thrown through a television. I hope he can conceal his disappointment when he loses out to all the bosses from Ninja Gaiden. When he eventually dies, he recreates the famous pose from the cover of Platoon. I hope he hasn't been saving that up for his entire life, because it's not as impressive as I suspect he thinks it is.

Stage Eight: Factory

The final stage, and as you would expect the game throws everything at you. The kung-fu warriors are out in force, and are as frustrating as ever. There are more goons with guns, and they take pot-shots at you while you're fighting the kung-fu guys, as if they weren't bad enough. Eventually, you reach a cage full of the captured girls, and a limo arrives. Out steps the final boss, who appears to be Duke Nukem after joining the CIA. He's got a gun, and he's not afraid to use it, and his constant grin gives him that added air of menace. He's tough to beat, but eventually he falls and you can free the lovely ladies.

But wait! The true final boss, a rather disappointing-looking fat chap, steps out of the car, throws out the key to the cage and says "Don't shoot!". When you go to pick up the key, the treacherous swine grabs a machine gun and attacks. Then follows one of my favourite final boss battles of all time. All you have to do is dodge the guy's bullets for long enough that you can land one punch on him; when you do, he falls to the ground, and the game forces you to kick him to death. That's right, once you knock him down, the only thing you can possibly do is kick a man to death as he begs for forgiveness. Thanks a lot, Konami. That's a black stain on my soul that will never be erased.
At least it's a happy ending for the women in the cage. Jimmy/Billy sets them free, and you get a nice graphic of him surrounded by the many ladies. He just can't restrain himself, though, and he says "Sorry to keep you waiting, girls. Do you mind being kidnapped again... by me?" The smiles on the women's faces seem to suggest that no, they don't mind at all, and Jimilly's incredibly cheesy line looks to have paid off. Seriously, when will he ever get a chance to use that line again? I say fair play to him. But that's still not the end of the game. As a bonus, there's an extra stage after the credits where you have to fight all the bosses at once. It's nigh-impossible, frustrating and tedious, and I suggest you just skip it. Okay, now the game's finished. I promise.

Crime Fighters has it's problems. The collision detection is fairly atrocious, the stages are short and the bosses can be simply unfair, which really gets on my wick. But it redeems itself with its cool boss designs, detailed background, good music and the ability to kick enemies in the balls, complete with a little "ding!" sound effect. Overall, worth a playthrough, as pretty much every Konami arcade game is.

Bonus!
The American arcade flyer for Crime Fighters went down the rather unfortunate route of using real live humans to advertise a videogame. The results are... not great.

(Flyer courtesy of The Arcade Flyer Archive. Click the pic for a larger view.)
If those bricks are to scale, they're either tiny bricks or GIANT HUMANS. The guy on the left looks filled with disdain, as though all the others are not nearly as good as him at depicting an eighties street punk. I wonder where these people are now?