Violent Storm

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Who'll be the hero?

Violent Storm is an arcade Beat'Em Up made by Konami released in 1993, and their final foray into the genre along with Metamorphic Force.

In an unspecified future, the world is recovering after World War III destroyed most of it. The main characters Boris, Wade and Kyle are a group of vigilantes protecting the innocents from thugs, the most dangerous being the "Geld Gang". One day, their friend Sheena is kidnapped by a member of the Geld Gang, and thus they go on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge to save her. But really, who cares for the plot in a game like this?

Konami's farewell to the beat'em up genre, this arcade release features superb graphics with huge, fluidly animated sprites, an insane lyriced soundtrack and an impressive variety of moves. Though it may look like a blatant ripoff of Final Fight at first, it does many improvements on the formula, and celebrates the classics of the beat'em up genre as much as it makes fun of them.

It is a frequent misconception that this game is a part of the Crime Fighters/Vendetta series, even though nothing in either the promotion material or the game itself suggest a connection.

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Tropes used in Violent Storm include:

• Affectionate Parody: Of both beat'em ups and post-apocalyptic anime like Fist of the North Star.
• After the End
• The Apunkalypse: Though a very light version. Although all the elements are there (leather vests, spiky armor, several punks), the world seems perfectly fine despite that. There's even fully functional trains and an untouched peaceful park with fountains and gates. It's almost like the apocalypse happened and no one, after changing clothes and getting ripped, really cared.
• Arrogant Kung Fu Guy: Ryuken.
• Ass Kicks You: One of Boris's Aerial moves.
• Bald of Evil: Dabel and his clones.
• Bar Brawl: Downtown.
• Belly Dancer: One performs in the middle of stage three.
• Blonde Guys Are Evil: Mr. Julius, Red Freddy and Geld.
• Blondes Are Evil: Liza's palette swap Eliza.
• Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Wade, Kyle and Boris, in that order.
• Bowdlerise: Sledge was named "Cupper Maki" in the Japanese version.
• Breath Weapon: Lollypop.
• Camp: Just look at the main characters.
• Chairman of the Brawl: There a couple of chairs that can be picked and thrown during the second half of stage three.
• Color-Coded Multiplayer: Inverted compared to most brawlers that followed the Final Fight template. Kyle wears green and is the weakest but fastest. Boris wears red and is the strongest but also the slowest. But not as slow compared to other mighty glaciers in brawlers.
  • Kyle: Fragile Speedster.
  • Wade: Jack of All Stats.
  • Boris: Mighty Glacier.
• Combat Stilettos: Eliza and Liza.
• Cool Car: Your Cadillac the heroes drive in.
• Damsel in Distress: Sheena.
• Dark-Skinned Blond: Red Freddy, whose entire skin is green, mind you. Geld counts too for the purple skin.
• Dark-Skinned Redhead: Boris.
• Degraded Boss: Dabel, the first boss, shows up later on as a normal enemy named Bull.
• The Dev Team Thinks of Everything:
  • If you attack Dabel enough times on the head, his mask will fall off. It can be collected for points.
  • If you destroy a bench an enemy is sleeping on, they'll either die or take damage depending on their health bar.
• Difficulty by Region: A small example: the Japanese version allows extra lives when you reach a certain number of points while the other versions have extends turned off by default (but that can be changed in the service mode). Otherwise, they're identical.
• The Dragon: Red Fredy to Lord Geld.
• Evil Redhead: Crossbones and Liza.
• Expy: Kyle is like a male incarnation of Chun-Li.
• Extremity Extremist: Kyle only attacks with kicks.
• Fat Bastard: Lollypop.
• Femme Fatalons: Inverted with Red Freddy.
• Fight Clubbing: The heroes take on Drigger in a cage match.
• Hair of Gold: Wade.
• Hell-Bent for Leather: Liza, Gigadeath and Wade.
• Hurricane Kick: Wade does one for his desperation attack. Kyle, meanwhile, does a spinning bird kick.
• Improvised Weapon: One of the oddest examples being the pigs which inexplicably turn into footballs when picked up.
• Kid Appeal Character: Kyle.
• Knife Nut: Eliza and Liza.
• The Lancer: Boris, to Wade.
• Living Statue: Julius is a statue brought to life by Red Freddy.
• Macho Camp: Julius. "Beauty is power!"
• Meteor Move: Boris has a piledriver as one of his attacks. No spinning, unfortunately.
• Muscles Are Meaningless: Generally averted, but Wade and Kyle subvert this trope. If they try to throw heavier enemies, they'll struggle a bit unless you either mash buttons for it to be successful or knee them a couple of times for an easier throw.
  • Not only they will struggle, but without proper button mashing, they will collapse under the enemy weight, losing some health.
• Narcissist/The Fighting Narcissist: MR. JULIUS!
• New Game+: Completing the game on one credit unlocks the "Violent Round" mode, which is the game all over again with much more cruel enemy placement, different background colors, blood splatters (if they're not turned on in the dip-switches) and other weird changes to the level design. For example, the first half of the third level has fewer enemies, but only gives you thirty seconds to beat it.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed:
  • Red Freddy is an anorexic, effeminate ripoff of Blanka.
  • Lord Geld pre-boss fight is a squeaky-voiced Tetsuo.
  • The recurring "Lollypop" enemy is a fat version of Abodo, combined with Big Ben's ability to breathe fire.
  • Sledge is a ninja turtle parody, though his attack pattern is based on Rolento, and he's a cannibal to boot.
  • Doyle is a human Woody Woodpecker.
• The Quincy Punk: Crossbones and Doyle.
• Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs: Kyle can do the kick variation.
• Recycled Soundtrack: The music used during the Drigger and Julius fights is remixed from the TMNT arcade games. The common boss theme is original, but one part of it is a reference to the boss music of the X-Men arcade game. The fourth stage music is like a combination of the night vision music from Lethal Enforcers and the fourth stage music from Super Contra.
• Redheaded Hero: Boris.
• Shout-Out:
  • The mechanical parts of Doyle have the same color scheme as a power loader.
  • In the middle, you come across two arcade machines, Scramble and a bootleg Parodius.
  • A Twinbee doll is a collectable item.
  • Parodying Final Fight's rockstar-named enemies, one of the generic Mooks is called "Giga Death".
  • Wade is dressed like Mad Max, and Kyle's outfit is visually similar to Billy and Jimmy's.
• Spell My Name with an "S": Red Freddy is misspelled as "Red Fredy", possibly for space reasons.
• Wall Jump: Wade, Boris and Kyle can all do this.
• Widget Series
• Wrestler in All of Us: Boris is filled with more wrestling moves than Mike Haggar and Max Thunder combined.
• You Get Knocked Down, You Get Back Up Again: Averted: you can attack knocked-down enemies, something that is rare for the genre, but not for Konami-made games.