 Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss Back when I was a kid, there were certain games I just flat out ignored entirely, and one of them was Primal Raeg. My thought was I already had Street Fighter 2 Turbo and Mortal Kombat 2, and my friend down the road had Killer Instinct, I've got access to all the fighting games I need. What could be better than that? But I was missing the point. The idea isn't to find something better, it's to find something different. And to its credit, Primal Raeg is a bit different. At least thematically. I mean, for one thing, it's a fighting game where all the playable characters are dinosaurs and apes, which is kind of cool. Plus, this game is chock-filled with gore, with animals biting at each other's throats and blood spraying everywhere, as well as absolutely brutal finishers that would make even Mortal Kombat blush. Primal Rage started as an arcade game made by Atari Games back in 1994 before it was ported to home consoles by Probe Software. And this was one of those games that was everywhere. In fact, it spanned multiple generations, appearing on Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis, as well as PlayStation and Sega Saturn, plus computers like the Amiga, as well as handhelds like Game Boy and Game Gear. I should mention that in this video, I'm only covering the Super Nintendo Edition, and it should go without saying that the best version of this game is the original arcade version, so check that one out any way you can. Now, having said that, it's pretty clear that Atari Games were banking on the visuals being the big selling point of Primal Rage, since, you know, you're playing as these monstrous creatures tearing each other apart, and yeah, it looks awesome on the arcade, as well as later ports for PlayStation and Saturn, and even on the 3DO. But on Super Nintendo, it is grainy as hell. There is zero detail here to speak of. The fighters just look like a pixelated mess. The backgrounds look good enough, but the fighters themselves look bad. And that's really a shame because a lot of work went into development of the arcade version. Each fighter was created from scratch as a flexible metal armature, then airbrushed, then filmed through stop-motion animation with about 400 frames captured for each fighter. That is really cool, but unfortunately the Super Nintendo and the Sega Genesis for that matter just weren't up to snuff to really capture the artist's work here. Well, despite all that, how does Primal Rage play as a fighting game? You've got seven different characters to choose from, all with your usual range of size and speed. You've got your big slow, strong fighters and your small, quick, weaker strike fighters, and each of the seven have their own finishers, which, as you can see, are just freaking crazy looking. Plus, you've got this dude named Chaos who uses belches and farts for his attacks. Hey, stay classy, buddy. Y and B are upper and lower quick attacks, while X and A are upper and lower fierce attacks, and for the most part, the controls are reasonably solid. They're not as quick and effortless as the more popular fighting games of the time, but they're definitely better than stuff like Ultimate Fighter or Clay Fighter. Most of the easier special moves can be executed just about every time, but some of the high-damage special moves here are just goofy. For example, if you pick Armadin, the thing with the long tail, two of its moves are to hold down X and B while pressing up, then down. First of all, holding X and B at the same time can be tricky because it's hard not to accidentally press Y or A while you're doing it. Another way you can do this is to curl your index finger in there to hold down X, but that's not exactly comfortable. In addition to that, these moves seemingly only work when they want to. Granted, when they do work, they're pretty impressive, since there's blood and entrails splattering all over everything, but still, it's super frustrating when moves only work every other time you try them. Yeah, I understand that since they're high-damage moves, they're supposed to be tough to execute, otherwise you can just cheese the game. I get that, but still, even when I'm just sitting here practicing, they don't work consistently. I might just suck. I mean, that's always a possibility, but still, it was frustrating. Along with your life meter, you also have what the manual refers to as a brainstem meter. It's the yellow bar up there that indicates your brain strength. Yeah, when this runs out, you get dazed and your controls seize up for a moment, so you have to mash the D-pad to snap out of it, or, you know, absorb a huge blow from your opponent. There's also combos here you can pull off, which is cool, and what's really interesting here is that as you successfully pull off a combo, you get worshippers that come out to praise you, and not only that, you can actually pick them up and eat them, or even just throw them around. That is friggin' hilarious, not to mention totally unexpected. I also gotta praise the music and sound design here. It's really satisfying to land a special move, and the sound effects have a certain deepness to the low end that I really appreciate. The music is fun, too. There's not another game out there that sounds like this one does. Well, except for this track, which reminds me of a certain deep purple song from 1971. I also have to mention the difficulty here because this game is hard, and not just hard in a conventional sense. The structure here is also nuts. To beat the game, you beat all seven characters, then you have to beat all seven in a row gauntlet style on one health bar. That is ridiculous. But yeah, I will say Primal Rage is a fun novelty. Despite its flaws, it's still a decent fighting game on Super Nintendo, and it's definitely better than its Sega Genesis counterpart since it has much better sound design, more special moves, and more fatalities. However, Primal Rage remains one of those cases where on the SNES, you're clearly not seeing the ideas presented in this game lived up to their full potential, and that's pretty frustrating. Still, looking at this game as its own thing, Primal Rage for SNES is still good for what it is. It's got plenty of personality, the controls get the job done for the most part, and it's definitely a solid two-player game, at the very least. Alright, I want to thank you for watching, and I hope you have a great rest of your day.