Primal Rage

Before there were humans, gods walked the earth. They embodied the essence of Hunger, Survival, Life, Death, Insanity, Decay, Good, and Evil. They fought countless battles up through the Mesozoic Wars. Then Balsafas, an archmage from a parallel dimension, anticipated the threat that Earth's gods posed. He was not powerful enough to kill the gods, so instead he banished one to a rocky tomb within the Moon. This disrupted the fragile balance between the gods; pandemonium ensued, and a great explosion threw clouds of volcanic dust into the atmosphere. The dinosaurs died out, and the surviving gods went into suspended animation.

Now, the impact of a huge meteor strikes the Earth. Its destructive force wipes out civilization, rearranges the continents, and frees the imprisoned gods. Get ready to rumble...

Playable characters:
 * Blizzard - The God of Good and leader of the Virtuous Beasts, Blizzard is an ape with icy elemental powers who wishes to return Urth to its natural state, even if it involves killing every Destructive Beast in the process. He lives on the Cliff, an icy temple in what was once the Himalayas.
 * Sauron - The God of Hunger and one of the Virtuous Beasts, Sauron's immortality came with the price of an insatiable appetite. All of Urth is the battlefield for Sauron, and he intends to turn humanity into his personal all-you-can-eat buffet when he's done conquering the other Beasts. He lives in the Cove, a set of ancient ruins near the sea. Not to be confused with that other Sauron.
 * Talon - The God of Survival and a Virtuous Beast, Talon is the chief of a raptor tribe and is highly protective of it. He fights to maintain their safety and intends to make the world a paradise for raptors where humans are kept as cattle and hunted for sport. He lives in a lightly forested tropical grassland called the Strip.
 * Armadon - The God of Life, a Virtuous Beast, and guardian of the fragile ecological balance, Armadon is connected with the Earth's lifeforce and wishes to end the other Beasts' battles for supremacy and the devastation they cause by kicking their asses and subsequently causing more devastation. He lives in an underground cavern called the Hollows.
 * Diablo - The God of Evil and leader of the Destructive Beasts, he intends to conquer the planet and cause pain and torment to all of those who inhabit on it. He lives in a Lethal Lava Land called the Inferno.
 * Chaos - The God of Decay and a Destructive Beast, Chaos is a witch doctor who attempted to turn himself into Blizzard. The spell didn't work quite right and he was turned into a disgusting beast and was forced to live in his own filth for eons. He wishes to defeat his enemies and restore his former greatness. He lives in the Ruins, the remains of a long destroyed city.
 * Vertigo - The Goddess of Insanity and one of the Destructive Beasts, Vertigo is a sorceress from another dimension who was banished to the Moon by Balsafas, until the meteor crash weakened the old shields enough for her to return. She lives in the Tomb (near Stonehenge), and intends to enslave and torture all of humanity for her own amusement.

This Fighting Game is a little unusual in that there's no boss character to smack around. There was a planned upgrade that would've given the game a boss to defeat to beat the game but that went unreleased by Atari Games. There was also a planned sequel that too went unreleased due to being too many Fighting Games at the time.

There was also a novel based on the game, Primal Rage: The Avatars. Although not literature of exceptional quality, it is noteworthy in that it expanded the backstories of the Gods, and introduced two characters that would have been in the sequel; Slashfang the sabertooth tiger, and Necronus/Necrosan, the aforementioned boss.

This game contains examples of:

