Published 24th of August 2003

Kung Fu Chaos steps up to the plate as being one of the first viable party games available for the XBox. How does it go at setting the standard?

Platform: Microsoft XBox Developer: Just Add Monsters Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios Released: February 2003

SCREENSHOTS What do these ratings mean?

It may come as a surprise to the average westerner, but not all Martial Arts movies starring eastern actors turn out like “Enter the Dragon”. Not all the actors of these movies turn into international superstars like Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan or Jet Li either. In fact, if you take a walk through your local video rental store, or you have foreign movies on a cable TV channel, you’ll probably notice a plethora of old, low-budget samurai films with cheesy English overdubbing. Even if you’ve never seen one, you would no doubt have heard of these types of movies. Their premise was often pointless with little or no story and just featured a couple of hours of martial arts action for your viewing pleasure. Some were so low budget however that the director and crew couldn’t afford special effects or safety measures, so every punch, every knife stab and every kick in the face was actually real. You can still see this in some of Jackie Chan’s earlier films, at the end you’ll see a reel of out takes, and he indeed injures himself pretty badly to the point of breaking bones. This is the basis of Kung Fu Chaos. You are a Kung Fu actor wannabe and under the guidance of a director who is desperate to make a hit movie, and you’ll be fighting for real across dodgy and dangerous sets. You won’t be breaking any bones here though, in fact “violence” isn’t really a word to describe Kung Fu Chaos. Aside from the game's acronym bearing an unfortunate similarity to that of a fast food chain's, the best way to describe this game is silly, challenging fun.

Kung Fu Chaos is a party game in a similar style to Nintendo’s Super Smash Bros. series, featuring play for up to four players. The controls and gameplay are simple and easy to learn and above all suit the style of the game well. X performs your basic attack, Y performs a counter move. B is your throw button, A is jump. A and B together performs a slow but unblockable strike, and X and A together performs a different unblockable strike. Black is the same as pressing A and B together, white is the same as pressing X and A together. The R trigger blocks, the L trigger taunts, and pressing both triggers together executes your character’s unique special move. Of course, by combining these attacks together you can pull off small but effective combos that each have their uses in given situations but can also be countered in certain ways. Unlike the Super Smash Bros series though, you won’t instantly recognise the characters in Kung Fu Chaos. But, if you’re a fan of old cheesy Kung Fu flicks, you’ll recognise that almost all the characters are a parody of some kind of Kung Fu movie character. You’ve got the old wise master, the ninja hero, a spoof of the Chinese Monkey God, a parody of a popular Japanese martial arts comic book character and half a dozen others. Each character plays more or less the same as the others though, apart from their unique super attacks, which we’ll get to soon.

The object of Kung Fu Chaos is quite obviously to kill your opponents, but it’s the different ways you can kill them that make the game appealing. The most obvious and easiest way to kill an opponent is to knock them to the ground and then throw them into an insta-kill hazard on the fighting arena. These can be deadly spikes, piranha-infested waters, poisonous gas and stone faces with switch activated closing mouths, or you can simply toss your opponent off the edge of the battlefield into the bottomless abyss. You can also kill your opponents by depleting their health if you really wanted to, or you can use your super attacks. Once you knock your opponent down onto their back, they’ll lie dazed for a short while which allows you to pick them up or what not, but what is far more effective is taunting them first before doing anything else. When you taunt, your character will say something amusing and expletive symbols will come out of their mouth and hit the knocked down opponent. This doesn’t deplete their health but it keeps them on the ground for a bit longer to give you more time to do with them what you may like. Taunting also has a second effect. If you successfully execute a taunt, a little star will appear above your head. If you manage to get three stars, your character will start glowing, indicating you can pull off your character’s unique super attack by pressing both the L and R triggers simultaneously. These are all very difficult to avoid (some of them are all but impossible to avoid) and result in an instant death to your unfortunate opponents who are caught in them. Don’t think it’s easy though to build up your three stars. Taunting your opponents takes time, and you can easily be hit by another opponent which cancels your taunt. If you are knocked down and taunted by an opponent yourself, when they taunt you, they will actually steal one of your stars which can make for some very interesting tug of war situations. Not only can you be killed by your opponents, but if you don’t watch it, you’ll be killed by the arenas you fight in too. These are all movie sets, of course, because after all, you are a Kung Fu actor with everything you do being caught on film. Except these movie sets are the most dangerous you’ll come across. Everything from falling platforms, sinking boats, death-defying chasms, alien laser beams and dinosaurs will be constantly in your way and forcing you to change your fight strategies. The battlegrounds constantly move which means your scenery and obstacles will be constantly changing and will really keep you on your toes. Don’t be surprised when a small smile creases your lips as you see the movie sets fall apart or as you or one of your opponents dies in a funny way. It’s particularly entertaining to jump on the railing during the Titanic level as the ship is sinking and prevent your opponents from jumping on next to you so they go down with the ship. Funny stuff.

