Bad Dudes Vs. DragonNinja, often referred to simply as Bad Dudes (on the American NES port of the arcade original), and known in Japan simply as DragonNinja is a 1988 arcade game developed and published by Data East. It was also ported to many computer and game console home systems. Bad Dudes is a side-scrolling beat 'em up where the players are set in the role of the titular duo tasked with rescuing "President Ronnie" from ninja kidnappers. It was met with commercial success, and a generally positive to mixed critical reception. It has since become widely known for its general premise and introductory cut scene.
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Decent visuals, but otherwise a clunky and uninteresting side scrolling brawler.
Like Double Dragon, I've always had a soft spot for this one, mostly because the stage 2 theme is such a fucking bop. It's goofy, it's cheesy, it's just barely functional enough to pass as a game, but that's all part of its charm.
I was bad enough to save the president, but it was Reagan and I wish I hadn't.
Outro game que joguei quando era mais novo. É bem simples mas pode divertir
Memes used to work differently. We worked with what we had. The chunks of prescribed media that was made for us to repeat a few funny zingers and a game premise we would want to tell others about. Here comes Bad Dudes:
THE PRESIDENT HAS BEEN KIDNAPPED BY NINJAS. ARE YOU A BAD ENOUGH DUDE TO RESCUE THE PRESIDENT?
Used to be that’s all a game had to be. Hilarious longline statement: President has been captured by ninjas. Prompt for action: Are you a bad enough dude to rescue the President?
10/10 premise and execution, you don’t even need a manual, as a picture of a military looking motherfucker gives us our excellent prompt. Then we choose between two bad dudes or get to have both of them in multiplayer: BLADE AND STRIKER.
Over seven stages you move through urban Washington DC environments, from the streets to a truck level, to the sewers, to an underground lair where President Ronnie is being kept.
President Ronnie. So it was made in ‘88, but you hardly need that additional detail to know that about it. Funny thing is it’s one of those peculiar “this is America” views from the outside, more aspirationally American than interested in it’s actual culture. Or it is our only culture.
There’s an arcade game and it has chunkier weightier sprites. One of the biggest arcade games of ‘88. I say avoid it. The way this is downsized is so much more appealing. It retains arcade simplicity and then miniaturizes the parts around it, only leaving what is essential.
You punch, jump, and jump-kick your way through these seven levels and it’s tough going. You’ve gotta be a bad enough dude to use save states to save the States.
Then you get a beautifully rendered, for NES, clip of a helicopter, the White House, and you get to eat burgers with the President. Not only does Bad Dudes have the best NES setup for a premise, it also has the best conclusion.
Stone cold classic. But the game also sucks. It’s hard. The sound isn’t designed well for the platform. It’s hard to read sometimes. The mechanics aren’t as compelling or hard-hitting as the badass two-line story. The parts where you’re playing it aren’t as cool as the bookends: it doesn’t have this hyper-Americana about it, in-game, that’s just window dressing.
Still, try and find a more immediate premise than this one has, and come to realize it’s a rare exception of preferring a slightly less standout NES version to its more meaty arcade counterpart. Bonus points for being hilarious.
THE PRESIDENT HAS BEEN KIDNAPPED BY NINJAS. ARE YOU A BAD ENOUGH DUDE TO RESCUE THE PRESIDENT?
Used to be that’s all a game had to be. Hilarious longline statement: President has been captured by ninjas. Prompt for action: Are you a bad enough dude to rescue the President?
10/10 premise and execution, you don’t even need a manual, as a picture of a military looking motherfucker gives us our excellent prompt. Then we choose between two bad dudes or get to have both of them in multiplayer: BLADE AND STRIKER.
Over seven stages you move through urban Washington DC environments, from the streets to a truck level, to the sewers, to an underground lair where President Ronnie is being kept.
President Ronnie. So it was made in ‘88, but you hardly need that additional detail to know that about it. Funny thing is it’s one of those peculiar “this is America” views from the outside, more aspirationally American than interested in it’s actual culture. Or it is our only culture.
There’s an arcade game and it has chunkier weightier sprites. One of the biggest arcade games of ‘88. I say avoid it. The way this is downsized is so much more appealing. It retains arcade simplicity and then miniaturizes the parts around it, only leaving what is essential.
