The Street Fighter
A Review of Renegade On the NES
Sometime in May 1986, Japanese arcades saw the release of a brawler called Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun (roughly meaning Hot-Blooded Tough Guy Kunio in English). It stars Kunio, a miscreant high school student who fights to defend a classmate being picked on by rival gangs.
The game is notable for being the first brawler to feature an urban setting and for introducing many trademarks common to the genre—the tough-guy protagonist, themes of street justice, generic thugs, female villains, and so on. Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun underwent significant revisions for its Western release and subsequent NES port, including a name change to Renegade and a story that was wholly disconnected from its source material.
In this version of the game, you are Mr. K—a regular guy harassed by street gangs for no real reason. Beyond simple punches and kicks, he has a variety of moves at his disposal, including collar grabs, shoulder throws, punching downed enemies, and attacking adjacent thugs when an enemy has him in a hold. He wasn’t looking for trouble, but trouble sure was looking for him. Not being one to back down from a fight, he decides it’s time to put these punks in their place, Mr. K’s way.
Renegade exudes a strong 50s greaser vibe. The rock-and-roll themes across most levels pair nicely with the game’s setting, especially given the Japanese version’s theme of high-school delinquency. In addition, the game is pretty realistic in its portrayal of how a street fight would go down. The thugs you battle don’t just politely stand there waiting for you to gain the upper hand. Instead, they’ll quickly surround you, requiring your constant awareness of their positioning on either side.
After you defeat a foe, another one soon jumps into the fray. When fighting a boss, you have to whittle down their life bar before performing some of your fancier moves. Otherwise, they’ll either push you away or surprise you with a reversal of whatever you were trying to do.
The controls may initially take some getting used to. The functions of the A and B buttons constantly change, depending on the direction your character is facing. For example, when facing right, the A button is your punch, and the B button is your kick. But when facing the left, the button functions are reversed. Also, your character automatically turns toward the nearest enemy.
While it may be a bit confusing at first, the controls work well once you get acclimated. With a bit of practice, you’ll be able to throw punches at the enemy in front of you while kicking the other guy (or gal) attacking from behind, in addition to the other moves mentioned above. Renegade also features an early example of interactive environments in a fighting game.
Stages one and two take place on raised platforms. If you can manage to kick or throw an enemy over the edge, they’re gone for good. Of course, the same applies to Mr. K too, so fighter beware. However, when used skillfully, the environments can work to your advantage and save precious seconds on the clock.
Despite its good qualities, Renegade is hampered by spotty collision detection. Your attacks don’t always connect the way they should; meanwhile, the enemy can easily land punches in quick succession. Therefore, simply walking up to an enemy on the same horizontal plane is a tremendously risky move. Thugs are constantly swarming you, and there’s no recovery time between hits or knockdowns. It can easily lead to situations where you’re hopelessly stunlocked if you don’t quickly put some distance between yourself and the enemy after taking a hit.
The game has a rather esoteric power-up system that involves performing certain moves at precise moments in sync with the timer. For instance, you can gain a health replenishment item only after you kick a wall when the last two digits of the timer are a specific number, which also changes depending on the stage you’re on.
Similar rules apply to other items that boost Mr. K’s attack power in some way. It’s an interesting gameplay mechanic in theory, but it’s also highly dependent on the player having an instruction manual handy to know how to make these power-ups appear.
Overall, Renegade is a competent game in its own right. In a sea of imitators, it stood out as a true originator. The gameplay elements have since been copied or paid homage to in the plethora of brawlers that followed. The lack of balance due to uneven collision detection and an arcane implementation of assistive power-ups puts a slight dampener on enjoying the game. But at a mere four stages in length, the game at least respects your time, making its deficiencies less of a slog to endure.
And besides, without Renegade, there would be no River City Ransom—a game that more than made up for the faults of this one. If you’re looking to own Renegade, it’s currently available as part of the Double Dragon and Kunio Kun Retro Brawler Bundle on the Switch and PS4. A no-brainer purchase if you’re a fan of Technos brawlers. Bottom line: if you want to study the history of brawlers, Renegade should be at the top of your list.
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On a related note…
I had this one growing up and loved it immensely. When I found out it belonged to the Kunio kun series, I had to track down the original games. I have so much fun with this series, and it all started with Renegade.