River City: Rival Showdown Review (Kitasia)
I was pleasantly surprised how much character the game has. The writing, animation, the look, lore, this game NAILS it. Definitely worth checking out if you're a fan of the NES title.
But the flaws really do hurt. Sometimes your inputs do seemingly get dropped but it's not a deal breaker like you might think.
One issue is the fighting isn't setup as good as the NES title. There are invincibility frames which breaks the flow of fighting and you can't kick objects into enemies or anything like that which used to be really fun. Also special moves seems to take center stage more than I'd like because regular attacks don't seem all that useful but that could be a stat issue. Despite this, it still feels really good! Everything has weight to it.
Another issue is the time system. It seems really neat at first but you'll hate it after the first playthrough. In fact I recommend using a guide after the first playthough because the game is so finicky about its routes and I use the word route loosely because at times it'll will feel like there's 1 route and you're just subbing events in and out of them. The greatest sin of all this, is that you can only fast forward through the dialogue and not skip any of it, and some conversations can get pretty long. You'll be doing a lot of skipping before you even start your next playthough.
As for nitpicks, I would've liked some more attention to music, the classic tracks feel more recycled than nostalgic, and that mixture of 24hr time and 12hr time is mind boggling. Also I miss some of the US localized names but, you sorta get used to the Japanese ones.
I know this is a lot of me complaining but I really like what's there and I still recommend it. At has this sort of charm to it that has me wanting to see everything it has to offer. It may fumble a bit in some areas but where it shines, it REALLY does shine!