It's a party-style brawler and action title involving caricatured veterans of the aforementioned genre going through various set-piece scenes modeled after the progression of a movie, with some being major fight scenes, and others being various sorts of silly challenges and mini-games. It's got a noticeable slant towards pick-up-and-play multiplayer action, but there is a lengthy single-player component to it as well, which houses much of the unlockable stuff in the game. (And there are also options for using CPU-controlled characters as bots with different levels of AI for use as teammates and enemies in the multiplayer-oriented game modes.)

There are many humorous characters here which are considered rather iconic in seventies action/martial arts movies and the like; The Old Master, the Ninja, Lucy Cannon (remember Foxy Cleopatra from the latest Austin Powers movie?), a child-carrying samurai that looks remarkably like a … .Lone Wolf … shall we say ... with a cub. Then there's the immortal monkey god-type from Chinese mythology, the young girl out for revenge … well, on second thought, there's usually a guy playing that role, but you get the idea.

There are a couple of characters that don't seem to fit as well, and one which is conspicuous by his absence. The odd ones are Captain Won Ton, a Mexican wrestler, and Candi Roll, a … roller-skating, yo-yo wielding person. Maybe I haven't seen enough seventies movies, but those seem less than archetypical to me. (Though Candi could be a reference to characters like Roller Girl in Boogie Nights which was not a real seventies flick, but rather one set in the seventies. How many such characters were there, though?)

And then there's the one that's missing, sadly. I mean, they even have the theme from Enter the Dragon as an available soundtrack during scenes in this game, but they don't have a character evocative of its star. Just as Bruce Lee is an icon of seventies martial arts movies, it has become a tradition in video games depicting martial artist characters to have one which resembles him, but such a character is absent here, which I found disappointing. Some might call it trying to be original, but these characters aren't really about originality, they're humorous versions of genre staples at the time. Ah well, I just had to get that off my chest.

The portion of the game you'll spend the most time in to begin with is Ninja Challenge mode, which is comparable to "Story Mode" in other games. It is structured like a movie (well, a somewhat crazed one, anyway), and consists of various scenes involving your character vs. many ninjas, monsters and other characters, in situations ranging from ring combat to duels to mini-games. After each scene, you get a star rating (up to five, naturally). The better you do, the more stars you get, and the more you can potentially unlock (alternate costumes, variant game modes, character bios, etc.). The main scenes are pretty varied areas - generally humorous takes on one movie or another, and much running from place to place while fighting furiously and avoiding obstacles/pitfalls/etc. while on the move. Don't worry, it slows down or stops at some points when the focus is more on having an epic fight scene, such as at a scene's climactic finale. One scene, for example, has you fighting through a Chinatown-style area, wrecking a restaurant scene then jumping onto a boat, having to avoid oncoming obstacles while fighting off the other characters, with crates of watermelon ready to assault them with if need be. Another one takes you leaping from rooftop to rooftop while avoiding UFO death-rays, and includes a fight scene which takes place on top of a flying saucer.

Other scenes, especially after unlocking the Miniseries mode, are smaller in scope, usually revolving around a fighting or mini-game challenge. These can involve rescuing drunks who are flying out of a tavern window, with your character running around under the window with a trampoline to bounce them to safety; another one has you tossing around a tied-up captive princess (whom you rescued in a different scene) in order to knock your opponents off of their precarious treetop perches, while catching her safely to avoid sharing that fate. Maybe I'm just evil, but I found that one to be very funny, especially with the princess wriggling, yelling, and complaining as she is hurled back and forth. Unfortunately, these challenges can be very uneven in difficulty, and while most seem funny at first, the humor can wear off and give way to frustration when you're trying it for the fifth time in order to get a good enough score to unlock something. I advise taking a break and coming back to the scene later when that occurs.

The game has plenty of other mode options, with a couple of practice modes (one is freestyle with possibility of multiplayer, the other one is a focused single-player mode where you follow along and practice the basics). Then there's the basic Battle mode for multiplayer, or single-player with AI bots, with plenty of optional modifiers having to do with things like victory conditions, probably the oddest one being the "Wooden Men" option which has players competing to destroy the most wooden practice dummies. One really nice feature associated with Battle Mode is the ability to view a "Final Cut" of the battle scene after going through it, complete with director commentary by Shao Ting, director extraordinaire. It's also edited with zoom, slow-motion and other effects, all added automatically. These Cuts can be saved to the hard drive for later viewing if desired. There are even cinematic filters you can unlock for this feature, including one which makes it seem more like a grainy, old-style film. This really brings home the feel that your character is involved in shooting an action flick.

You can also play an unlockable Championship mode, which is something like a marathon version of Battle, taking place over twelve rounds. Also unlockable is Miniseries mode, featuring three challenges for each character, which leads to a further unlockable treat on completion. As mentioned earlier, some of these challenges are much more difficult than others, to the point of hurl-the-controller frustration in some cases. Still, it's not essential to beat these, it's just a nice bonus.

Game Fu
The design goal for a game like this is to have combat that is easy to pick up and get into, yet has some depth to it. I think this has been accomplished here. Some have criticized the game for having the same list of combo moves for each character (though they do look different when doing them), but it should be stressed that this is not a traditional fighting game, with different techniques that must be memorized for each character. This is a different genre of game, with different goals in mind. The main differences between the characters, other than visual, lie in the Super Moves. These are gained by pulling off taunts after knocking an opponent down. There is some timing involved here, and it's also possible to be interrupted. Each time you taunt successfully, a ball of energy appears over the character's head. Collect three, and you can unleash the character's Super Move. However, these energy tokens can be stolen from you by other players if they successfully taunt you before you are able to use them. The Supers are unique to each character, and some must be directed for maximum effect, while others just affect a general area (they're all pretty good for taking out multiple opponents). One character turns into a whirlwind, while another unleashes a series of shotgun blasts, for example.

There are several types of combos, with variations as far as how long they take, and each with different considerations as to when they should be used. There is something of a rock-paper-scissors approach with the moves, since some are easier to interrupt (such as the heavy attack/combo) while others are easy to pull off but blockable, and others are ideal for use when opponents are blocking (such as the heavy attack or trip moves/ combos). There is also a spin attack for knocking back multiple opponents, a running attack, jumping attack, quick counter-attack, and it's possible to pick up and throw opponents as well, either at other opponents or straight over the nearest precipice. Yes, you can and will start out just hitting buttons and hoping for the best, but the key to victory, especially against humans or the harder AI opponents, lies in the well-timed utilization of these techniques (keeping in mind that some techniques will be useless against certain opponents, while others will be highly effective).

Overall, I liked this game quite a bit, since it catered to my tastes pretty well (I'm a Kung Fu/Action fan from way back), and provided me with some good pick-up-and-play fun and humor. You probably won't play it as much by yourself after unlocking everything you can, finishing the game with each character, etc., but it does last a while before that happens. I mainly play alone, but I still considered it to be worthwhile. That being said, you will get more mileage out of it if you have others along to play with or against, since it is slanted towards a multiplayer, party-style gaming experience.

In any case, it's a good time for one or all, to the tune of either the Enter the Dragon theme song or Kung Fu Fighting as you give those pesky ninjas a good pummeling, Kung Fu Chaos style.