Capcom’s Street Fighter came out in 1987 but its 1991 sequel really set the bar for fighting games, with its eight characters and combo control buttons. And of course gave Jean-Claude Van Damme and little Kylie Minogue a spin-off movie.
“So real it hurts”, five arcade games flew out of the Midway stable in quick succession from ’92 - ’97 – cue high punches, low punches, high kicks, low kicks and blocks. Known for its gore and the particularly gruesome finishing Fatality moves. Also spun off into a fantasy martial arts movie, directed by Paul WS Anderson.
Cowabunga, dude! First released in 1989, the game was nevertheless played well into the nineties, along with its sequel Turtles In Time, as ‘turtly’ rad fans played the four turtles (often all together with the four-player option) and pitted themselves against the evil Shredder.
Coining the phrase Boomshakalaka, NBA Jam used both real team names and digital likenesses of famous basketball players – although not Michael Jordan, who owned his own naming rights. Shaquille O’Neal starred in the arcade game, playing for the Orlando Magic, but was removed from later home Sega versions when he ‘did a Jordan’.
Four players got to turn into Homer, Marge, Bart and Lisa as they fought their way to the kidnapped Maggie. Moe’s Tavern, Springfield nuclear power plant and nasty Mr Burns featured, along with Marge’s vacuum player (?!).
Players got to settle into proper racing seats as they selected raced real-life foes hunched over their own steering wheels in up to seven other parallel cabinets, as the Race Leader sign flashed proudly over the leading stock car driver. Re-released in 2010 as Sega Racing Classic.
“It’s got brawls!” shouted the game’s poster, featuring Bret Hart as one of the eight WWF fighters in this wrestling game that took inspiration from both Mortal Kombat and NBA Jam.
Another Sega series set on a movie set, this time the Isla Nublar, Jurassic Park came out in 1994 and you could chase your velociraptors from the ‘comfort’ of a moving Jeep seat. Celebrating the latest Jurassic World, Jurassic Park Arcade makes a triumphant return in 2015.
A latecomer to the decade, the game went on to become one of the bestsellers on the Sega Dreamcast. Taxi drivers are on the clock and racing around the city as fast as possible (sound familiar?), doing stunts for tips.
Sega’s ’93 3D fighting game had chunky fighters, with Lego-style hands and enormous triangular feet, and just three simple moves. Namco’s Tekken - which came out a year later - was directed by the same poached designers, and allowed the player to control each of the fighter's four limbs independently.
With your consent, this website shall use additional cookies (including third party cookies) or similar technologies to make our site work, for marketing purposes and to improve your online experience.
You can revoke your consent via the Cookie Settings in the footer of the website at any time. Further information can be found in our Privacy Policy and in the Cookie Settings directly below.
Privacy Preference Center
When you visit any website, it may store or retrieve information on your browser, mostly in the form of cookies. This information might be about you, your preferences or your device and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to. The information does not usually directly identify you, but it can give you a more personalized web experience. Because we respect your right to privacy, you can choose not to allow some types of cookies. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings. However, blocking some types of cookies may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer.
More information
Manage Consent Preferences
Strictly Necessary
Always Active
These cookies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched off in our systems. They are usually only set in response to actions made by you which amount to a request for services, such as setting your privacy preferences, logging in or filling in forms. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not then work. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable information.
Performance
These cookies allow us to count visits and traffic sources so we can measure and improve the performance of our site. They help us to know which pages are the most and least popular and see how visitors move around the site. All information these cookies collect is aggregated and therefore anonymous. If you do not allow these cookies we will not know when you have visited our site, and will not be able to monitor its performance.
Third Party Content Cookies
These cookies may be set through our site by third-party providers of third-party content that is embedded on our site. They may be used by those companies to load, display, or in other ways to enable you to use that content. As this third-party content is provided by autonomous companies on their own responsibility, those companies may also use these cookies for their own additional purposes, such as marketing. Please refer to the privacy policies of those companies for that information. If you do not allow these cookies, you will not be able to use this third-party content embedded on our site, such as videos, music, or maps.