Deadly Moves
From Sega Retro
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| Power Athlete/Deadly Moves | ||||||||||||||||||||
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| System(s): Sega Mega Drive | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Publisher: Kaneko[1] (JP) Kaneko USA (US), Samsung (South Korea) | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Developer: System Vision[1], Inter State[1] | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Genre: Action[2][3], Fighting | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Number of players: 1-2 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Official in-game languages: | ||||||||||||||||||||
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Power Athlete (パワーアスリート) is a 1992 fighting game for the Sega Mega Drive and Super NES developed by System Vision and published by Kaneko. In the US, the Mega Drive version was renamed Deadly Moves, with the Super NES version becoming Power Moves. Both the Japanese and US versions use English text.
Contents
Story
Joe, a young American martial artist, decides to challenge the eight Fighting Masters throughout the world in order to become the world's strongest fighter and dethrone the reigning champion.
Gameplay
The game is a fighting game that plays on a two-dimensional plane like a beat-'em-up. The winner of a match is whichever fighter is the first to win two rounds. Rounds have no time limit.
In the single-player mode, the player plays as Joe and can challenge any of the Fighting Masters in any order, except for the final boss, Ranker, who must be challenged last. After defeating an opponent, Joe's statistics are increased. Opponents can be challenged multiple times to level up more. The game ends if Joe loses a match, but it can be continued a limited number of times. The player is also given a password after each victorious match that tracks which opponents have been defeated and Joe's statistics. The player can change the difficulty level (between eight settings) and the number of starting credits in the options. There is also a two-player versus mode where two players can challenge each other as any fighter (except the final boss). Players must choose different characters.
Fighters can move from side to side with 
or 
but also in and out with 
and 
. Moving in or out of the plane can be done to avoid attacks. There are effectively three layers (a background, middle, and foreground); fighters in the foreground or background layers cannot hit each other, but fighters in the middle lane can hit opponents in any lane (and can, in turn, be hit by them). Fighters jump with 
. They punch with 
and kick with 
, either of which can also be done while jumping. Every character has special moves performed using special button combinations.
Defending is done by holding the D-Pad away from an attacking opponent, which negates all of the damage from the attack (though some special moves still do a small amount of damage when blocked). There are no combos since fighters recover quickly enough from any hit that the next hit can be blocked. Fighters can throw by pressing ++ in close range (or ++ when facing left), which cannot be blocked.
Statistics
In the single-player game, each fighter is rated on multiple statistics.
- SPD: Determines the fighter's movement speed.
- JMP: Determines how high the fighter can jump.
- STR: Determines the strength of the fighter's attacks.
- DEF: Determines the amount of damage taken by normal attacks (but not special moves or throws).
- LIF: Determines how much health the fighter has.
The main character Joe gains stats after each victorious match. For most of the categories, the amount gained increases when there is a greater disparity between Joe and the opponent in that particular stat (and no amount is gained if the defeated opponent has less of a stat than Joe has). The exception is the LIF stat, which increases depending on how much health Joe has at the end of each round.
Characters
Note: Move lists assume that the character is facing right. When facing left, and should be reversed.
| P | Punch |
| K | Kick |
Playable
Joe is the only playable character in the single-player mode, but the other characters can be played in the versus mode.
| Joe (ジョー) | |||||||||
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Country:  U.S.A. | |||||||||
An American fighter. The single-player mode follows Joe's journey to become the champion of champions.
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| Warren (ウォーレン) | |||||||||
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Country: U.S.A. | |||||||||
A Hawaiian fighter. Warren uses his large size and powerful strikes to compensate for his cowardice.
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| Vagnad Rovnoski (バグナド・ロフノスキー) | |||||||||
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Country:  Russia | |||||||||
A huge Siberian wrestler with onyx skin. Vagnad learned to fight while held in a concentration camp.
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| Buoh (舞王) | |||||||||
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Country:  Japan | |||||||||
A Japanese kabuki performer. Buoh is a master of ninjutsu, kung fu, karate, aikido, and kobudo.
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| Gaoluon (百竜 or ガオロン) | |||||||||
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Country:  China | |||||||||
A Chinese martial artist. Gaoluon has mastered the hard-fist method of the northern Chinese fighting style.
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| Reayon or Li Yong (麗栄 or リーヨン) | |||||||||
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Country:  Thailand | |||||||||
A Thai martial artist born in China and the only female fighter. Reayon has mastered the flexible-fist method of the northern Chinese fighting style.
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| Baraki Kimera (バラキ・キメラ) | |||||||||
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Country:  Kenya | |||||||||
The head of Kenya's Opa Opa Tribe. He is also a member of the secret organization "Junk."
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| Nick (ニック) | |||||||||
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Country:  Spain | |||||||||
A Spanish matador. Nick prefers to use knives when fighting, and is a member of the secret organization "Junk."
