Double Dragon Advance
- gameboy advance
Product Description
After a global nuclear war leaves the world in ruins, gangs emerge as the new elite by seizing control of the city. Twin brothers Jimmy and Billy Lee survive the cataclysmic event with their martial arts abilities intact, but Billy’s girlfriend is soon kidnapped by mysterious thugs. Now it’s up to you to guide both brothers owing to different stages filled with enemies and boss characters. Whether you play solo or cooperatively with a friend, you must master new techniques and weapons to find the girl and defeat the terrible guys.
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Rating: 3 / 5
I have played the original Double Dragon and Double Dragon 3 for the NES. Although the NES version only had 4 Levels, the GBA version should have a bit better graphics and longer gameplay.
The NES version of the Game made you use things around you to your advantage. I hope this game does the same!
Rating: 5 / 5
Looking at the box brings back a flood of memories, the days when action video sports meeting where unadorned and direct, rescue the girl or save the planet from some dark evil that is always cloaked in darkness. The hero is small, the enemy is huge, and immense over your pixel studded character, making your victory all the more glamorous.
It’s mob rule in New York after a brutal nuclear war. The streets aren’t safe to walk on even in the day time. Twin Brothers Billy and Jimmy Lee, master of a mysterious martial art they made called Sou-Setsu-Ken. They run a Kung Fu dojo to teach helpless civilians to defend themselves against street gangs, the most perilous gang being the Shadow Warriors.
The Lee Brothers received an troubling letter: “If you want Marian back, bring us the secret book of Sou-Setsu-Ken”-The Shadow Warriors
The evil Shadow Warriors want the Lee Brothers’ mysterious martial art! Well like hell they will give it to them! Billy and Jimmy depart on a pummeling rampage, kicking ass and taking names, all the way to confront the Shadows head honcho, Machine Gun Willy, on his home turf.
DD Advances is a fantastic revamped of the world’s most legendary Side scrolling, two-dimensional game. With polished graphics, using characters from both arcade sports meeting and the Super Nintendo game, and incorporating moves from all ports of the game NES, SNES, Arcade and Sega Genesis, Double Dragon Advanced brings back a class game playing and the prime reason to own a Game Boy Advanced.
Rating: 5 / 5
Darek Mok really underestimated this game in his review. I am a long time Double Dragon fan going back to 1987. Since then I’ve beaten the game on many systems including Double Dragon 1-3 NES, Game Boy 1-2, Arcade 1-2, Sega Master system, Amiga, Tiger Electronic game, and Double Dragon watch (back in the 1980’s and early 1990’s Tiger and other companies made game watches), and the most hard Double Dragon game I’ve beaten was the one for the Sega Game Gear.
This GBA version seems like a combination of the 1-2 sports meeting for the arcade which are extremely simple to beat.
The GBA version has many new moves and weapons like Nunchucks, sticks and the like. The Game Gear version you can pick up handguns and shotguns.
So by and large I will delight in this game for many years to come. As far as difficulty it seems a small simpler than the Game Gear version, but yet I’ve only gotten to level 5.
Rating: 5 / 5
This is not the Double Dragon you remember, but it’s a Double Dragon you’ll never forget!
Since we’re discussing classic sports meeting and nostalgia, a bit of a history lesson is in order, from my own (admittedly biased) perspective:
I had small interest in the GameBoyAdvance until I got a chance to play this title. It was released “way back” in late 2003, apparently only for a limited time, making it somewhat rare these days.
“Double Dragon Advance” is based directly on the 1987 arcade game, Double Dragon, a classic three button, two player brawler, produced by Taito (liscensed from Technos), that launched the fighting genre as even its predecessor “Renegade” never could. In the days before the one on one “Vs.” fighters, this coin-op title was king, and was quickly ported to every platform under the sun, inspiring several mostly lackluster sequels, spinoffs and countless imitations (some of which were quite excellent, like Final Fight, Vendetta, the Streets of Rage series, Alien Vs. Predator, Cadillacs & Dinosaurs, or the arcade TMNT sports meeting).
Featuring splendid graphics and sound for the time, it had colorful cartoony animation, memorable music, and bone crushing sound effects. The theme was a gritty, honestly realistic (for the time) street fight, with lots of moves to choose from, a variety of weapons, and two player cooperative action. At the close of the game, the two players (if they were both still standing) would face off in a grudge match to the death. While the whole concept made small sense in the real world, it was an extremely fun video game experience. During the game too, players could harm each other, so this presented the potential for competition or cooperating depending on the mood of the players.
