 Hey thanks to Tyler from the iRetro Gamer channel for requesting this on my Patreon page, I recommend his My Retro Life series if you want to relive the time period when a lot of these old consoles were first released, complete with tons of home video footage. Over in Japan there exists a series of video games referred to as the Kompati Hero Series, a crossover between Ultraman Gundam and Common Rider. The series started on the Famicom before migrating over to the Super Famicom where it became known as the Great Battle Series. What makes these 5 games stand out so well today is that they're all very English friendly for being games that never left Japan. We start with SD The Great Battle, released very early in the Super Famicom lifespan in December of 1990 and it definitely shows since it kinda looks like a beefed up NES game. This is a top down 8 directional shooter where you can flip between Ultraman Gundam and Common Rider as your main character, you'll find that to be a recurring theme with each of these games. As you can see, the SD stands for Super Deformed, making each of these characters the same height, which makes sense for logistical reasons because otherwise Gundam and Ultraman would be like 20 times taller than Common Rider. The SD element is another recurring theme in this series. SD The Great Battle is pretty dang simple and straightforward. Not many weapons or items or nuance here, it's strictly an action game so you can destroy while switching between 3 superheroes using the R button. The only real flaw here is the difficulty curve. The game starts out really easy but eventually you'll find that certain bosses take freaking forever to defeat and you'll begin to wonder if it's worth it. No passwords or battery save here either. SD The Great Battle isn't a bad game, it's just kind of dull and it's easily outshined by the later games in the series as you'll see in just a bit. Next there's Great Battle 2 The Last Fighter Twin released a year and a half later and this time around our heroes are in a traditional beat em up. It's beat a kick, aid a punch and why to jump which is a little unusual but whatever it's a beat em up it's not like this is gonna be all that complicated. There's even a fourth character you can play as from here on out, a fellow by the name of Fighter Roar otherwise known as Kota Azuma. This time around you use the select button to switch between characters and the R button activates these E capsules you collect that eventually can be used to unleash a clear screen attack which is nice. You can also charge your punch attack by holding the punch button down. There's also a nifty sliding move you can do that really comes in handy because this game is really tough. Thankfully this game is two player co-op which helps ease the difficulty a bit and there's a password system as well. There's only four total levels here but they're pretty dang long. So ultimately I think this one is best enjoyed with the second player. Overall though Great Battle 2 The Last Fighter Twin is kind of dull. It's fine if you like co-op beat em ups but even then you're better off with... The Great Battle 3. This is really the only quote-unquote true sequel in this series and that it's the same genre as the game preceding it. Great Battle 3 takes any of the good qualities in Great Battle 2 and improves on them big time. The sprites are bigger, everything is faster, the settings are more interesting, the clear screen attacks are better and even funny in some cases. And the charged attacks have more punch to them. Fighter Roar in particular is great to play as here. He's a handy character because of his bow and arrow projectile that works similar to the Archer in King of Dragons. There's also coins you can collect so you can stop at these item shops and buy power-ups that make for stronger attacks. There's three difficulty settings here but even on the easy setting some of the boss fights here are crazy tough. You go through nine levels, they aren't as long as the previous game thankfully but there's a lot to get through so again it helps to play with a second player. There's also a password system here as well, although the passwords are 24 characters long. Ouch. So yeah, Great Battle 3 isn't gonna measure up to games like King of Dragons, The Peacekeepers or even another Super Famicom only game Ghost Chaser Densei but it's still a perfectly okay co-op beat em up with some personality to it. The Great Battle series takes a left turn and really gets interesting with Great Battle 4. This time Ultraman, Common Rider and Gundam and company star in a game that's like something out of the Goemon or the Legend of the Mystical Ninja series. Great Battle 4 is a side-scrolling action platformer interspersed with these one-on-one mech fighting battles. The feel of the controls here is very similar to a game like Mega Man X. This game isn't as good but that should at least give you an idea of the general ballpark of how this game plays. What really makes Great Battle 4 so fun is being able to switch between all the different characters because in this setting they're all capable of different things. Gundam's ability to fly is very useful and necessary in some cases. Common Rider's flamethrower is fun as hell to use and Ultraman's missile launcher is great for when you want to bust out the heavy artillery. You can also pick up power-ups and charge your weapons similar to the Great Battle beat em ups. Unfortunately all the characters share one life bar however and certain characters can only fire their weapons when standing still so that's kind of a downer. If there's a flaw in Great Battle 4 it's the one-on-one mech fighting which I admit kind of grinds the game to a halt. There's a trick to these fights though in the description below I have a link to a move list on Game Facts that'll tell you how to execute the basic fighting moves. The best way to go about these fights is to block first and then attack. Yeah it's kind of a bummer that you have to fight so defensively but if you want to progress with the game it's necessary. But yeah, Great Battle 4 is so much freakin' fun. It's an absolutely kick-ass run and gun style action platformer with exhilarating music, fantastic sound design with some great explosion sounds, really good controls and a lot of variety in the gameplay with all the different characters you can play as and yes, it's two-player co-op. It's a little on the short side with only six stages but there is at least a manageable password system. You should definitely check this one out any way you can. And that brings me to Great Battle 5. As great as the fourth game is, the fifth game may be even better. The badass action platforming, weapons and making stuff go boom is all here and in top form but it's presented in this bizarre Wild West motif. So if you've been jonesing to see Ultraman dressed as a cowboy then here you go. Also, replacing the mech fighting are these gallery shooter stages that play a lot like a similar game with a similar theme, Wild Guns. So if you like that game, you'll love this one. There is an important difference between the fifth game of the series and the rest, however. You pick a superhero at the beginning of the game to join Fighter Roar and you're more or less stuck with just those two characters through most of the game. You can still switch between the two with the X button. It's just a little bit of a downer that you don't have all four superheroes at your disposal this time around. What is really cool about this though is that starting at level 5 the enemies and level design can differ based on who you pick so that gives the game quite a bit of replay value. If there's anything to nitpick about Great Battle 5 it's the constant respawning of enemies. It's the type of thing where if you even go a fraction backwards the enemy comes right back. It's some Ninja Gaiden type stuff but that's not really that big of a deal. Great Battle 5 is the complete package. The music is really fun and fits the game perfectly. The boss fights look incredible. The gallery shooter stages are a massive improvement over the mech fighting stuff from the previous game and even the password system is pretty manageable. Great Battle 5 is easily one of the best games never to leave Japan. So yeah, as far as the main Great Battle series goes on Super Famicom that about does it. The series goes on to continue on other platforms like PlayStation, PSP, 3DS and even Game Boy Color. The Super Famicom also received several other games that derived from the original series that star these superheroes. For example, there's Great Battle Gaiden 2, Matsuri de Wasoi, another side-scrolling action platformer and there's versus multiplayer games like Battle Pinball and a combat racing game titled Battle Racers that's well worth checking out. But yeah, for the main series, seek out Great Battle 4 and 5. They're really great games. Anyway, that's all for now. Thanks for watching and have a good rest of your day.