Kart Fighter

Kart Fighter
Publisher	Ge De Industry Co.
Developer	Hummer Team
Console	Famicom
Date	1994(?)
Engine	Street Fighter II Engine
Sound engine	Hummer Sound Engine
Alternate names/hacks	AV Bishoujo Senshi Girl Fighting

Kart Fighter (瑪莉快打) is a fighting game for the Famicom developed by Hummer Team. The game was possibly made in early 1994 because AV Bishoujo Senshi Girl Fighting reuses assets from Kart Fighter. It's well known due to having characters from Super Mario Kart beating each other up, Street Fighter II style.

Overview

File:KFgameplay.PNG

Kart Fighter's gameplay.

Kart Fighter uses the Street Fighter II engine, albeit slightly altered. Everyone's movesets are pretty similar overall. Every character, except Nokonoko, can throw a projectile. Also, some characters have charge attacks and some have stationary attacks. A handful of the background graphics seem to have been taken from Little Nemo: The Dream Master, Mario & Wario, and, obviously, Super Mario Kart. The music mostly consists of 8-bit renditions of songs from Mario & Wario, but the songs from Peach's stage, the title screen, and the ending theme are all remixed from Super Mario Kart.

Kart Fighter has five difficulty levels to choose from, like in most of the games based on this engine. The AI, however, seems to have a predefined pattern on the second round no matter which difficulty level is selected (ex: ducking will cause them to shoot a projectile if they have one, jumping leads to either a charge move or an uppercut, etc.) Kart Fighter also has a versus mode; to join, press the 'a' button on a second controller.

Characters

File:KFSelect.PNG

Character select screen.

There are a total of 8 playable characters in Kart Fighter. The character's names in-game are in parentheses.

• Mario (Mari)
• Luigi (Luigi)
• Princess Peach (Peach)
• Yoshi (Yossy)
• Toad (Kinopio)
• Donkey Kong Jr. (Donkey)
• Koopa Troopa (Nokonoko)
• Bowser (Koopa)

Move Commands

Mari (Mario)

• D, DF, F, a: Fireball
• B, F, a: Uppercut (Can only hit grounded opponents)
• B, B, b: Flying Kick

Luigi

• D, DF, F, a: Fireball
• ?, ??, ?, ?: Uppercut (Can only hit grounded opponents)
• ?, ??, ?, ?: Flying Kick

Peach

• D, DF, F, a: Fireball
• D, DB, B, b: Spin Kick
• Hold Back, b: Hair Whip

Yossy (Yoshi)

• D, DF, F, a: Fireball
• D, DF, F, b: Tongue Attack
• F, DF, D, b: Tail Dance

Kinopio (Toad)

• D, DF, F, a: Mushroom Shot
• B, B, a: Uppercut (Can only hit airborne opponents)
• F, FU, U, b: Flying Kick

Donkey (Donkey Kong Jr.)

• D, DF, F, a: Banana Slide
• D, DB, B, b: Uppercut (Can only hit airborne opponents)
• B, DB, D, a: Spin Attack

Nokonoko (Koopa Troopa)

• D, DB, B, a: Charge
• B, F, b: Shell Spin

Koopa (Bowser)

• D, DF, F, a: Fireball
• B, DB, B, b: Charge
• D, D, a: Tail Flop

Connections

• Selecting Start or Option on the title screen plays part of an unused Chaos Emerald sound effect from Somari.
• The option screen uses Super Mario World's Super Mushrooms as the border around the difficulty levels. The spin-jump sound effect from the same game is played when choosing one.
• The lava in Luigi's stage is also from Super Mario World for the Famicom.
• The song in Donkey Kong Jr.'s stage is a slightly altered music track from Jing Ke Xin Zhuan.
• Kart Fighter was likely developed sometime after Garou Densetsu Special, since Donkey Kong Jr. has a grounded projectile similar to Terry Bogard's Power Wave.
• Some of the sound effects in Kart Fighter were reused in Harry's Legend.

Music

Name	Description	Source	Audio
Title Theme		Super Mario Kart	[1]
Select Screen		Super Mario Kart	[2]
???			[3]
???			[4]
Mari / Luigi Stage			[5]
Peach Stage		Super Mario Kart	[6]
Kinopio Stage			[7]
Yossy Stage		Songs Without Words	[8]
NokoNoko / Koopa Stage			[9]
Donkey Stage			[10]

Reception

Since Kart Fighter is an unlicensed game, it doesn't have feedback from any commercial gaming magazines. However, with the ROM being available to the public, there are plenty of user reviews on GameFAQs, YouTube, and several independent review sites.

• Kart Fighter on GameFAQs has an average user rating of 3.5 out of 5 with three reviews. One reviewer praised both the graphics and sound, as well as the gameplay, and said 'Overall this is quite possibly THE best Bootleg game EVER made. And its also simply a very good 2-D fighter game as well.' They gave a score of 4 out of 5.
• Another reviewer on GameSpot stated that Kart Fighter 'is like a poor man's version of Super Smash Bros.', but is still worth a play. They gave the game a 7 out of 10.
• Siliconera said that Kart Fighter is clearly Street Fighter II-inspired, and 'As a pirate NES game Kart Fighter is fairly advanced.' Their feedback was mainly positive.

Unused Tiles

File:KFUnusedTiles.PNG

Unused "Game Over" tiles.

Going through Kart Fighter's tiles, one can find some that spell out "Game Over". These were left unused. This suggests Kart Fighter was planned to have a Game Over screen, but it was scrapped.

Trivia

• In Kart Fighter, Toad, Koopa Troopa, and Bowser are referred to by their Japanese names. Yoshi is sometimes called Yossy in Japan.
• Mario and Luigi have their hat colors swapped on the title screen when compared to Super Mario Kart's. Also, their in-game sprites are only palette swaps of each other.
• The inputs for Luigi's Uppercut and Flying Kick seem to be executed by a command that only the CPU can do. This is likely a bug in the game, seeing as Mario's commands work.
• Bowser's the shortest character in the game. This is because the size of the CHR banks prevented his sprite from being any larger. Going through the tiles shows that he was likely the last character developed.
• Peach has black hair instead of blonde and wears a different outfit then her usual dress.
• The song played on the Top 8 screen, which is loosely based on the 'Mario's Rank' song in Super Mario Kart, has been reused in many of Hummer Team's other fighting games. Kart Fighter, being the only Mario-themed game to use this music track, is likely where it originated from.
• On the Top 8 screen, the last 0 in each score on the board is different compared to the other 0's.
• The game does keep score; it'll appear on the Top 8 screen if you get enough points.

Gallery

Kinopio (Toad) vs. Nokonoko (Koopa).

KFCart.jpg

Original cart.

Kart FighterAr.JPG

Re-release by an unknown company in Argentina in the early 2000s.

KartFighter.jpg

A pirated copy made after 2003.

Mario Fighter (Kart Fighter New Copy).png

Another pirated copy made after 2009, found in Perú.

The top 8 score screen at the end of the game.

Video

Kart Fighter Walkthrough

Gameplay.