CES: Nintendo Shows Off Punch-Out!! For The NES
Three years ago Nintendo introduced Punch-Out!! in the arcades and it was a smash hit. The huge cartoony characters, fantastic action, and digitized announcer voice all added up to a fun and entertaining experience. The arcade game allowed players to control a nameless boxer, who was shown at the bottom of the screen as a wireframe graphic with a head and boxing gloves attached. It also incorporated a second screen on the top, which showed off each boxer’s portrait and other pertinent information. Because of this, we thought it wouldn’t come out for the NES, but we’re happy to be wrong!
For the NES version, Nintendo has considerably revamped the graphics to work on a single screen and to run on the reduced power of the NES. We were surprised to see that the boxers are still rather large on the screen and have unique animations and tells, giving them each a unique personality. The developers are in the process of creating new fighters for the game to give the home console version more depth and challenge. Your playable character is now called Little Mac and his whole body can now be seen at the bottom of the screen, no wireframe graphics in sight. He’s considerably smaller than the arcade version, but his adversaries still take up a great deal of screen real estate.
We’re told that the game should be made available in time for the Christmas shopping season. Punch-Out!! seems like a perfect game to use Nintendo’s new NES Advantage joystick with to replicate that hard-hitting arcade action. A little bird told us that Nintendo is trying to land a famous boxer for the cover, but they’re not willing to spill the beans just yet. We’ll keep you updated!
Craig has been covering the video game industry since 1995. His work has been published across a wide spectrum of media sites. He’s currently the Editor-In-Chief of Nintendo Times and contributes to Gaming Age.
