CGOTW: Punch-Out!!
Here's an interesting factoid: According to Wikipedia -- where the truth lives -- the developers of Punch-Out!! decided to shrink Little Mac, the player's rookie boxing avatar, to make it easier to see the action on the screen. This also had an effect on scrawny kids like yours truly, who identified with the David and Goliath undertones of boxing against massive, cartoony cronies like Piston Honda and King Hippo. I'd like to think that my subconscious mind viewed each match as a metaphor for man's capacity to overcome any obstacle, no matter how gigantic or crudely-animated.
It's more likely I just enjoyed the look of shock on Bald Bull's face as I sent him down to the mat again.
With it's simple controls and outlandish characters, Punch-Out!! was never meant to accurately represent the "Sweet Science." That didn't stop me from spending hour after hour playing it, memorizing enemy patterns and waiting for the right moment to throw a Star Uppercut. After going back and playing on the Virtual Console, I'm happy to report the game is just as goofy and fun as it was in 1987, maybe even more than deeper simulations like Fight Night. Few things are as satisfying as smacking Soda Popinski around the ring for mocking me before the fight, and for that, Punch-Out!! is this week's Classic Game of the Week.
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No matter what Nintendo revisionist history says, this game is still Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!
Line up now. Who can honestly say that they beat Mike Tyson, preferably back when they were kids?
I did, and it still stands as a personal landmark of hardcode gaming achievement. As a kid, it was a litmus test as to who were elite gamers and who weren't.
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I loved this game when I was younger. I could always get to Mike Tyson but never defeated him. :/
Speaking of Little Mac:
Hell yeah.
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Oh, the nostalgia. Played the hell out of this game and could still never beat it. That damn first minute of Tyson's uppercuts would always knock me out. Still loved it, though. Any of you play the arcade version?
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Word! I remember seeing a friend of mine beat Mike Tyson, but I don't think I ever managed to. However, Bald Bull stumped me for so long it's not even funny, and he more or less became my #1 nemesis from the game. After literally weeks of going toe to toe with him, I finally beat him, and I cannot tell you how happy this (then) 10 year old was.
I picked up the game on the VC a few months back, and I was actually surprised that, even though I hadn't really played it for 20 years, I still remembered the enemy patterns and how to take them out. Bald Bull went down for the count upon our first meeting, and I had a huge smile on my face like I was 10 again. I don't know if it was muscle memory or that the characters were still lodged in my brain somewhere, but I was really surprised that I remembered how to beat those opponents so well!
Edited due to bad grammar. Cause: caffeine intake low.
24.24.1.342 dhaelis [Executed]
Same here.
If you haven't seen it, here's the live action performance.
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This was the most amazing thing for me as well.
Pharacon wrote:
What? It's on the Virtual Console? All right!!
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I did as well. It took freaking hours and hours of play and frustration. I remember being at Sears with my parents and watching this kid kick the crap out of Tyson, which finally helped me overcome the mighty nemesis that is Iron Mike.
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I don't think that I ever got past Bald Bull more than a couple of times. I certainly never made it to Mike Tyson.
Fedaykin98 wrote:
As a kid I could get to Mike Tyson, but it wasn't until I dusted my NES off my freshman year at high school that I finally dealt that winning knockout blow.
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I beat Mike Tyson.. but the fight was so hard that it wasnt a shoein to win each time.. I think in the end I got it to about a 40% chance I could win..
This game to this day is one of the best ever.
Aint nothing new about the world order..it's been playing since the day they put George Washington on a quarter
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Punch-out is an all time favorite of mine on the NES, SNES and also the arcade version. In university the first floor of the mess hall had several arcade cabinets set up. Punchout, Gauntlet and Xenophobe provided a fun diversion on the way back from gorging on the all-you-can-eat meal plan. (I was lifting a lot back then!)
I've never finished a single punch-out.. I always get to but not past the final fighter. It was the first title I tested on my psp when I was curious to see how homebrew works. (I own the cartridge still, so don't go picking on me.)
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So is the punch-out on Virtual Console the one with Mike Tyson as the last fighter, or the one with Mr. Dream?
Mr. Dream. Nintendo doesn't include Mike Tyson anymore because of contract disputes.
"Even though that place should only be fifteen or twenty minutes away geographically, in actual practice - between the hours of four and seven - Redmond might as well orbit the Earth." - Tycho, Penny Arcade
It wasn't a dispute so much as the original contract had expired. Nintendo had signed Tyson to a 3-year contract, which was inked even before his initial title victory. But by the time the contract was up, Tyson had lost to Buster Douglas, and Tyson's personal affairs were in turmoil. From most accounts, Nintendo simply chose not to offer a contract renewal, and moved on. These events happened before the 1991 rape charge, which is sometimes erroneously offered as a reason Nintendo didn't renew.
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What he said.
I don't find much of a difference between fighting Tyson or Mr. Dream, aside from whether I'll survive the encounter with my ear intact.
"Even though that place should only be fifteen or twenty minutes away geographically, in actual practice - between the hours of four and seven - Redmond might as well orbit the Earth." - Tycho, Penny Arcade
There is no difference in how he fights, it's the exact same move patterns. Dream is basically a palette swap with a different face.
But beating Tyson is far more satisfying.
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This number is burned into my memory, but I can't remember the combination to any locker I ever had or even my own home phone number 1/2 the time. One of my favorite games of all time, I played so much that most opponents went down in the first round. The most amazing exhibition I saw was an acquaintance of mine would sit with controller in hand, facing away from the TV and still beat all comers. He claimed to be able to beat Tyson like that, but I guess having an audience threw him off - he made a valiant attempt but couldn't beat him while I was watching.
I beat Tyson. It was just rote memory skills and repetition. I probably played that game more than any other in 8 bit history besides the first Super Mario.
"That's because you were 10. Everyone likes Garfield when they're 10. When you're 10 you think a cat eating lasagna is genius." - Mumford
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When the game was first out and popular I easily tried and failed a hundred times to beat Tyson. Ten years later I walk into a friends apartment and see he has a NES hooked up. Oh fun I think, I pick up the controller and pop in Punch Out. I cruise through the entire list of fighters and beat Tyson on my first try. It was kind of a bummer to have tried for so long and then to finally do it so anticlimactically.
Baba Ganoush1
Before it was Mike Tyson's Punch Out, it was Punch Out in the arcade with the green gridded see through boxer....
There was no Tyson... Mr. Sandman was the last opponent before the game repeated your opponents over and over (ahh the days of hi-score arcades...)
On a side note, this might be one of Nintendo's first 'DS' titles (having 2 monitors)... speaking of which, why isn't Punchout offered on the DS??
AnimeJ wrote:
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I beat Tyson but even after reading how and watching friends but you still had to 'learn' it even knowing 'how' to do it. Similar to watching youtubes of Portal levels and then trying to recreate them.
Do you ever walk alone like a drifter in the dark?
It wasn't that it was all that technically difficult to beat Tyson, it was just that the first 1:30 was so damn intimidating. I get all flustered just thinking about it.
Baba Ganoush1