It’s not just fighting though. Thrown into the mix are some pretty fun mini-games to keep the overall feel of the game light hearted and for some good change. These can vary, like needing to throw out lifesavers to drowning actors, throwing a princess to knock your opponents off wooden platforms (if you don’t find that somewhat amusing you’re hard to please) or catching stuntmen as they fly out of a second storey window. Sure, these aren’t Kung Fu type things or things a Kung Fu would do, but hell, they are fun and great for a laugh.

Combine all this and some excellent multiplayer modes and you have one hell of a fun party game. You can chop and change how your multiplayer battles work too. Up to four players can fight it out, and you can change anything from the rules (how a winner is determined) to the number of rounds to win a match. Rules can be lives (player with most amount of lives at the end wins, or last man standing), kills (most amount of kills wins), style (who performed the most and best combos) and several others. You’ve also got two distinctly different multiplayer modes of play. One is the Battle Game, where you’ll fight for a predetermined number of rounds on any scenario that you choose and the first player to reach the required rounds to win is the winner. The other multiplayer mode is championship where you’ll fight across each of the scenarios, with the mini-games thrown in for good measure, and players are given points depending on whether they place 1st, 2nd, 3rd or 4th. The player with the most points when all the rounds are finished wins. Both modes and very fun and you’ll be shouting and laughing with your friends, and generally be having a great time as you play. Something that is a little disappointing is the AI of the computer opponents in a multiplayer game. You can add computer players into your multiplayer battles to make up the numbers if you don’t have four people to play (like you should be able to do in all good party games) and choose between three skill levels for it. Yet, even on the hardest difficulty setting, the AI is quite disappointing and really not much of a challenge even on 1-on-1 situations. They also seem to have their favourite player to attack as well, and will continue relentlessly attacking that player, completely oblivious to whatever is going on around them. It’s also somewhat of a pity that the developers didn’t add in more movie sets and actors because it would have been even more of a challenge and been even more fun but as it stands you’ll still be playing this for hours on end as you attempt to be the ultimate Kung Fu actor.

It’s not just the multiplayer where the game shines though. Unlike many other party games, Kung Fu Chaos also features a pretty solid single player experience. Your main single player game mode is the Ninja Challenge, where you’ll progress from scene to scene, under the guidance of the director Shao Ting (who himself is a parody of just about any director of a martial arts flick). You’ll be given a star rating out of five at the end of the scene, depending on how many ninja enemies you kill along the way or in the case of some of the mini-games, how well you do in catching the stuntmen or whatever. You’ll need to achieve at least three stars in any given scene to pass it and move on to the next scene, however if you want to unlock everything you’ll be pushing to gain five stars on every scene, which can be a very difficult and frustrating task. There’s a lot of scenes to play through and you’ll unlock certain things when you finish the scene with certain characters as well as how many stars you achieve. There’s extra scenes, hidden characters, alternate costumes, combats rules and much more to unlock. Some of the stuff is relatively easy to unlock, and some of it isn’t, but it’s all worth it, even if it is just a humourous cut-scene. In fact, the majority of the stuff in the game will require some hard single player work to unlock. Added to the Ninja Challenge mode is the Miniseries mode (which in itself needs to be unlocked) and this features three short scenarios for each of the game’s characters, which upon completion awards you with more unlockable content. A small gripe though is how quickly everything can actually be unlocked. Sure there’s lots of stuff to get, but not a lot of it is particularly difficult to achieve. Perhaps if they threw in some harder modes (because you can’t change the skill level in single player modes) with some bigger rewards, the replay value for single player may have been just that little bit better. But as a whole the game’s lastability is great, especially on the multiplayer front (which is probably where you’ll be spending most of your playtime anyway) and you’ll no doubt be spending a lot of quality time with it, either by yourself or with a group of friends.

