Punch-Out!! is a boxing game that was originally released in 1987 for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). You play at Little Mac, an aspiring boxer, fighting through minor, major, and world circuits to become the world champ. You will square off against a cast of (admittedly pretty racist) international characters, who will re-challenge Little Mac with new movesets and drastically increased difficulty as you progress from circuit to circuit.
The player’s moveset is about what you would expect for a boxing game of this time – A and B are left and right punch, holding up on the directional pad will turn a body punch into a face punch, tapping left and right will make Little Mac dodge in that direction, holding down will cause Little Mac to put his hands up and block, but double-tapping down will cause Little Mac to dodge. Landing a punch at an especially opportune moment or carrying out an extended combo of punches will earn Little Mac a star, which can be used by pressing start to perform an extra hard-hitting uppercut (referred to as “star punches” in later games). Little Mac’s stamina (essentially how many punches you can throw) is represented by a heart with a counter next to it. You gain hearts by successfully dodging an opponent’s punch, but lose them if you miss an attack, block an attack, get hit, or get blocked by the opponent. Losing all of your stamina makes it so that Little Mac can no longer attack, and must dodge the opponent’s attacks to regain stamina.
This game is much more reactive than active, which is where Punch-Out!! shines. This isn’t Wii Boxing – flailing punches and button smashing is a very quick way to lose the match.
Punch-Out!! is a game of perception and patience. Each fighter will telegraph when they are going to attack, and you have a split second to try and interrupt it with your own attack or get out of the way. While these tells are well-telegraphed in the visual sense, with characters often dramatically winding up their punch (except for you, Great Tiger…), the player must be almost instantaneously reactive or get hit. During later matches, some attacks are one-hit KOs, if not the opener for a punishing chain that is a nightmare to get out of. Incorrect timing on punches and dodges/blocks are also often heavily punished, meaning that, especially as the player progresses to the major and world circuit, the game begins to demand nothing short of perfection from the player.
So I gave up.
Listen, I’m all for underdog stories, I like the idea of playing as a complete beginner who works there way up to becoming the champion – it’s an endearing and timeless story, and I’m sure many people were met with a sweeping rush of joy after finally mastering and beating this dastardly game.
But maybe Punch-Out’s brutal difficulty conveys its own message about surrender.
I know its inarguable that intense difficulty levels from older games is a holdover from arcades / artificially extending a game’s length by making it near impossible to beat, but hear me out: what if giving up is the point for some players? I have the luxury of emulating the game on the Switch, where I can make save-states, rewind to before devastating punches land, play without eating through an allowance worth of quarters – and something about the idea of potentially a large portion of players who picked up this game never beating it was an idea that struck me.
For a game that’s about overcoming all the odds and becoming the world champ, players are probably going to be losing a lot more than winning, and some players will hit their limit and put the controller down.
For some people, their reflexes just aren’t going to be fast enough. They’re going to see a telegraphed attack, but never figure out to counteract it. The loses will pile up, and they’ll be met with the game-over screen, Little Mac sitting on a stool, looking defeated, the player encouraged to keep training and play again, forced to start from the very beginning of the first circuit. Maybe they’ll quit out of complete anger, maybe dejection, apathy, disappointment. Still, they walk away from the game, and never see Little Mac rise to the very top.
Not every fight is your fight.
Dramatic for a boxing game refereed by Mario, sure, maybe, but some challenges are simply insurmountable. Little Mac is called that for a reason – his character model is small on screen, mostly for the logistics purpose of the player being able to see their opponent in front of them. As a result, every opponent – even Glass Joe – towers over you. Despite this, some opponents go down easily, and some are simply too great to topple.
As we have talked about the evolution of games, especially the shift from arcade to at-home gaming, we’ve often talked about why games used to be so hard, but rarely about what has driven them to become easier. For what it’s worth, in my humble opinion, not all of us will be world champs – not all of us really care that much about it in the first place. Some of us are much happier waggling our Wiimotes at the tv, trying to beat Matt in a flurry of uncoordinated punches. And that’s enough.
Great overview of the game but also your experience with it! As someone that only ever had the chance to play video games after 2008, the rate at which I rage quit a game goes up exponentially if it was made prior to 2000. They really are quite unforgiving the farther along you go, though I wonder what your assessment about games getting easier says about the way we collectively view winning. I don’t want to get all “participation trophies are for whimps” but current videos games are indeed built on the premise that everyone will (or at the very least can, given the time) “beat” the game. It would be interesting to consider if multiplayer game modes are the counter to this–meaning that campaign modes lead you to victory but multiplayer reminds you of your actual capabilities. In any case, lots of room for analysis!