 * After the End
 * An Ice Ape: Blizzard
 * Anti Hero: Both Blizzard and Armadon are Type IV, while Talon could been seen as either type IV or V and Sauron is type V AT BEST. As noted above, Sauron and Talon are real jackasses for "Virtuous Beasts", wanting to eat everyone and wanting to enslave all humans for cattle, respectively. Sauron in particular has the most disturbing ending screen in the game.
 * Note that the seperating of the dino gods into the "Virtuous Beats" an "Destructive Dinos" was created purely for the toyline and has no bearing to the video game storyline, which explains both Sauron's and Talon's douchebaggery.
 * It should also be noted that these are essentially Kaiju. The "heroic" once are more concerned with protecting their territory and facing off against earth-destroying evils than they are with something that is little more than food to them.
 * Anti Villain: Chaos is by far the least unpleasant of the Destructive Beasts (besides the fact he's disgusting and stinks to high heaven, according to the novel). In his ending, he regains his human form and leads the human tribes in rebuilding the world. He's also actually handsome.
 * According to the novel, while both Talon and Sauron do horrible things to their followers (Keeping them as Cattle/Eating them respectively) they are still more or less decent gods that will reward those the serve them faithfully.
 * Baleful Polymorph: one of Vertigo's three fatalities.
 * Boss Rush: This takes place instead of a Final Boss battle, which was planned, but cut.
 * Bowdlerise: At the last minute, Chaos' Urine Trouble Finishing Move was taken out of the Super Nintendo port of the game. Performing it in that version will result in Chaos merely performing his victory pose while a red circle with a line through it flashes.
 * In some versions of the game, one human victim (whose brains have spilled out) is blurred in Sauron's ending screen.
 * Breath Weapon: Diablo's Torch, Chaos' Power Puke, Sauron's Sonic Roar and Primal Scream, Blizzard's Freeze Breath, and Vertigo's Voodoo Spit.
 * Crapsack World: It's a bad time to be a human in Urth. Blizzard and Armadon are the only Dino Gods who have even the slightest consideration for humans, and Blizzard's attempts to get the Gods to stop being dickbags is ignored in the novels, while Armadon wants to sleep.
 * Damn You Muscle Memory: Unlike in most other fighters, the special moves are instead performed by holding down the buttons and then inputting the directions, instead of the other way around. You can still perform them the normal way in some versions of the game, but seeing that all of them require you to hit at least 2 attack buttons at the same time, it's not really worth the trouble. Try doing this with the fighters in MUGEN, where you now need to input the commands at the same time, Street Fighter-style.
 * Darker and Edgier - Ironically averted in the novel, which has everyone teaming up to wail on an undead dragon.
 * Digitized Sprites - Made from Claymation figures.
 * Dinosaurs Are Dragons - Gods, more accurately. In the book (and the canceled sequel), though, there is an undead dragon that shows up to annoy everyone.
 * Does This Remind You of Anything - Ancient, horrible deities sleeping finally awaken and wreak havoc upon the world and then start slapping the shit out of each other. It's like the Cthulhu Mythos meets Jurassic Park meets Mortal Kombat.
 * When selecting Sauron, you can choose a purple skin tone for him.
 * Everythings Better With Monkeys: Blizzard and Chaos are both giant apes. (Chaos was supposed to be an even more disgusting thing than a regular ape, but yay creator laziness.)
 * Fantasy World Map: The meteor rearranged the continents to look like a Tyrannosaurus skull.
 * Fartillery: Trope picture. One of Chaos' moves is the "Fart of Fury."
 * Fragile Speedster: Talon.
 * Gaias Vengeance: Armadon, who is waken up by the constant movement and destruction caused by the other Gods.
 * Gorn: As if the gameplay hadn't had enough of this, the energy bars are veins connected to a heart at the end, and the special bar below is a nerve linked to a brain. Winning a match causes the loser's heart to explode and the brain to melt into ashes. There's also the fatalities.
 * In the intro screens, Talon is being interrupted by Vertigo while feeding on Chaos' carcass, complete with torn-open chest and visible ribs.
 * Speaking of Talon, his Shredder Fatality became even gorier with updates. In prior versions, the victim did the stock animation collapse in a fountain of blood. Version 2.3 left the victim standing, but lifeless, skinned and with lots of skeleton exposed.
 * Jerkass Gods: All of them to some degree.
 * Kaiju - Uhm, the dinosaurs are pretty goddamn big?
 * Mighty Glacier: Sauron and Armadon. Armadon, at least, can fire projectiles, and Sauron has AOE attacks.
 * Mix and Match Critters: Vertigo (part Plateosaurus and part cobra) and Armadon (a bipedal Monoclonius/Ankylosaurus/Stegosaurus hybrid).
 * Naked People Are Funny: Perform enough hits and damage with a single combo, and your followers will celebrate by streaking.
 * Names to Run Away From Really Fast: The main characters are named Diablo, Talon, Vertigo, Sauron, Blizzard, Armadon, and Chaos.
 * Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot
 * Palette Swap: Chaos and Diablo are smaller, redder versions of Blizzard and Sauron, respectively.
 * People Farms: Sauron and Talon's goal.
 * Please Wake Up: On the continue screens after losing, you can see the humans trying to revive their respective god, with one of them pleading to the player to continue.
 * Prehistoria: It's more like Posthistoria, but they were fighting Prehistoria.
 * Puny Humans
 * Recycled in Space: It's Mortal Kombat WITH DINOSAURS AND GIANT GORILLAS!
 * Remember the New Guy: Slashfang got the treatment in the novel. He was always there, but he stayed in the Savannas he called home until the other dino gods discovered and invaded them, causing him to join the war.
 * Talon occasionally does this to his chosen avatar.
 * Rule of Cool: Almost everything in this game would be insanely stupid if it wasn't also insanely awesome.
 * Rules of the Road: The game has a "No Cheese" sign (a wedge of Swiss cheese with a red bar through it) which flashes whenever a player tries a "cheesy" fighting tactic, such as throwing another while they're stunned from blocking, or using two stun techniques in the same combo.
 * Shock and Awe: one of Armadon's finishers.
 * Shrink Ray: One of Vertigo's fatalities involves her shrinking the opponent and eating them.
 * The Smurfette Principle: Vertigo. Averted in the novel.
 * Stock Dinosaurs: Talon is a Deinonychus (complete with feathers, but on his head), Diablo and Sauron are tyrannosaurs, and Armadon is a mix-and-match dino with a ceratopsian's head, an ankylosaur's armour, and stegosaur's thagomizer.
 * Taken for Granite: Vertigo can turn the opponent to stone and shatter them for one of her fatalities.
 * To Serve Man: The gods eat their worshippers. (Well, can. The only one who canonically does this is Sauron.) And yes, you can do this when you're playing as them.
 * They all do this before the Boss Rush.
 * TOTAL DOMINATION!
 * Tyrannosaurus Rex: Sauron and Diablo
 * Urine Trouble: Chaos' "Golden Shower" fatality.
 * What Could Have Been: The aforementioned canceled sequel would have introduced a new character, Slashfang the sabertooth tiger, as well as a boss, Necrosan/Necronus, some sort of skeledragonsaur, and used a Bloody Roar-style transformation system (the players were avatars of the gods). As a result, the ending for every character is left open-ended. The tie-in novel tied up these loose ends.
 * What Measure Is A Human: Even Blizzard, the nicest of the Virtuous Beasts, isn't above chowing down on his followers, and Talon, as mentioned, considers humans to be cattle.
 * Whip It Good: Vertigo uses her tail as a whip-like weapon.
 * World of Badass: You'll probably end up dying, especially if you're a human. On the plus side, it may well be the coolest death imaginable!