I had never seen nor heard of Galaxy Fight prior to three weeks ago when someone I follow retweeted a gif of Juri bumrushing a literal child and kicking him in the face. At the time, I was refining a design for a character of mine who is a kickboxer, and seeing Juri cave a young boy's face in was a potent hit of inspiration. I had to play Galaxy Fight, and while I could download an ISO and burn it onto a CD-ROM, I instead shelled out about 35$ for a used Japanese copy because I just had to have the real thing in hand. Juri's thighs are still selling this game today.

Galaxy Fight is pretty barebones. Keep in mind that my fighting game literacy sucks, so when I say that I didn't find much here to differentiate it from your typical mid-90s fighter, someone more intimate with the genre may find a lot more nuance. There's nothing wrong with that either, fighting games of this era were great and even a very average one makes for a good way to kill a three-day weekend. However, this also makes Galaxy Fight a hard sell to anyone buying up genuine copies of old games (certainly not an American copy), though I suspect if you're serious about collecting you're probably accustomed to paying more than a game is reasonably worth. Look, I get it. I bought a copy of Mario Party, I have a sickness of the mind.

But maybe you don't, maybe you're a reasonable person and just want a good fighting game to play in emulation. In which case, Galaxy Fight is a much easier recommendation, as its aesthetic design and overall feel makes it worthwhile enough to spend a bit of time with. Combat feels very punchy, responsive, and carries just the right amount of weight. It's especially satisfying to launch an attack from a sprint thanks to the way characters truck across the screen, there's a good sense of momentum and force behind it. In terms of how a fighting game should feel, it checks all the boxes for me, even if it may be lacking in depth.

Setting aside my obvious Juri bias, I also gel with the way the rest of Galaxy Fight's modest roster looks and plays. Kouta Kita - who passed in 2017 - may be better known for Waku Waku 7, whose roster Roomi could effortlessly fight in with, but I think I prefer the designs in Galaxy Fight more. Not that I'm against cute things, but the darker, more sci-fi driven aesthetic resonates with me more. These designs translate well to sprite art, and even on the Saturn, Galaxy Fight is graphically impressive. Character pallets change to reflect the lighting conditions of the levels they're in, watery surfaces look convincingly wet thanks to some excellent reflections and shimmering effects, and parallax scrolling is used to create scope to great effect. I also love everything that's going on in Roomi's stage.

Plus, it's got Juri, man. Juri.

Although Galaxy Fight isn't the most innovative fighter of its time, it's still perfectly competent at what it does, and fun enough for what it is. I'd also like about 15 bucks back, maybe 20, but whatever. Whatever! I've made my bed, and it's filled with dusty-ass Sega Saturn imports.