The 16-bit era was lousy with side-scrolling beat'em-ups that attempted to duplicate the success of Final Fight, and nearly all of them missed the point completely. None of them seemed to figure out that Final Fight is more than a game about beating up people. To even begin to replicate Final Fight's charm, you need to have ridiculous characters, a moderate amount of gameplay variety, and (most crucially) the ability to "accidentally" trade hits with a second player.
Riot Zone doesn't have a two-player mode. This should immediately tell you everything that you need to know.
Despite being a relatively late release in the TurboGrafx-16 CD-ROM's lifespan, Riot Zone is about as basic a Final Fight clone as you can get. Though it captures the basics of Final Fight's gameplay, the more complex and memorable elements are ignored. The characters are generic, you never pick up any weapons, and there are no smashable objects in the background scenery. You do pick up your occasional roast chicken for health and clock radio for points, but these item drops are always predetermined. The same enemy will drop the same item on every playthrough. You won't ever smash any phone booths and find a surprise health-restoring bottle of whiskey inside -- every single element is scripted and predictable.
Final Fight, for all its simplicity, had a dynamic feel. Its few random elements made gameplay feel fresh for longer than it would otherwise, and its goofy nature made you want to play through until the end. As silly as it sounds, you need to be able to pick up and eat used chewing gum in order for a beat'em-up to feel worthwhile. You need to beat up cars for no reason, and you need to see the word "SEXY" scrawled on a bathroom wall or two. You can have all the technical gameplay competence in the world, but if there's no promise of each successive stage offering more outlandish situations than the last, I'm not going to want to pound bad guys into pulp past the second level.
Unfortunately, Riot Zone's gameplay is barely adequate, and doesn't do nearly enough to make up for what it's lacking in other areas. There's no weapons, so you're forced to rely on your fists and feet throughout the entire game. The characters possess extremely limited movesets, and you can use every single one of your attacks within the first three seconds of gameplay.
By the time you've beaten up the requisite fat guy brigade halfway through the first level, you'll be ready to call it quits. There's nothing here to make continued play worthwhile. Riot Zone is Final Fight without character, wit, or soul, and it doesn't even have a two-player mode. Metro City Mayor and former street fighter Mike Haggar gives Riot Zone one "AROOYEAH" out of ten.
I dare you to stay awake until the end of this 45-minute-long Riot Zone video. Treat yourself to a Final Fight speedrun if you can make it past the ten-minute mark. You deserve it.
