Back in the day, Sega worked hard to be the most advanced video game company in the world. It had its own consoles and was constantly competing with other major companies such as Nintendo, Atari, 3DO, Playstation and SNK for first place in the video game entertainment market. Following Sega, its own games were persistently developed and updated. The developers worked tirelessly creating something that could easily be called a new vector in the development of the genre. Yu Suzuki, for example, had a hand in creating the legendary Virtua Fighter, the very first fighting game with 3D polygonal graphics. Noriyoshi Oba worked on the incomparable, both in terms of gameplay and music, Streets of Rage. Hirokazu Yasuhara gave birth to the king of high-speed platformers Sonic. And Makoto Uchida made wonderful games in the beat ‘em up genre: Golden Ax, Altered Beast and Die Hard Arcade. I will introduce you, dear reader, to the latter more closely in this article. You will find out why Die Hard Arcade became a game licensed from the hard-boiled action movie "Die Hard", how much it influenced the development of the "beat ‘em up" genre and what features and secrets the remake of the game for Playstation 2 contains.
ME VS DIE HARD ARCADE/DYNAMITE DEKA
MAGAZINE VERSION OF THE ARTICLE:
You can read the magazine version here or below under the spoiler.
The game was released in 1996 in arcade machines around the world. Development was handled by Sega AM1 and Sega Technical Institute (Die Hard Arcade was the last game STI made before the studio was dissolved). AM1 had previously worked on a new version of the first Virtua Fighter called Virtua Fighter Remix for arcade machines, Sega Saturn and PC, and STI created a wonderful beat ‘em up Comix Zone for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. When creating DHA, the developers were inspired not only by Sega’s past hits, but also by the cool Hollywood action movie called Die Hard. They took very little from it, but that little was enough for Sega to decide that instead of removing or editing references to the Die Hard movie and releasing a censored version in the Western market, they could simply purchase a license from Fox Interactive and turn it into Dynamite Deka (translated as Dynamite Detective) in Die Hard Arcade. Naturally, this unconventional tactic to lure Western players paid off, although I still can’t believe that this is even possible. In the original Japanese version, the only thing that may seem like an homage to the film is the seizure of the Eternal Tower skyscraper by a terrorist group on New Year’s Eve and the appearance of the main character, who works for the police. In the Western version, the main character’s name was changed from Bruno Delinger to John McClane, the Eternal Tower skyscraper was renamed Nakatomi Plaza and moved from San Francisco to Los Angeles. The main villain, however, is not Hans Gruber at all, but a certain Wolf “White Fang” Hongo in both the Japanese and Western versions of the game. The partner, and also the second player, changed her name in the Western version from Cindy Holiday to Kris Thompsen, although both options have nothing to do with Die Hard, but, apparently, the developers definitely needed to change something else in the game. Considering that in Die Hard Arcade there are also enemies in firefighter costumes, sumo wrestlers, the president’s daughter and robotic spiders who came from nowhere, this attempt to connect everything with the film cannot in any way affect the ridiculous, but funny parody farce that is this crazy game. Sega carried out good advertising and was able to deceive fans of the film and ordinary players with this cunning disguise.
Makoto Uchida during an interview with French gaming site joypad.fr (apparently he communicated with the interviewer via Facebook)* spoke in detail about how Die Hard Arcade was created. Here is a translation (I apologize if it’s not accurate) of a part of this interview:
In 1996, players discovered Dynamite Deka (Die https://moneyslotsonline.co.uk/slot-providers/pragmatic-play-slots/ Hard Arcade in Europe and the US) on arcade machines and the Sega Saturn console. Can you tell us how this project began and why you chose this particular film?. translator: Die Hard)?
In 1995, I left Japan to visit the United States. My mission was to create a game that the American public would most likely enjoy. I turned to action games because this is a genre that is especially appreciated by American gamers. At the same time I saw the movie Die Hard and I really liked it! So I designed a game in the same style, with a building, terrorists and an arsenal. At the end of the project, one of the employees saw the game and he shouted: "Wow! But this looks like Die Hard, you should absolutely get a license from 20th Century Fox!». After several months of negotiations, he showed me the contract signed by the film company, which allowed us to use the name "Die Hard Arcade".
Do you have any anecdotes related to the creation of the game?? How did the porting to Saturn happen??
Dynamite Deka hardware on arcade machines is almost identical to Saturn. Thanks to this, porting was not difficult.
Can you tell us why in the two player game mode there is a battle between two heroes at the end? This is a nod to Double Dragon?
Many players have been known to insert a lot of coins into the arcade machine when they reach the final fight, but the game usually ends immediately after defeating the boss, even if the protagonists’ health bar is completely full. That’s why we added the final battle (approx. translator: so that players can use the coins remaining in the arcade machine to fight each other and not feel offended because their precious coins are left in the machine).