You punch, jump, and jump-kick your way through these seven levels and it’s tough going. You’ve gotta be a bad enough dude to use save states to save the States.
Then you get a beautifully rendered, for NES, clip of a helicopter, the White House, and you get to eat burgers with the President. Not only does Bad Dudes have the best NES setup for a premise, it also has the best conclusion.
Stone cold classic. But the game also sucks. It’s hard. The sound isn’t designed well for the platform. It’s hard to read sometimes. The mechanics aren’t as compelling or hard-hitting as the badass two-line story. The parts where you’re playing it aren’t as cool as the bookends: it doesn’t have this hyper-Americana about it, in-game, that’s just window dressing.
Still, try and find a more immediate premise than this one has, and come to realize it’s a rare exception of preferring a slightly less standout NES version to its more meaty arcade counterpart. Bonus points for being hilarious.
You ever had that moment where you hear of a product, no matter what it may be, and there is something about it that stands out as being either so incredible, so unique, or so stupid, that you just had to check out the product because of it? That would be the case with me and Bad Dudes. On the surface, I thought it just looked like every other arcade game of the time, with nothing within it to make it stand out, not really giving me any reasons to consider playing it myself. However, then I heard that the sentence “Are you a bad enough dude to rescue Ronnie?”, who is the president, is in this game, and I was so utterly amazed at how dumb, yet amazing that piece of dialogue is, that I just couldn’t help but check it out myself.
So, after one singular playthrough of the game, I can say with confidence that the line is there, it is hilariously awful, and there is even more ridiculousness that is hidden within, making it something that I am glad that I checked out. However, with that being said… I was right. It is basically like every other arcade game of the time, and it has nothing that makes it stand out from the rest. Of course, the game itself isn’t bad (ironically), and I imagine if this was your first exposure to a side-scrolling beat-’em-up, then you would probably get a lot more enjoyment out of it, but really, at this point in time when we already had games like Double Dragon on the market, there are plenty of better options to choose from.
The story, of course, is about being a bad enough dude to rescue the president, which is all that I ever wanted to be in life, the graphics are pretty standard for an arcade game of 1988, but they are still good, the music is good, but it certainly isn’t the most memorable soundtrack out there, the control is fine, albeit a little awkward at times, as well as being limited with the moves you can pull off, and the gameplay is pretty much exactly what you would expect just by looking at a single screenshot.
The game is a 2D side-scrolling beat-’em-up, where you take control of one of the bad dudes, go through plenty of different levels, beat up a wide amount of enemies with several moves at your disposal, gather several weapons, health items, and time bonuses along the way, and take on a set of bosses that are pretty standard for these kinds of games, but at the same time, somewhat unique at the same time. There is nothing about this game that is unique from any other beat-’em-up at the time, except for the fact that you are primarily on a 2D side-scrolling plane, which not too many other games in the genre do, but this game does manage to stand out from others with the absolute ridiculousness of plenty of the elements in the game.
I have already mentioned the “bad enough dude” line, but there are also other hilarious lines, such as where you talk with the president himself about going to get a burger, which is funny no matter what context it is in. In addition, the sound effects in this game are pretty weird, but at the same time, fucking hilarious. They are so detailed, yet at the same time, extremely repetitive, playing MANY times throughout the game, and while it did get a little annoying after a while, I won’t lie, I was chuckling a lot of the time because of how dumb it was. Not only that, but some of the bosses can also provide a good laugh with how they are placed on the ridiculousness scale. There are several bosses I could mention for this, but the one that stands out to me the most would be with Kamui, a green ninja boss you fight in the third stage. His gimmick is that he makes clones of himself, which is not a new boss gimmick whatsoever, but what makes this one stick out is the sheer amount of clones he makes at once, and how he sends them all at you at once, which, again, is hilarious to me.
However, once again, none of this can save the game from being yet another generic side-scrolling beat-’em-up, meandering along for more then it really needs to, while also introducing little-to-nothing new in later stages to make it so that you question why you even bother to continue playing. Not to mention, it does implement some of my biggest pet peeves that I find when it comes to arcade games like this, such as with arcade syndrome, where the game throws a million enemies at you at once for the sake of “difficulty”, and how there is a boss rush on the final stage. I wouldn’t say I completely disliked my journey through it, because again, all the dumb, stupid, hilarious moments did keep me going, but if you are someone who doesn’t find these moments that dumb or that hilarious, then there is nothing for you here.
