GAME CLEAR No. 27 -- Virtua Fighter 2

Virtua Fighter 2 (1994, Multiplatform)

Developer: SEGA AM2
Publisher: SEGA
Clear Date: 5/27/2021
Clear Platform: Saturn

With Virtua Fighter 5: Ultimate Showdown coming out imminently, I decided to finally try to get through arcade mode in Virtua Fighter 2. It didn’t hurt that I got a new Saturn pad in the mail as well. This is gonna be a brief review of both!

So, full disclosure, I ended up cheesing the hell out of this. After giving arcade mode a couple honest tries with Jeffry and Jacky, I got pretty frustrated at the fairly difficult, one-chance final boss Dural. I Googled around and found out you could basically totally cheese the game with Jeffry’s flying ass, so I did that and it worked! Obliterated everyone no problem (on easy).

So that’s credits. Is it a good game? Yeah, fairly! It feels good, and the animations are definitely surprisingly good for the time. The counters and grabs are surprisingly fluid, even compared to some of the more canned animation of modern day fighting games. Color me impressed. Like many arcade style games, I haven’t really spent a ton of time with this prior to credits, so my opinion isn’t fully informed. Nevertheless, this definitely seems like something that would’ve been revolutionary at release, and I can definitely appreciate that.

But what about the Retro-Bit officially licensed Saturn controller? It’s pretty good too! I purchased the white Japanese-style controller since I already have an OEM controller with my North American Saturn. I went with the $35 wireless version since it supports both the original Saturn and has a USB dongle for modern hardware. It feels remarkably similar to the original. I did a quick A/B test between my original and the new one, and they feel nearly identical in my hands in terms of weight and shape. The face buttons feel maybe a bit better on the original, but the shoulder buttons feel a bit better on the new Retro-Bit. It features “Home” and “Select” buttons, which I assume helps with its Switch compatibility. It claims to have a 30hr battery life which I have not come close to running up against. The controller also comes with a carrying case for it and its dongles, which is especially handy for keeping up with the latter. Finally, it does feature the SEGA logo as an officially licensed product. Totally superficial, but it does lend it a certain sense of legitimacy that is often missing from other reproduction controllers.

Playing Virtua Fighter 2 felt great, and I’m sure I’ll get plenty more use out of it as I continue to collect for and play Saturn. I haven’t yet tested it on other hardware, but it claims compatibility with PC (of course) as well as Switch and PS3. I imagine it would pair quite nicely with some retro offerings on those consoles and/or Steam, not to mention emulation. Overall pretty pleased with the device so far.