The Most Underrated and Unappreciated Fighting Game Ever

I have a question for you: What is your favorite fighting game franchise? Street Fighter? Tekken? Mortal Kombat? How about Fighters Destiny? You might be thinking, "What is Fighters Destiny?" Allow me to tell you about it. Fighters Destiny, also known as Fighting Cup in Japan, was released for the Nintendo 64 in 1998. I enjoyed this game so much as a kid and nowadays, you hardly see anyone talk about this fighting game.

The Characters

There are nine main characters in this game. Ryuji, a Japanese karate exponent; Abdul, a well-balanced fighter from Mongolia obsessed with Arabic culture; Tomahawk, a professional wrestler from the United States; Meiling, a Chinese martial artist; Kaze, a Japanese ninja with a massive catalog of special moves; Pierre, a French clown with a deceptive fighting style; Leon, an all-rounder from Spain; Bob, a powerful Brazilian fighter; and the tough aerial combat specialist Valerie from Germany. There's also five secret characters that can be unlocked by completing different challenges, consisting of a quick and powerful female Swiss warrior named Boro, a Russian jester-esque fighter named Joker, a training robot from Germany named Robert, an old Japanese karate expert named the Master, and a comical fighting cow from Hokkaido named Ushi.

Gameplay

When you play most fighting games, the objective is to empty an opponent's health gauge. In Fighters Destiny, it follows the same method, except it relies on a point system. Each character has a list of moves that can be performed during a battle. What you see above is stars. They represent the points an opponent scores. In the game default, the fighter to reach seven points in a match wins. Once you deplete an opponent's health gauge, they go in "Piyori condition," a brief spell of dizziness in which opponent's life bar has been drained completely and the fighter has a limited time to perform a move in order to score points. The point system are as follows:

• Ring Out: Knocking an opponent out of the ring (1 point)
• Throw Down: Taking an opponent down with a throw (2 points)
• Knock Down: Performing a routine knock out (3 points)
• Special: When an opponent is in Piyori condition, the fighter performs a special move (4 points)

*If time runs out, the winner is awarded one point via Judge's Decision.

Game Reception

Fighters Destiny scored a respectable 77% given by GameRankings, a 7.3/10 rating by Nintendo Power, and an 8/10 by IGN. While the game had mixed reviews, most people, however, liked the scoring system and the new moves that the characters can obtain by completing the Master Challenge. Sure, it may not be on the same level as Street Fighter or Virtua Fighter, but it's arguably the best fighting game for the N64 I've played in my childhood. Unfortunately, Fighters Destiny sold a paltry 18,000 copies two months after its North America release. In other words, the game was a commercial flop.

Despite its poor sales, Fighters Destiny is still an enjoyable game to play either by yourself or with a friend. The graphics aren't the best, but this fighting game is worth playing over and over again. A sequel, Fighter Destiny 2, was released in Japan in 1999. I'll do a review of that in a future story. Fighters Destiny deserves more attention in 2025, even though its over 25 years old.

Before I conclude this story, I want to give a shout out to AcidGlow. He's a gamer on YouTube and I've been following his channel for years. His Fighters Destiny gameplays are amazing. I'll post a link to one of his gameplays below, so you can check it out as well as his other videos.

If you've played Fighters Destiny as a kid, what did you think about it? Let me know in the comments below. Subscribe to my page on here. Follow me on my socials. Finally, like this story and please leave a generous one-off tip. It'll be found at the end of this story. Big or small, your tips will support creators like me so we can keep publishing new stories and share them with everyone.

https://youtu.be/04P08UfiXY0?si=4XLrkWlKixUdMIdn