Overall, despite how stupid, yet memorable several parts of the game really are, it is still yet another beat-’em-up that sort of gave Data East an edge into the genre alongside others, but not nearly enough to where they could stand out, or even come close to overthrowing the others. I wouldn’t recommend you playing it, not because it is bad, but because you can easily experience the best parts of the games just by watching a YouTube video, so there is no need to go out and play it for yourself. That didn’t stop me though, going to spend $10 on not just this game, but also its sequel which was bundled alongside it……. no, I am not that good with money, why do you ask?
Game #286
So, after one singular playthrough of the game, I can say with confidence that the line is there, it is hilariously awful, and there is even more ridiculousness that is hidden within, making it something that I am glad that I checked out. However, with that being said… I was right. It is basically like every other arcade game of the time, and it has nothing that makes it stand out from the rest. Of course, the game itself isn’t bad (ironically), and I imagine if this was your first exposure to a side-scrolling beat-’em-up, then you would probably get a lot more enjoyment out of it, but really, at this point in time when we already had games like Double Dragon on the market, there are plenty of better options to choose from.
The story, of course, is about being a bad enough dude to rescue the president, which is all that I ever wanted to be in life, the graphics are pretty standard for an arcade game of 1988, but they are still good, the music is good, but it certainly isn’t the most memorable soundtrack out there, the control is fine, albeit a little awkward at times, as well as being limited with the moves you can pull off, and the gameplay is pretty much exactly what you would expect just by looking at a single screenshot.
The game is a 2D side-scrolling beat-’em-up, where you take control of one of the bad dudes, go through plenty of different levels, beat up a wide amount of enemies with several moves at your disposal, gather several weapons, health items, and time bonuses along the way, and take on a set of bosses that are pretty standard for these kinds of games, but at the same time, somewhat unique at the same time. There is nothing about this game that is unique from any other beat-’em-up at the time, except for the fact that you are primarily on a 2D side-scrolling plane, which not too many other games in the genre do, but this game does manage to stand out from others with the absolute ridiculousness of plenty of the elements in the game.
I have already mentioned the “bad enough dude” line, but there are also other hilarious lines, such as where you talk with the president himself about going to get a burger, which is funny no matter what context it is in. In addition, the sound effects in this game are pretty weird, but at the same time, fucking hilarious. They are so detailed, yet at the same time, extremely repetitive, playing MANY times throughout the game, and while it did get a little annoying after a while, I won’t lie, I was chuckling a lot of the time because of how dumb it was. Not only that, but some of the bosses can also provide a good laugh with how they are placed on the ridiculousness scale. There are several bosses I could mention for this, but the one that stands out to me the most would be with Kamui, a green ninja boss you fight in the third stage. His gimmick is that he makes clones of himself, which is not a new boss gimmick whatsoever, but what makes this one stick out is the sheer amount of clones he makes at once, and how he sends them all at you at once, which, again, is hilarious to me.
However, once again, none of this can save the game from being yet another generic side-scrolling beat-’em-up, meandering along for more then it really needs to, while also introducing little-to-nothing new in later stages to make it so that you question why you even bother to continue playing. Not to mention, it does implement some of my biggest pet peeves that I find when it comes to arcade games like this, such as with arcade syndrome, where the game throws a million enemies at you at once for the sake of “difficulty”, and how there is a boss rush on the final stage. I wouldn’t say I completely disliked my journey through it, because again, all the dumb, stupid, hilarious moments did keep me going, but if you are someone who doesn’t find these moments that dumb or that hilarious, then there is nothing for you here.
Overall, despite how stupid, yet memorable several parts of the game really are, it is still yet another beat-’em-up that sort of gave Data East an edge into the genre alongside others, but not nearly enough to where they could stand out, or even come close to overthrowing the others. I wouldn’t recommend you playing it, not because it is bad, but because you can easily experience the best parts of the games just by watching a YouTube video, so there is no need to go out and play it for yourself. That didn’t stop me though, going to spend $10 on not just this game, but also its sequel which was bundled alongside it……. no, I am not that good with money, why do you ask?
Game #286