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Mike Haggar returns in this satisfying wrestling brawler 

In 1993, Capcom released Saturday Night Slam Masters in arcades. It’s a wrestling game in which two wrestlers pound each other to pieces in the ring. The game was ported to several consoles. For this review, I played the SNES version. This is an excellent game! It’s similar to Street Fighter II, although characters can move in any direction and the combat is a bit slower overall. 

The game has two modes: Single Match and Team Battle Royal. For Single Match, there are eight playable characters. The characters are excellent as they are large and expressive. They also look unique and each one has distinctive moves. If you want a fast but weaker character, go for Oni (Japanese warrior) or Stinger (Mexican luchador); the more balanced wrestlers are Mike Haggar (from Final Fight), Biff, and Gunloc; and if you want a huge and strong wrestler, go with Titan, Grater, or Rasta (these guys are massive). Before a match starts, you’ll see the wrestlers come into the stadium with the audience cheering (it’s pretty cool). 

The gameplay is very good. There are only three things to do: attack (Y button), jump (B button), and pin (A button). You can also double tap the D-pad to run. Your basic attack is either a punch or kick, but you can do other attacks while running and can also bounce off the ropes to do more attacks such as a close line or a flip kick. Again, each wrestler has unique moves. This alone makes SNSM superior to most wrestling games on SNES (such as Natsume Championship Wrestling, in which all the wrestlers look the same and attack the same). You can also grab your opponent if you’re close enough, and this allows for more moves such as the pile driver or shoulder throw. You can also exit the ring, but a timer starts immediately, so you’ll want to get back in ASAP. 

Like a fighting game, the characters have lifebars. Once you’ve drained your opponent’s lifebar, you will be able to successfully pin him. Pinning is actually very easy. Once he’s on the ground, simply stand over your opponent and press A. If he’s on his stomach, your character will roll him to his back. Then you press A again and he’ll pin him. There’s just enough strategy here to make the matches exciting. However, the computer can be cheap sometimes as some opponents grabbed me a lot and did excessive damage with throws and slams. 

In Single Match mode, you’ll wrestler each of the eight characters (thankfully, the game doesn’t make you fight a clone of your character). Once you’ve defeated them all, you’ll face Jumbo (egg-shaped guy) and then the final boss, Scorp (Scorpion in the original game). After beating them, you will be crowned the champion, but then you have to defend your title, so now you have to fight everyone again, but this time they’re harder. Thankfully, there is no Game Over screen as the game allows you to try again upon losing and choose any character. 

Team Battle Royal has four wrestlers competing in a 2-on-2 match. This time you have ten characters to choose from (Jumbo and Scorp are playable characters). This mode is a ton of fun! It can be chaotic with four wrestlers going at it at once, but that’s why it’s so fun. What’s great about this is that four players can play simultaneously using the Multi-tap. While I haven’t been able to do this, I can only imagine that playing 4 players is a lot of fun as the wrestlers smack and jump all over the ring. 

As far as presentation goes, this game has some cool stuff. First of all, it’s awesome that Haggar is here. When he wins a match, his daughter Jessica runs into the ring and he hoists her up in the air in one arm. Rasta (who resembles a gorilla) approaches the ring with a monkey on his shoulder. The wrestlers also say something before and after each match, and of course, what they say can be pretty funny (“My technique will turn you into sushi” and “I’m gonna lick your face before I chew it off” are two of my favorites). I wish Zangief were in the game, but at least he’s mentioned by Biff, who is apparently a fellow Russian wrestler. The game has far more personality than most wrestling games of this era. 

Final Verdict—4 Stars: Recommended 

Saturday Night Slam Masters is a simple yet compelling wrestling game that stands tall among its peers. With its excellent mechanics, fun characters, and 4 player capabilities, I daresay it’s probably the best wrestling game on the SNES. It also paved the way for the 4 player wrestling games of the late 90s such as WCW vs. NWO: World Tour (which I loved as a kid). It would be great if Capcom brought this series back, but if not, at least we can always enjoy this classic.