At the end of the game, when you defeat the evil leader of the terrorist organization and save the president’s daughter, the latter will invite the two of you to fight each other and the winner will eventually become her bodyguard
Plot: December 31, 2015 (this date is indicated in the original Japanese version of the game, in the Western version nothing is known for sure, but I can assume that it is most likely December 24, 1989). Inside the Eternal Tower/Nakatomi Plaza in San Francisco/Los Angeles, the annual New Year’s party takes place with countless VIP guests from the world of finance and politics. After fooling the Eternal Tower/Nakatomi Plaza security team, Wolf Hongo and his group of terrorists seized control of the building, tried to steal $640 million from the safe (in the film, Hans Gruber tried to do the same) and took the president’s daughter hostage! Veteran SFPD Bruno "Dynamite Cop" Delinger/John McClane and rookie detective Cindy Holiday/Kris Thompsen make their way to the roof of the building with the help of the Rapid Response Squad helicopter. They set themselves an almost impossible task: to stop the terrorists and save the daughter of the President of America. I told you all the most important things, but if you need a little more detail, you can read this page from the instructions for the American version of the game. So, for some reason I suddenly became interested in how people reacted to the game, who wanted the game to be more like a movie than a parody action movie somehow related to the original work? Although in the absence of fish, McClain’s Japanese can pass for an American. I most likely would not be offended, especially considering the fact that the game is still a furious action game for two players (this could well have happened in a game based on Die Hard 3, but certainly not in the first part), which is trying its best to be as cool as Die Hard himself. Whether it works or not doesn’t really matter if it’s all crazy, weird, and damn fun.
We knock the crap out of our opponents by driving them into the floor
Gameplay: The world’s first fully 3D beat ‘em up is, let me tell you, quite an achievement. Exactly the same first of its kind was Virtua Fighter, which became an ideal example for Die Hard Arcade to follow. From there, DHA borrowed special moves that can be performed using a special combination of a joystick (stick) and three buttons: hand attack, foot attack and jump (in VF, the Block button is used instead of jumping). There are so many of these techniques. There are more than fourteen varieties of grabs alone, from a standard punch to the face to a suplex and piledriver. The player can even juggle the enemy in the air with different combinations of attacks. Those who like to create incredible combos will definitely like this game. Like in Streets of Rage and Comix Zone, the main character can use the environment to fight the enemy. We can beat them with a mop, throw an old watch, blind them with a gas can, shoot them with a rocket launcher, chop them with an ax, take away weapons and use them against them, etc.d. And as if all this wasn’t enough for the player, you can also press special attack combinations to take advantage of the features of each weapon to the maximum. For example, you can simply shoot from a pistol while standing, or you can shoot while kneeling (this way we will not only cause damage to a prone enemy, but also dodge bullets) or shoot at an opponent while in the air at that moment. With a pistol in your hands, you can also neutralize the enemy by grabbing him and putting handcuffs on him. There are also additional items, such as magazines for firearms, first aid kits, a lighter (which can be connected to a gas canister and get a good homemade flamethrower), etc.n.
The easiest way to defeat an enemy is to handcuff him
With such a fun, clever, and varied combat system, Die Hard Arcade feels like a never-ending game that you simply can’t put down. Play through it at least ten or twenty times and it will still feel like you’re playing for the first time. It’s just a pity that the passage itself won’t take you even twenty-five minutes of free time, thirty at most if you constantly stumble over enemies and rub your face into their fists. You won’t find any forks ala Final Fight 3 and Golden Ax Revenge of Death Adder here. Also, the main character cannot walk around the level from left to right (or in any other direction), only fight enemies inside small arena rooms from which you cannot leave until the battle is over. There is no block either, because we dodge attacks by moving up and down around the arena, in general, the norm for the genre, and I would not call this a disadvantage. It’s a little inconvenient to turn our main character towards the enemy (the main character doesn’t seem to be fighting, but is crossing the road, constantly turning his head first to the left, then to the right). From a three-dimensional bitmap, first of all, you want complete freedom of movement and maneuvering, which is found in 3D battles like Virtua Fighter or Tekken. Although it’s probably stupid to ask all this from a pioneer in the genre. All of the above disadvantages are not really disadvantages, because you instantly forget about them when you start fighting tooth and nail with bosses, measure your strength against unusual and interesting enemies, fall into traps on the level (you can, for example, trip over a roll of toilet paper) and become a participant in real Quick Time Events. Quick Time Events, ladies and gentlemen, are like nothing you’ve ever seen in a beat ‘em up genre of this era. If during a QTE the player presses the wrong button, he will either run into an enemy in the corridor, or lose some health (for example, from a collision with a fire truck), and if the player does everything as expected, then with one blow he will knock out a suddenly appearing villain, restore some health to himself, or dodge a rocket/car. As you may have noticed from my more or less detailed description, the gameplay tries to surprise, amuse, constantly keep you in suspense and makes you ask for more. Isn’t this a sign of a quality bitmap??
The instructions for the game contain an exact description of two main characters And main villain, although for some reason there is nothing about the president’s daughter. John McClane is exactly like in the movie. It is written about Chris that she is a newcomer and only recently entered the service, but she is able to stand up for herself due to the fact that she is a true kung fu master. If you’re wondering, these two characters in the game differ from each other only in appearance (although during the game it seemed to me that Chris was a little faster than John). I should also note that the main antagonist in the picture above has an incredibly large hand. Looks like some kind of mutant from a horror movie, not the leader of a terrorist organization.
In the lower left corner in a pink dress is the daughter of the President of the United States of America Caroline Powell.