A sequel was rushed out the following year in arcades “Double Dragon II: The Revenge” which was mostly a retread/enhanced remake of the first game, with “left and right attack” stylishness controls (like Renegade). The hardware was tweaked for less brake and the difficulty was greatly increased. The game was still excellent, but less well recieved than the original. After this the series took a nosedive in quality. Double Dragon III: the Rosetta Stone featured completely redrawn artwork that was much more generic than the original, the moves repetoire was stripped down and modified, and a lame “shop” feature was introduced where players had to insert more real coins to take virtual cash to buy extra lives, new moves and lame “endorsement” characters. The weapons were reduced to two, honestly weak ones, a sword and a pair of nunchucks. The NES version of DD3 was really different, and became something of a hit with fans, even though it still wasn’t a splendid game. The home console ports of the series had varying quality over the years, with the NES versions being the most well loved, but featuring scaled down graphics with small cartoony characters, fewer moves, weapons, and lots of puzzle and platform elements to increase the difficulty and distract from the fighting theme (Battletoads would handle this type of gameplay in a much better fashion some years down the road).
Eventually, a goofy cartoon and comic series were made inspiring an dreadful one on one fighting game called “Double Dragon V: The Shadow Cascade” and a honestly decent Neo Geo one on one fighter would be made based on the dreadful movie inspired by the game. The Super Famicom/SNES would feature Return of Double Dragon/Super Double Dragon which tried to give a fresh adventure in the spirit of the first two sports meeting, but due to strict deadlines, much of the game was cut and it finished up feeling very generic compared to the original game, with small, redrawn characters, generic enemies, and a much smaller repetoire of moves (favoring instead the ability to “charge up” potential to increase the strength of your punches and kicks, or block attacks to allow cheap “grapple” counter moves). The weapons in this game were made incredibly rare but incredibly cheap.
The original arcade game simply remained the best of the lot, in terms of graphics and gameplay.
There were some flaws of course. Players learned that the elbow punch go was in fact so powerful that you could win the game using it exclusively and never be hit by an enemy. Veterans learned to play the game for fun and limiting their use of this go. The game was also small, taking about 15 minutes to complete in one meeting (but the replay regard was such that one could play it over and over). Finally, due to hardware limitations, there was some brake when a lot of characters appeared on the screen. Many of the characters in the game were just the same sprite with a different haircut or different colored clothing/skintone, but it was so small that this didn’t become too repetitious.
==History Lesson Over, DDA make pleased starts here!==
Quick forward to the modern era. Double Dragon the series has seen copious sequels and spin offs, going from terrible to worse. Most people remember the original arcade game and probably the well loved NES takes on the series (with their inferior graphics, platforming elements, and high level of difficulty).
DDA goes back to the roots, recreating the entire arcade game, but with redrawn graphics (closer to the stylishness of “Return of Double Dragon” on the SNES), that keep up a faithful, gritty look to them, with “updated” hairstyles that still have a retro look to them (such as the Abobos with the “Afro” hairstyle). So some things are the same as the arcade game, some things different.
So what can DD fans expect?
Many new moves have been added. The elbow punch has been toned down so it’s not so powerful as it was before, and the brake has been removed. Some things from the arcade are missing, such as Jeff (the character who could do all the player’s moves and was a boss in stage 2) and the throwable box/crate.
Many features from the various DD sports meeting over the years have been incorporated into this title, forming a rather solid fighting game experience:
Players can now bow (a go that the enemies in the series could always do but never the player), and do an uppercut or a flying knee (similar to moves from the NES versions of Double Dragon 2 and 3) from the bow position. The headbutt is still there, but a running go (and dash attacks) have been added, as from Double Dragon III: The Rosetta Stone and “Vs. Mode” of the NES version.
There is a “block” feature, like Super Double Dragon/Return of Double Dragon. This go is hard to implement properly, but if done right, an incoming attack is intercepted and the enemy tossed over the player’s shoulder. Not as spectacular as the grab/beat downs of SDD/RODD but a welcome addition for advanced players.
A downed opponent can be “stomped on” much like Double Dragon III (and DD2 for the Gameboy) for extra hurt. The players can also “bow over” a fallen body and repeatedly punch it in the face (much like a similar go in the NES version of DD, which was inspired by another similar go in Renegade).
Players can still kick a large throwable object (oil drum, rock) with their foot, though it’s a bit harder to pull off than the arcade version and so less useful.