The graphics are spot on for the subject material and suit the game almost to perfection. The movie sets are excellently detailed, both in the foreground and background, and it really invites you to come and play. You’ll see the characters make death-defying leaps across the aforementioned death-defying chasms (complete with the wire to hoist them across) as the ground crumbles and breaks underneath you, and your raft can get torn to shreds as the Tyrannosaurus bites down on it and swings it around in his mouth. Each scene is very detailed and looks great as a whole. However they do start getting repetitive over time, as each time you do them, they are the same thing and nothing changes, so you’ll know exactly when you’ll need to make that jump, or when to avoid that Tyrannosaurus. As it stands, the only real unpredictability comes with the behaviour of your human opponents, and even then, once you play the game enough, you’ll probably have a pretty good idea on what they are thinking too. The characters themselves also suit the overall theme of the game. They look cartoony and silly, and while they might not be the most incredibly detailed characters in a video game, they certainly don’t look out of place. For a party game of this nature, you won’t get graphics much better than this. A game such as this is meant to be stupid fun, and the graphics set the stupid and fun mood perfectly.

The sound too also suits the game very well. Each character has their own distinct voice that you can hear when they taunt, or when they are hit, and some of the special moves have some quite strange sounds too. The previously mentioned obstacles that are present within each movie set all sound as authentic as they should, and the voice of the director is actually quite humourous although you do hear it a lot so the humour can dissipate and it can get a little annoying (thankfully you can turn it down or turn it off altogether). The music stays in the background and does its job the way you’d expect it to, and Just Add Monsters have even taken the time to stick in the famous “Kung Fu Fighting” song and the theme from “Enter the Dragon”. The sound, like the graphics, isn’t the best treat you’ll see and hear on the XBox, but it suits the game, and for a game of this nature, that’s what counts.

Even if the game didn’t have any unlockable content, it would have been fun to play. But Kung Fu Chaos, like its Gamecube counterpart Super Smash Bros Melee, features a truck-full of features to unlock (albeit a truck-full of features that aren’t very difficult to unlock for the most part), and it really raises the bar for future XBox party games. The great single player and the rewards you achieve by playing it are balanced pretty well and benefit your overall gaming experience, in all modes of play, although it would have been nice to see some bigger rewards and more challenging single player modes.

Kung Fu Chaos is undoubtedly a lot of fun in both single player and multi player, but shines especially when you have a group of friends who also enjoy a good, fun laugh. It’s easy to get into and fun to play and that’s what makes a good party game, and the variety of gameplay modes are a nice touch. Is it the best XBox party game? Yes. I’d go as far to say that it’s the best 4-player XBox game currently available. Does it stack up to the greatness of the Gamecube’s Super Smash Bros. Melee? Not quite, but it’s the closest XBox title you’ll get to it.

How the game scores (out of 10)

Graphics: 8.5

They aren’t the prettiest graphics that the XBox can produce, but they are still damn good. The movie sets look fantastic and so do the special effects. The character models could have used a little work but it’s not like that’s a serious flaw. The bottom line is that they set the mood of the game perfectly.

Sound: 7.5

The director’s voice can get a little annoying and sometimes it can be hard to hear the music tracks, but other than that, the sound is also exactly what you’d expect coming out of a game of this nature.

Gameplay: 8.5

The overall gameplay isn’t all that complex, but it’s easy to learn and get in to in just a few matches and that’s the way it should be for a party game. The variety in the minigames is also a welcome addition and the game will keep you occupied in single player as well as multi player.

Lastability: 7.5

There’s quite a lot of stuff to unlock, but most of it is rather easy, some of it is not so easy admittedly, but there’s not really enough of the ‘not so easy’ kind. You won’t be just unlocking boring stuff though. You can unlock extra play modes (as well as alternate costumes, ending cinemas, extra single player challenges and character bio’s), which actually gives you the incentive to play them, and as mentioned numerous times in this review already, the game is great fun in multiplayer and will keep you and your friends entertained for hours.

Overall (not an average): 8

If you’re looking for a fun, challenging game, but you don’t want to take your gaming too seriously, you should definitely check out Kung Fu Chaos. It’s got all the good multiplayer elements of a party game as well as a great single player mode, and it’s great for a few laughs. Invite some friends over to watch some old cheesy Kung Fu movies, then continue playing Kung Fu Chaos into the wee hours of the morning. As the director Shao Ting would say, “My greatness must be rubbing off on you, so keep up the good rubbing!”

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