Who doesn't know Sachen? Also known as Thin Chen Enterprise, Joy Van, and Commin, they are what I consider to be the biggest unlicensed company ever. Seriously, they supported the Watara Supervision and Mega Duck/Cougar Boy, made games for the NES, Sega Genesis, and Game Boy, and had their games published in almost every continent in the world (U.S. by Color Dreams and American Video Entertainment, Brazil by Milmar, Australia by Home Entertainment Suppliers, and Europe by Color Dreams and some other company I can't think of. They published their Game Boy games. Toy Tec Electronics?) Some of Sachen's games are still a mystery, such as some of their Game Boy games and the unreleased Bridge (TC-024)...Until now. Presenting: Street Heroes for the Game Boy Color.
Street Heroes was originally released for the NES and Famicom in 1994. It also went under the name Samurai Spirits, featuring a different intro and title. Sachen ported three of their later Thin Chen numbered games to the Game Boy: Jurassic Boy 2, Thunder Blast Man, and this. A lot of the original game remains intact in this port, but not everything.
Street Heroes is a fighting game, very similar to Street Fighter (and likely based on it.) The options screen lets you select difficulty and time allowed for each fight, but the game is always the same difficulty no matter what you select. I haven't tried 1P VS 2P yet, so I'll omit it from this article. It's likely a link-cable VS mode. The manual instructs you each character's special attack (some are easy to figure out, like quarter-circle-B) that are unique to each. It's pretty easy to win if you abuse their specials (which I did because I suck at fighting games.)
The graphics are actually faithful to the original's, both in style and palette. There's less flicker during a fight since the Game Boy Color can handle the character objects better. Sound is a bit more subdued than the original, even though the NES game has subdued music as it is. Sadly, there's no voice samples, which gave the original a bit more flair. Also, the music starts to repeat itself after about 4 stages. Boo. Controls work fine enough, can't really say much about it.
The ending shows all the characters' endings instead of just the one you're playing as. Can't say much else about it. A lot of it is similar to the NES version, so if you liked that game, you'll enjoy this one. Sadly, it's pretty rare, like all non-NES Sachen stuff.
Images:
Packaging:
Interesting that Dark Moon is listed, as he isn't playable in 1P mode. Probably meant for multiplayer mode.
Video:
Stay tuned for more!
