Fans who loved the game back in 1996 will see this MVS arcade port as a bit of a revelation, particularly as only the console AES version seems to have been readily available up until the Nintendo Switch release. In this sense, it's quite easy to appreciate the conceptual origin of Waku Waku 7, whether or not anyone has any knowledge of the genre. Developers tend to cash in on the flavours they know audiences like, rather than producing more creative and experimental fighting projects. Looking back, perhaps it would be fair to say that 2D fighter games were one of the first genres to become overtly over-saturated. Despite the game's age, there's an inherent appreciation for its origins and conception, which came about as a sort of reflection and commentary on the saturation of the genre at the time. The incessant parodying of various other games and cultural influences, largely achieved through the delightfully odd cast of seven fighters, is an intriguing and playful source of inspiration, which also quite expertly fuses the charm of Waku Waku 7 with a familiar-seeming and gratifying set of fighting mechanics. Although on the surface this bears many of the technical trademarks of SNK fighters, such as particular use of screen zoom and the same four-part attack mechanics, it's also distinctly different. At a time when fighting games were immensely popular, but perhaps also very saturated and indistinct, Waku Waku 7 was quite the antidote for those burned out on the likes of Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, King of Fighters and others.

Arina makihara