While all the moves from the first two arcade sports meeting appear and then some (though the method to do some of their moves and their relative strengths have changed), the weapons from these two sports meeting are also intact, with the exception of the throwable box/crate, grenade, iron ball, shovel (replaced by the double bladed battle axe), and log. New to the weapons set are the nunchuku (from DD3, the VS. mode of NES DD1, and SDD/RODD), and kali sticks. The sticks are the same type of weapon used by Chin Semei from DD2, but were never available to the player until now. These two new weapons are rather cheap, being able to hit so quick as to trap an enemy in a combo before they can ever react. These two weapons are never used by enemies, but conveniently “fall out of the pocket” of a downed enemy now and then.
Thankfully, an irritating feature of the NES DD sports meeting, where weapons were taken away after a very small time when defeating a wave of enemies (rather than at the end of a mission as in the arcade), does not show up here. Weapons can be used over and over again, until the end of a mission or if they are dropped into a bottomless pit (that kills you instantly).
Unlike the rare Sega Genesis port of the first Double Dragon, where large throwable objects (Rock, Oil drum, etc) vanished after a certain number of throws, all the thrown weapons can be used over and over (except the knife, which vanishes, as it always did, after downing one target, and the “firecracker” explode stick which obviously is unusable after it explodes).
In DDA, if a player dies holding a weapon, that weapon vanishes with him, so strategically you should drop a weapon when you’re about to die, so that you can have something to pick up again when you come back on your next life.
Players no longer fall flat on their faces if they walk off a ledge without first jumping, but weapons can be dropped at any time by critical the “block” button. This is a first for the series and very useful (previously you had to be hit or fall in order to change weapons).
Another difference from the arcade sports meeting is that the chain link fence at the start of Mission 2 cannot be climbed on as it was in the arcade game, and a ladder is missing, removing the ability to fight on a higher level at the start of this area. Also the ability to climb rocks, while still present in Mission 3 is diminished, since you can only climb part way up the cliff until the enemies are defeated, and then the player automatically climbs to the top (and can’t climb down again) for the upcoming boss fight.
Baseball bats and axes can be thrown (something only enemies in the series could do before, starting with DD II: The Revenge) as well as swung.
The large masked boss “Burnov” who first appeared in Double Dragon II: The Revenge appears here, and is as cheap as ever. The shovel weapon is converted into a battle axe (it was mislabeled an “axe” in some versions of the DD2, and with the poor graphics of some of these ports, it might well be mistaken for one). Chin Semei, the stick wielding foe from DD2 also makes normal appearances.
This version of DD features many more enemies on screen at a time than any previous version of the game, and without brake. Less of the social class is visible on screen at a time, due to the smaller screen area. But the characters are still large and colorful.
In the original arcade game, Billy “Hammer” Lee wore blue and had golden-haired hair. His twin brother Jimmy “Spike” Lee wore red and had brown hair and an identical haircut. In this update, following the tradition begun with the NES DD1, Billy has brown hair, and following Return of/Super DD, Jimmy has a spiked blonde haircut. Both the brothers go their moves identically and have the same sounds.
As far as modes go, the game has a release player mode where one takes control of Billy to go on his classic quest to save Marion from the Black Warriors (aka the “Shadow Warriors”). In the Japanese version of the original arcade game, the storyline was that New York had been ravaged by a Nuclear War and gangs ruled the city. Billy and his brother had started a martial arts Dojo to teach ordinary people to protect themselves from the evil street gangs. This lead Willy, the leader of the Warriors to have Billy’s girlfriend kidnapped to intimidate the brothers and lure them out in the open to be attacked by the gang members. The US version didn’t allude to the nuclear war or their role as community activists, but now we see this plot dictated to us via anime stylishness cutscenes, with artwork reminiscent of “Fist of the North Star” an ultra violent Japanese cartoon that inspired a few sports meeting of its own. Some things are changed in the tale to imply that the boss characters are not killed, but only beaten up until they give up, but these scenes can be skipped with a few quick button presses.
There is a two character release player mode, in which you can control BOTH Lee brothers, but one at a time (you switch between them by critical the brilliant button). This is a challenging way to play since the brother you don’t brilliant is completely defenseless. It’s too terrible there wasn’t an option to let the computer AI control the other brother. I use this mode when playing solo to play as Jimmy, letting Billy get killed (or beating him up myself for extra points) and playing owing to as the red clad character. If you complete the game solo, there are a few less shape of dialogue at the end, and no “brother vs. brother” mode (which has been now clarified as a friendly martial arts match rather than some kind of death fight… which was clarified in the NES version by making Jimmy the secret leader of the Shadow Warriors gang, rather than Willy, who was secretly in like with Marion and wanted to steal her from his brother!).
