Ask and ye shall receive!
Here I profile my planned playable characters for the game (nothing against adding more, but I approached this thinking of archetypes):
Kunio The obligatory core of any Kunio game (except for Riki Densetsu; the exception that proves the rule), the man himself is the most popular student at Nekketsu High School, even if not the best. Yet even if he's not the most academic type, Kunio's altruism and athleticism have earned him the respect of almost everyone. Kunio's signature attack is his mach kick, which whittles down enemies and can stun them. At the start of the game, he's home sick, but when he hears his load of a buddy Hiroshi has gotten into a jam for the umpteenth time, he rushes back to Nekketsu High and a new adventure starts!
Misako Kunio's fickle ex-girlfriend first showed what she was made of in
Shin Nekketsu Kouha Kunio Kun: Kunio Tachi No Banka; both in that she could fight and that players got to see her in a bikini. Something of a tomboy (soccer is her passion, and she has a talent for kicking balls of all types), Misako is naturally attracted to athletic men, which on the plus side meant she was easily drawn to Kunio, but on the minus-side, meant she was easily drawn to his rivals. This may be why they had a falling out since SNKKKKTNB. (I'm not typing that title out multiple times!) Questionable ethics aside, Misako remains a useful ally in battle; particularly with regard to crowd control, as her mighty spin-kick can clear out unwanted company like a bad fart--but it is just a kick! Pretty girls don't fart; perish the thought!
Riki Kunio's friend and his most reliable ally, at when they aren't beating each other up
, or competing in sporting events that tend to lead to beating each other up. The two also trade verbal barbs from time to time. Riki is a more academic guy than Kunio on top of being a comparable athlete, but he does have a big weakness in the form of girls. He's constantly attracted to them to the point of foolish obsession, and legend has it he once lost a fight to a cheerleader because he just kept gawking at her panties while she kicked him in the face--nobody is quite sure if this legend is true, because Riki beats them up severely if they mention it. Sadly for Riki, the girls themselves tend to be more interested in Kunio. Maybe he will find true love someday, but you probably don't care. What you should care about is Riki's staying power in a fight; he can stand up to a lot of abuse while giving it back with moves like his mach punch attack.
Hasebe She's so different from Kunio on the surface that it's a wonder they get along so well. Hasebe is a gregarious and introspective people-person, compared to our beloved hooligan who's associations with others are usually of the aggressive variety. Yet she's more than insightful enough to see that Kunio is actually a good guy despite his rough demeanor, which has made her something close to his current girlfriend. Back in RCR, she proved a valuable spy by chumming around with Yamada and his allies, the Dragon Twins, and then reporting on them to Kunio and Riki. Hasebe's fine memory for detail, though, also led to her development of a skill not widely-known until recently: She's picked up a lot of the ferocious streetfighting techniques of thugs she snooped on. Her frighteningly powerful uppercut speaks volumes to the rude sort of people that aren't swayed by her amiably flapping mouth speaking volumes.
Godai Frequently grinning, laughing, and making his teammates grin and laugh, Godai is a great guy whose brimming charisma is only occasionally undermined by the fact that one of the things he finds funny is whacking people on the head with a stick. Fortunately, his aptitude for wielding melee weapons makes him a useful guy to have around if you're idea of hanging out with buddies involves getting into street brawls. Aside from that, there's not much to say about him here, but don't worry; he'll say plenty himself in the game.
Momozono Cheerleading gets a bad rap in the sports world. Not as bad as Sumo wrestling, as at least people find cheerleaders attractive, but still, a lot of school sports snobs contend that it's not really a school sport if it doesn't involve the team manipulating the trajectory of some sort of balls. The real athletes, they contend, are in the center of the field or court while cheerleaders stay on the sidelines assuming vaguely sexual poses; except when they assume blatantly sexual poses. Yet these haters don't stop to think of how tough their ordeals really are--few other sports place such diverse demands on their teams as doing high jump kicks, dropping into the splits, flipping, lifting other people and sometimes throwing them into the air, and withstanding falls onto concrete. As such Momozono, the captain of Nekketsu High School's cheer team, can do well in a fight; being very agile and able to spin and flip out of situations that would pin down many, ultimately coming out ahead. Momozono is actually quite like a more feminine counterpart to Kunio; she's a bit of a ditz but she's popular for her athleticism and attractiveness. She is also known for performing the power ballad, "Lover To Friend", which went to #1 on Nekketsu High School's pop charts. Sure; normally high schools don't have pop charts, but if you want to see normal high schools, play something else.
My Afterward My character choices reflect the processes that led to my starting work on this fangame, and I'll go into that history a bit here. It began when I first read the announcement that Miracle Kidz was working on a long-awaited sequel to
River City Ransom; not just a spinoff but a game with similar mechanics. I never really discovered anything else, but Googling around led me to discover that ARC had started making a Kunio games for the 3DS.
It was their remake of the first ever Kunio game, but it also had an expanded story mode with RPG mechanics akin to RCR. Sadly, the news was bittersweet, mostly because I didn't actually have a 3DS (I actually
still don't), and they never released the game outside Japan. Beyond that, as I liked Misako a lot in her debut game I was disappointed that she was brought back in this game but not playable, and I was rather annoyed that they insisted on keeping characters confined to backward NES color pallets--we all know Kunio has brown hair; if they have the technology to show that they should. These primitive graphics also made me seriously doubt that the game actually needed to be made for 3DS instead of just regular DS.
Still, much as with the circumstances that led me to discover that game, I kept searching for news on it and inadvertantly found a nifty mod of
Nekketsu Kakutou Densetsu for PC; it actually had Misako playable (among other girls) and all the characters were beautifully rendered in colors that matched their official art, so it looked a lot like
River City Ransom EX. I enjoyed the game and its art, and at that point I was struck with an idea: I've got a great source of sprites right here, I know a bit about Game Maker, so if I can't get my RCR sequel, why not make it myself? I began to do just that, and although it's still in its early stages, it's got a promising engine to start.
Now back to my character choices: Kunio and Riki were the obvious ones, and I chose Misako as the third one to compensate for her not being in the 3DS games. (She finally did return to a playable role as part of Misuzu's team in the PS3 remake of
Downtown Nekketsy Koushinkyoko Daiundokai, but still never on 3DS yet.) Hasebe was chosen because she was extremely notable for being a high tier fighter in my sprite source; what I call the "EX" version of KD, and her formidable fighting talents seem to have ascended to canon in the aforementioned PS3 game. Then there's Godai; he's in it just because I've always loved Godai with his delightfully silly grin, and he seemed like he'd be a blast to write in a humorous game with a story mode. Momozono was a relatively recent choice, but I chose her because I loved her "Lover to Friend" song, which along with her cheerleader status, gave her more of an inherent identity than some characters, and she also seemed to be a nice choice for an evasive play style that other characters might have less of.
Hopefully, you've enjoyed my preview of a game I hope to finish someday!
Subject: River City Riot 
Tue Jul 14, 2015 1:29 am
