World Heroes: the wild, historical heartbeat of 90s fighters

[soulsas]

I still remember the first time I slid a token into that gleaming Neo Geo arcade cabinet, the screen flaring to life with a kaleidoscope of over-the-top animation and pulsing sound. It was World Heroes, a name that may not echo as loudly today as Street Fighter II, but to me—and to many who haunted the arcades of the early 90s—it was a blast of creativity that hit differently. This wasn’t just another 2D fighter trying to ride the coattails of Capcom’s genre-defining titan. No, World Heroes was its own kind of cool.
Developed by ADK and published by SNK, World Heroes dared to blend the button-mashing thrill of fighting games with a premise ripped straight out of a time travel fever dream. Why just fight Ryu or Guile when you could pit Rasputin against Bruce Lee—sorry, Kim Dragon—or see Hattori Hanzo throw down against a muscle-bound Frankenstein’s monster named Brocken? It was wild. It was bold. And yeah, it was a little goofy. But that was the point.
While Street Fighter II leaned into contemporary archetypes—karate masters, army commandos, stretchy yoga mystics—World Heroes threw all caution to the wind and dialed up the absurdity. Historical caricatures were the lifeblood of the game’s identity. Jeanne d'Arc (reimagined as Janne) fought with elegance and conviction. J. Carn, a Mongolian brute with moves as big as his ego, could slam opponents like a mythic beast. Each character felt like they leapt from the pages of a Saturday morning cartoon drawn by a time-obsessed maniac. And I loved it.
As a kid, there was something impossibly cool about choosing a fighter based not just on their move set, but on the mythos they carried with them. These weren’t random martial artists—they were legends, distorted through a neon-glazed lens. It made every match feel like you were rewriting history with your own fists. And while Street Fighter was the refined, technically superior experience, World Heroes was the punk rock alternative. It didn’t just play differently—it felt different.
One feature that especially stood out was the “Death Match” mode—a brutal, trap-filled variation of the standard fight that introduced electrified ropes and spiked floors. It was chaotic and hilarious, like a wrestling match gone wrong. Street Fighter may have had the prestige, but World Heroes had the spectacle. It didn’t care about balance as much as it cared about fun, and sometimes that’s what mattered more.
Looking back, I can’t help but smile at how World Heroes embraced the bizarre with open arms. It was a fighting game with soul, not afraid to be weird, not trying to be something it wasn’t. And as someone who grew up obsessed with both history and hadokens, it felt like a game made just for me.
Years later, I still boot it up—whether through retro collections or a dusty cartridge—and I’m instantly transported. Not just back to the game, but to the sensation of discovery, of excitement, of play that doesn’t take itself too seriously. World Heroes may not be the king of fighters, but in my book, it was always one of the coolest kids on the block.
Can you believe it’s been 33 years since World Heroes first punched its way into arcades?

 

[Yousef Yousef]

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