The third mode will only work for certain players, the 2 player mode. In this mode you either need two GBA’s (or Nintendo DS’s since the DS can play GBA sports meeting) and two copies of the game, plus a link cable. Or you can substitute a GBA for a “Gameboy Player” addon and play the game with two players on your TV screen, using a GameCube console. A third more obscure way is to run two copies of a certain GBA emulator on a PC (or over a LAN with a friend).
I prefer to play the game on the huge screen myself, and the graphics look AS GOOD (I wouldn’t say better, just different, though perhaps you could argue there’s more detail in places) as the 20 year ancient arcade version.
Finally, there is a one or two player mode that has never appeared in the series before, a “survival” mode, similar to the one featured in Final Fight on the Sega CD. You appear in a dojo-like room (similar to the one you start off in in the NES version of DD3) and endless waves of enemies attack you, in increasingly hard attacks. There is no way to “win” this mode, as the enemies will keep appearing forever, and your shape and the timer prevent you from staying alive forever. This is just meant to test your ability to kill as many enemies as possible before the timer runs out.
Despite the advertisement on the back of the box, there is NO right “Vs. Mode” like the one featured in the NES DD1 (which let you pick any from several characters and fight one on one in a special arena). The only Vs. battle is just like the arcade game, and only present if you beat the game with two players. If you play the 2 character release player, you can take control of one brother to beat the other one up with no resistance.
The controls in DDA are tight and open, and thankfully it uses four buttons (punch, kick, jump, and the new ‘block/drop weapon’ button), making combinations for different moves simpler to pull off intentionally.
All in all, this is a solid beat-’em-up with splendid appeal for retro fans. It isn’t exactly like Double Dragon from 1987, but it takes the best elements of the DD series over the years and revamps and remixes the ancient to make a new, and rather fun game.
By and large the length of the game is somewhat longer than the original arcade, but the game takes only about 20 minutes to beat, another 5 onto the original run owing to time of DD on average difficulty. The unlockables include a cheat for 10 credits instead of 5 (shared by both players), a sound test, and an expert difficulty option. A few of the levels are new: a truck top fight taken from SDD/RODD, a watered-down cavern level borrowed from DD2 for the NES (iirc), a “Chinatown” area reminiscent of those seen in DD3, and an extension of the “trap room.”
Some new enemies have been added to the usual gang members seen in the first two sports meeting (note: only two of the bosses from DD2 are here, the rest are all straight from the first arcade game). The new characters include Burnov and Chin Semie (sp?) from DD2, plus there’s a samurai character with a sword (that you sadly can’t use), a cartwheel kicking martial artist reminiscent of the final boss from DD2 NES (and the TurboGrafx CD version of DD2), and a variant that uses a “shadow trick” reminiscent of the incredibly cheap “doppelganger” enemies from the end of DD2. The most irritating addition to the gang are the “Steve” enemies that wear dark sunglasses and affair suits like Matrix Agents. These men are predictably cheap, with hyperfast combos. Once they hit you, you’re toast. Thankfully after a flurry of attacks, these guys adjust their ties, allowing you a chance to hit them finally. While droll, these gents look rather out of place in a gang of otherwise colorfully dressed punks, buff bruisers and martial arts scrappers. It’s as if somebody’s limo was late and they chose to join in on the action (in a post apocalyptic world?). When the thugs are better dressed than the final boss, something is incorrect!
This is very much a game in the stylishness of classic arcade brawlers, so you won’t find spectacular endings, thousand hit combos or fireballs here. All attempts have been made to foster a certain level of realism in the moves (even the legendary Hurricane Kick from DD2 here doesn’t have the “floating effect” it did in the 1988 arcade sequel where it first appeared). The game is small, and somewhat more repetitive than the arcade game since it’s longer and has more enemies (with more varied affect pallets for their alternate clothing, skin tones). Some might be annoyed that they’ll face waves of green, gold, and silver bleeding Abobos (the arcade game featured ONE green bleeding boss, and DD2 in the arcade featured two gray bleeding Burnovs).
I’ve rambled enough, but hopefully this information will prove useful for ancient school fans, fans of arcade brawlers and die hard Double Dragon fans who might be a bit skeptical about this release. It’s very much “retro” in a excellent way, and probably the best “2-D” scrolling fighter game to come out in the 21st century. It won’t replace the original arcade game in this DD fan’s heart, but it is regarded as a splendid game and worthy addition to the series in its own right.
A worthwhile cart to own even if you’re not a fan of the GBA (there’s always the Gameboy player on the GC)!
Rating: 5 / 5