You know the moves, those favorite forward-down-forward inputs, the semi-circles, the 360 rotations, the QTEs, the fatality and so on and so forth, which culminate in a dope piece of pixelly satisfaction.
What might your favorite video game move be?
Dave: Streets of Rage 2 is my favorite game of all time. Max the wrestler is my preferred character. And his Atomic Drop is pretty much the most bodacious–and slightly unsettling–beatdown move to pull off.
You need to place yourself behind your opponent and because of Max’s girth you can’t vault over him so it will take some skill to get into position but once you do and reel off this killer drop, oh boy.
"My knee wants to make love to your colon."
The Atomic Drop instantly kills most of the cannon fodder amd does MASSIVE DAMAGE to bosses and it’s jsut big fun to unleash. Plus, the sound effect is dope. It’s like someone ramming a plate of glass with a garbage truck.
Steve: A little more recent, but i have to go with Conan for the Xbox360/PS3. The brutal combo moves in this game were so far over the top they needed pure oxygen to breathe. You want to see Conan uppercut a guy so hard that he spins into the air, then hack the dude in half at the waist while he’s still airborne? You got it! Complete with spilling entrails. Speaking of entrails, how could you not love him reaching into a poor sucker’s abdomen and showing him what his bowels look like in the light of day. Then there’s knocking a poor bastard to the ground and drop kicking his neck so hard that his head flies off! How about Conan going cuisinart on a punk bitch, slicing rapidly then delivering a sound BOOT to the guy’s chest, sending him sprawling backward in a half dozen or so bloody chunks. Last, but certainly not least, is one particularly brutal maneuver that sees our esteemed Cimmerian warrior toss his two-handed greatsword +17 into the air, then upper-cutting a poor schmoe sending him careening into the spinning blade, then catching the sword on the way down only to have the bad guy’s body keep falling, in two pieces, onto the cold hard earth, sending blood and body parts everywhere. God i love this game!
Savage sword? INDEED!
Erich: Turning to a different kind of axe, one of the most viscerally satisfying video game experiences I’ve ever had was playing Guitar Hero for the first time. Think back, if you will, to a time before music games were all the rage, before big box stores were stacked to the rafters with, well, big boxes filled with plastic instruments. Imagine a time when an upstart guitar game got a limited release because retailers weren’t sure they could ever sell a game that cost (gasp!) $80! We may be jaded now, but the thrill of playing the original Guitar Hero at a Best Buy demo kiosk was enough to get me to finally buy a PS2. Since picking an entire game as my SAN entry is kind of lame, I’ll point to my favorite moment in the best song in the original GH: Boston’s More Than a Feeling. The rhythmic clacking of the opening arpeggio was a fun test of finger skills, but nothing in that game was more fun than the build-up to the chorus. Who says chords are for wimps?
I see my Marianne walking awaaaaay...
Tags: Symposium Ad Nauseum
Most viscerally satisfying game maneuver for me is the Izuna Drop in Ninja Gaiden II for 360. There’s nothing like sending an enemy into the air, jumping up, slicing off a couple of limbs, and then grabbing him into a spinning drop that makes his head EXPLODE when you drive him into the ground.
Great one Evadrion! I totally agree. Also of note is the Underworld Drop, which you pull off with the fully upgraded dual-wielded swords.