Back in the 80’s and 90’s, licensed games were everywhere. Some were good, like the Disney Capcom games, while others were absolute wastes of time. One trend for licenses in the 90’s was for celebrities such as actions stars or athletes ( and Michael Jackson) to get their own games. You would think that athletes would get sports games, and some did such as Ken Griffey Jr with good results. The problem is that some athletes got games in genres that made no sense and quickly earned the ire of gamers. One of these games was the infamous Shaq Fu, a horrible fighting game with broken controls, a nonsensical story and just overall embodying everything wrong with licensed games. Shaq must have taken the ire personally because decades later, he licensed another game and this time the goal was to not suck.
Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn shifts from being a fighting game toward being a beat em up. This is a change for the better as far as I am concerned, and the gameplay is actually fun, much to my surprise. The goal was to be better than the first game and the developers succeeded, by making a game that refuses to take itself seriously. Instead, the game goes out of its way to be as over the top as possible and point out every plot hole and strange design choice, You play as Shaq, a Chinese orphan who must defeat parodies of pop culture figures who are really demonic. It is as insane as it sounds.
But how is the gameplay itself? Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn is a beat em up that has simplistic controls, but with a variety of moves that can be done. With the right move, Shaq will pull off techniques like a shoryuken, and stylized jumpkicks. There are numerous new techniques to learn and combos to discover, but what is interesting is how the game shows the impact the special moves have on the environment. Using a special move will damage the ground and the ground will show that damage as long as you are in that area.
Another thing I enjoyed were the power upa. Health pick-ups can be found as with any beat em ups, and finding an Icy Hot ( even the product shilling is done in a and self referential clever way) is the best way to restore yourself. Each stage will also have transformations that Shaq can use and these are actually very creative. What drags the game done a bit for me is the controls. They are nowhere near as bad as the original Shaq Fu, and are in fact somewhat minor. The issue is that the controls sometimes end up sticking, particularly during a boss fight. This gets annoying, but is not game breaking thankfully.
Even with the controls issue, I had a blast with Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn and that is something I didn’t expect. I recommend checking this one out, as it is a fun brawler with a very good sense of humor to it.