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Bosses
The final boss is not playable.
| Ranker | |
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Country: U.S.A. | |
| A mysterious fighter who appeared suddenly and began winning victories against the other champions with strength that had never been seen before. |
Stages
Joe travels to a different country to face each Fighting Master in the single-player game. In the two-player mode, players can choose any stage.
Warren
Vagnad
Buoh
Gaoluon
Reayon
Baraki
Nick
RankerBonus stages
Bonus stages appear after every three opponents defeated (not counting rematches). They award bonus points, with a perfect awarding 50,000 points.
Versions
The Mega Drive and Super NES versions of Power Athlete are virtually the same game, save for a few minor graphical differences and performance. For example, Joe uses blue "bracelets" in the Mega Drive version, while on Nintendo's console they are red. Shadows are also semi-transparent on the Super NES, as opposed to the solid black seen on the Mega Drive. There are other minor palette changes, witnessed in areas such as the upgrade screen.
Beating an opponent in the Mega Drive version also leads to a longer victory sequence, in which, rather than calculating a score and fading straight to black, the background fades and then the score is calculated.
The Character Select/Bonus Stage theme from the SNES version adds voice samples.
Localised names
| Language | Localised Name | English Translation |
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| English (US) | Deadly Moves | Deadly Moves |
| Japanese | パワーアスリート | Power Athlete |
Production credits
- Producer: Akihiko Uto
- Director: Takahiro Shima
- Programmer: Hisato Shirochika, Hideki Suzuki
- Charactor Design: Kuzira.MK2
- Designer: Kuzira.MK2, T.K, Shikanosuke, Dogrou, Aki.Misuzu, Betty.Black, Dember Sato
- Voice: Kuzira.MK2, Misako.S
- Sound: Hideki Suzuki
- Special Thanks: Kato Dappe, Rika Shima, Takayuki Shoji, Koji Naya, Inter State Co., Ltd., System Vision
Magazine articles
- Main article: Deadly Moves/Magazine articles.
Promotional material
Physical scans
| Sega Retro Average | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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63 |
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| Based on 25 reviews | |
| Mega Drive, JP |
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 Cover
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  Cart  Manual |
| Mega Drive, US |
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 Cover
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 Cart  Manual  PCB |
| Mega Drive, KR |
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 Cover
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   Cart |
Technical information
- Main article: Deadly Moves/Technical information.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 http://gdri.smspower.org/wiki/index.php/Inter_State
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 File:DeadlyMoves MD JP Box.jpg
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 https://sega.jp/history/hard/megadrive/software_l.html (Wayback Machine: 2020-07-02 23:21)
- ↑ File:Power Athlete MD credits.pdf
- ↑ 1700 igr dlya Sega, "" (RU; 2001-xx-xx), page 22
- ↑ 1700 igr dlya Sega, "" (RU; 2001-xx-xx), page 56
- ↑ Beep! MegaDrive, "December 1992" (JP; 1992-11-07), page 30
- ↑ Electronic Games (1992-1995), "March 1993" (US; 1993-02-09), page 64
- ↑ Entsiklopediya luchshikh igr Sega. Vypusk 1, "" (RU; 1999-xx-xx), page 291
- ↑ Entsiklopediya luchshikh igr Sega. Vypusk 1, "" (RU; 1999-xx-xx), page 305
- ↑ Famitsu, "1992-11-27" (JP; 1992-11-13), page 43
- ↑ Game Power, "Febbraio 1993" (IT; 1993-0x-xx), page 45
- ↑ GamesMaster, "April 1993" (UK; 1993-03-18), page 81
- ↑ Hippon Super, "January 1993" (JP; 1992-12-04), page 84
- ↑ Joypad, "Janvier 1993" (FR; 199x-xx-xx), page 82
- ↑ Joystick, "Février 1993" (FR; 1993-0x-xx), page 186
- ↑ Mega Drive Fan, "March 1993" (JP; 1993-02-xx), page 59
- ↑ Mega, "April 1993" (UK; 1993-03-18), page 56
- ↑ Mega, "July 1993" (UK; 1993-06-17), page 35
- ↑ MegaTech, "April 1993" (UK; 1993-03-20), page 56
- ↑ Mean Machines Sega, "March 1993" (UK; 1993-02-28), page 40
- ↑ Play Time, "5/93" (DE; 1993-04-07), page 106
- ↑ Sega Power, "April 1993" (UK; 1993-03-04), page 34
- ↑ Sega Pro, "March 1993" (UK; 1993-02-11), page 60
- ↑ Sega Pro, "April 1993" (UK; 1993-03-11), page 64
- ↑ Sega Zone, "June 1993" (UK; 1993-05-xx), page 28
- ↑ Sega Force, "March 1993" (UK; 1993-02-04), page 72
- ↑ Sega Saturn Magazine, "September 1995" (JP; 1995-08-08), page 87
- ↑ Tricks 16 bit, "Tricks Sega Gold 800 igr" (RU; 1998-03-20), page 48
| Deadly Moves | |
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Main page | Magazine articles | Reception | Region coding | Technical information | |
