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Guide Haggar, Cody or Guy through the scrolling streets, beating up anyone and everyone (apart from each other - unless you really want to).

Life's tough when you're the mayor of Metro City. If it isn't coping with the many social problems and working out budgets and stuff, you're having to put up with the constant bribes of the Mad Gear gang.

Mike Haggar - the ex-wrestler mayor of Metro City - is having none of this rubbish and turns down every one of the hoods' evil bribes. Obviously the criminal lads are a tad perturbed by this turn of events, and in a fit of vengeance, kidnap Haggar's daughter Jessica and parade her scantily-clad form on national television!

Haggar describes that enough's enough and chooses to take to the streets, using his wrestling skills to subdue any Mad Gear hoods who cross his horizontally scrolling path. Helping him rescue Jessica is her boyfriend, the street fighter hunk, Cody. Joining the crusade as well is Guy, a streetwise ninja-type who enjoys wearing orange pyjamas in public.

It's their task to traverse the seven scrolling levels, beating up the hoods and defeating the evil bosses of each area, in a quest to reach the Mad Gear leader - Belger! Only by defeating him in combat can Haggar reclaim his daughter and save the day (maybe even the whole week if he's lucky).

The action starts off in the slums, where our heroes know they'll find the evil gangland leader Damnd - he who abducted Jessica in the first place! This level is a basic round, with no real foes that cause any problems.

The subway is not a safe place to be - especially when the Mad Gear hole up there of a night time! It's our heroes' job to beat their way through the cons and reach a seedy boxing ring, where they face the imposing fighter that is Sodom - a guy who carries two swords for combat!

The corrupt cop, Edi E, runs the seedy West Side of Metro City, but before the lads can face him, they have to beat their way through a bar room brawl and face the likes of the dodgy-looking Andore and Andore Jr! Yikes!

The manufacturing sector of Metro City, taken over by Rolento and his Mad Gear cronies is Haggar and Co's next destination. Patrol the area and take a lift up to the lair of the deadly army commando - the twisted Rolento!

The Metro City park and bay area used to be a nice place to take a walk, until the biker division of the Mad Gear gang decided to take up residence! Our heroes have to beat up legions of bikers and molotov-chucking meanies before facing up to the meanest boss of all: the rather dodgy Abigail (yes, it is a "he"!)

The richer, East Side of Metro City, is the more respectable end of the city... however, by this time, the Mad Gears have got wind of the heroes' intention and have drafted in their greatest fighters to "take care" of them. Can they reach the imprisoned Jessica?

Along the way, there are plenty of barrels, crates and telephone boxes to smash open. Inside are all manner of goodies, including money, food and weapons. There are three basic weapons the lads can make use of.

1. Knife
   A pretty disposable weapon - simply chuck it at the foe of your choice! If you choose Cody, you can slash enemies at close range for extra damage!
2. Sword
   A light-weight weapon, very fast to hit with and inflicts moderate levels of damage, depending on who's using it.
3. Lead Pipe
   A very heavy and cumbersome weapon, the lead pipe is the most powerful weapon in the game - best used by Haggar.

Final Fight CD gives one or two players the chance to hone their combat skills in a special bonus game.

Basically, you're on a suspension bridge with 60 seconds on the clock. Mad Gear meanies swarm on and it's your job to clobber them senseless. This special round never appeared in either the arcade or the Super NES versions of the game and is a great bonus to the game.

Previously, to play a decent version of Final Fight, I've had to play the Super NES version, which was good, but lacked many of the features of the arcade original. No more! The Mega-CD game is far superior and actually slightly better than the coin-op.

Gameplay-wise, it's exactly the same, but the fab soundtracks have been greatly improved over the coin-op's. Everything that made the coin-op so utterly skillful has been faithfully reproduced - from the addictive fist action to the amazingly detailed backdrops. All of the crunching sound effects and sampled screams have been included too, making for a chillingly realistic beat-'em-up experience.

This game has action oozing from every pore - whilst the Super NES version was limited to three baddies on-screen, the Mega-CD version is packed to the brim with them! Frankly I'm stunned by the sheer quality of this game - it knocks the spots off Streets Of Rage II and is an essential purchase for all Mega-CD owners! Make sure you buy this!

Whey hey! Yahoo! At last! Final Fight on the Mega-CD is incredible. The definitive beat-'em-up has all the features of Capcom's classic coin-op which means that all three characters are here in the best simultaneous two-player fighting action on any machine - apart from Street Fighter II, of course!

Even on the Easy difficulty setting this conversion is mightily challenging, the screen resembling the London Underground at rush hour - it's just so packed with sprites for the killing!

As is expected from a CD, the soundtracks are slick and groovy renditions of the arcade originals - in fact they're better! Likewise the sound effects come blasting from the speakers with fantastically sickening, over-the-top duplications of fist against bone and knife into arm!

It's just excellent to hear Hagar as he roars into the next punishing piledriver at Guy scream into another damaging, flying kick and then the cries and screams of all those on the receiving end!

Due to the virtually limitless memory of the Mega-CD the representation of each three characters is both detailed and smoothly animated. Even Cody looks pretty good in this conversion.

Final Fight is the best scrolling beat-'em-up ever! It makes the Streets Of Rage games look very poor indeed with respect to the comparitive intelligence of the enemy sprites and the associated pleasure of 'doing away' with them.

There's really nothing else to say, and with Street Fighter II loitering with menacing intent just a few months away (hopefully - Rich)!

Presentation 92%
P. A fabulous intro kicks off the proceedings, and there's a good deal of options to tweak as well. The bonus timed level is a welcome addition to the game.

Graphics 94%
P. Amazing backdrops and sprites that are nigh-on perfect replicas of the arcade originals. There's also some fab animation on all of the characters.

Sound 94%
P. A brilliant range of smacks, thuds and screams back the proceedings, along with some awesome CD soundtracks.

Playability 96%
P. Final Fight CD amazes from the beginning with highly addictive beat-'em-up action. We're not exaggerating when we say that it's like having the arcade machine in your bedroom!

Lastability 94%
P. There are seven tough levels to conquer, four difficulty levels and a duel-like timed game to add to the interest. It's one of those showcase games that has you playing months after you've completed it.

Overall 95%
Move over Streets Of Rage II! Final Fight CD rules supreme as the ultimate combat game available for any Sega console. It's just like having the arcade machine at home!