Retronauts 177: Double Dragon

Glad you liked it! Neon doesn’t feel like classic DD, but I don’t think it was aiming for that. It’s worth a few bucks.

Glad you enjoyed the episode! We tried to do the series justice. That’s an excellent point about Super DD, I wish I had remembered to mention it…

The Double Dragon III-locker has logged on! I got really into the arcade version of DDIII probably because it felt conquerable. I & II were just so hard with relentless enemies, while III with its varied cast (a magical third brother means 3-player action!) and new moves made it feasible to get good at. I never beat it on a single coin but I could definitely beat it on a single dollar which is more than I could say for most games of its ilk. Also there was a “step on the correct letter tiles” challenge late in the game ripped straight from Indiana Jones & the Last Crusade which I thought was funny.

Diamond Feit

I'm a big fan of Top 47k podcast (and hg101 in general) so maybe I'm a bit biased, but yum, what a great episode this was. I haven't played a lot of Double Dragon (we went through the arcade version on XB360 with a friend a couple of years ago) but it was a childhood fixture, I remember watching DD2, DD3, SDD and even Game Boy DDII being played quite a bit. I think I'll check the demo of Neon out on the XB360.

Eino Keskitalo

As one of those rare Double Dragon superfans, this episode was a real treat! Kurt and Rob made for excellent guests too, hope we get more of them soon! Double Dragon 2 on the NES is one of my all time favorites. I played it with MY older brother Jimmy, so clearly that game was meant for us! That amazing boxart seared itself into my mind and created a glorified ideal of what Double Dragon ought to be! Sadly loving DD is perhaps the most frustrating niche in gaming. As you noted, Technos did a terrible job at managing the IP, so Billy and Jimmy never established a consistent look compared to their fighting brethren at Capcom and SNK. Most of western box art had them pretty dopey and unappealing. In reality, I was merely a fan of how Double Dragon manifested itself through 1 and 2. Yet the following games never got the formula right. I remember being really frustrated by how poorly the movie and cartoon handled the franchise. Like most kids, I had seen a number of martial arts movies already and wanted something tougher like The Warriors. Property gripes aside, I still think the NES DD2 is a better fighting game than Final Fight, given the more varied move options and stage variety. And there is a seed of an interesting beat em up in Super DD, even though the rushed development squandered a potentially rich fighter. Ever since Street Fighter2 and Final Fight, most beat em ups followed the Capcom template, but Super Double Dragon represents a road not taken with its own gameplay model and the interesting ability to lock and counter incoming enemy attacks. It just plays very differently to Final Fight and I wish Technos could have refined and developed those ideas further. And yes, Double Dragon Advance is the closest to a “real” new entry in the series we ever got. Sigh... Thanks again Retronauts!

The DD movie chat was bundled into another episode, I think, a broader piece on game movies? Maybe I'm misremembering because I am old and senile. — JP

Retronauts

One day I'd really like to see you tackle Warriors and Streets of Fire, and their influence on video games. (I'm surprised the latter didn't come up in this ep). Maybe something for a Retronauts East Friday session in line with the Raiders, Goonies et al. episodes.

Zachary Adams

Jeremy mentions a Double Dragon movie podcast by Bob. Are we getting another movie month episode??? Please don't toy with me.

Will Oliver

Yep, but 1UP stuff doesn't really factor in to our planning since it was so long ago and in a different format (hence the Chrono Trigger episode last week).

Retronauts

Bob did a Double Dragon (and a Kunio episode with Kurt) episode way back in the 1UP days, but it's been a long time. There's always room for more Abobo discourse.

mordak