Breakers Collection review

These Breakers aren’t fakers, but real 90’s-era fighting games from Japan.

In 1991, Street Fighter II debuted in Japanese and North American arcades, revolutionizing the fighting game genre. But after a half-decade of dominance, two-dimensional pugilism began to lose some of its luster. By the mid-’90s, coin-ops such as Virtua Fighter, Tekken, and Soul Edge had swapped sprites for polygon-based visuals. Sure, the boxy-looking combatants might not have had the charms of hand-drawn cels of Ryu or Mai Shiranui, but they unveiled a fluidity and visual fidelity that games like Street Fighter II or The King of Fighters just couldn’t match.

As such, the 1996 release of Visco’s Breakers might have felt a bit untimely. Here was a game that lacked the technological sophistication of its 3D contemporaries and also struggled to match the bitmapped charisma of peers such as Art of Fighting 3, Samurai Shodown 4, or Street Fighter Alpha 2. While the title was successful enough to spawn an updated version with 1998’s Breakers Revenge, the franchise remained in Japan until a 2017 region-free Dreamcast version of the original game. And even that release had issues, purportedly not working on some consoles built after November 2000.

But much like their cast of valiant challengers, fighting games can be remarkably resilient. Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in the genre’s golden era, spurred by compilations such as Street Fighter: 30th Anniversary Collection, Samurai Shodown NeoGeo Collection, and Capcom Fighting Collection. With the release of Breakers Collection, Sao Paulo-based QUByte Interactive revisits Visco’s engaging one-on-one matches, offering welcome additions such as crossplay bolstered by rollback netcode and even a new Team Battle mode.

Delve into Breakers Collection and you’ll undoubtedly notice similarities to Capcom’s famed fighting franchise. Release a projectile and opponents become engulfed in a flame effect that resembles Street Fighter II. Likewise, Brazilian-born combatant Rila’s unruly mane, bangles, crouching stance, and chomping assault emulate Blanka’s appearance and trademark attack. Meanwhile, Tia’s muscular thighs, ability to dispense a flurry of powerful kicks, and celebratory animation will undoubtedly elicit memories of playing as Chun-Li.

But Breakers isn’t an uninspired copycat. Undoubtedly, there’s a sense of weight across matches. Save for the Dhalsim-like Alison III, the rest of the cast isn’t floaty. Some strikes, like the “Balloon Bomb” where Maherl puffs up like Kirby before dropping down on an unfortunate opponent, convey power and intensity. Knockbacks communicate a sense of muscularity across the game’s roster of eight characters. And as a NeoGeo game, the action is driven by four buttons rather than six.

There’s also a feeling of flexibility across matches, allowing participants to harness the capacity of combos, juggles, dashes cancels, as well as the eponymous Breaker system, which permits players to escape from devastating combos. But Breaker’s damage scaling is arguably the most interesting addition to play. Not only does your offensive output vary based on the length of a combo, but factors such as health, the time between attacks, as well as streaks, all influence the action.

As such, you can approach Breakers strategically, exploiting the inexperience of opponents with lengthy combos or a succession of Supers. With two players of the same skill level, matches can range from technical showdowns down to button-mashing brawls where a couple of newcomers can fumble around trying to pull off double quarter-circle-instigated strikes. Face off against the CPU and Breakers’ superior AI ensures variability. Here, opponents aren’t going to fall for spamming, prodding you toward mastering a character’s complete arsenal. In keeping with genre tradition, expect a steady string of expletives to accomplish the showdown against boss Bai-Hu.

Both Bai-Hu and newcomer Saizo Tobikageno are additions to Breakers Revenge, the other half of this collection. Expect a slightly different rebalancing of damage output and AI, as well as slight changes to the backdrops for each battle. But don’t expect Revenge to be a follow-up that extends a comprehensive catalog inventory of additions. In execution, this is less of an update than Street Fighter II Turbo ever was. After spending hours with both titles, I’m not even completely sure that Revenge is the definitive version of Breakers.

Undoubtedly, you might find a few minor blemishes with the Unity-powered port. Matchmaking and online play proved competent, allowing for mostly lag-free fights against remote rivals. Play either game in the default NeoGeo resolution (320*224) and you’ll be able to view an overlay showing character movesets on the edges of the screen. But favor a more efficient use of screen space and those move lists as well as translucent Start and Pause icons overlap across the playfield. On the dedicated moveset screen, crudely drawn character portraits nearly make some of the fighters unrecognizable.

On the upside, the addition of Team Battle allows for longer matches, with squads of up to three combatants facing adversaries in King of Fighters-style faceoffs. Breakers Collection behaves well on Steam Deck, save for soft-crashing when switching between windowed and fullscreen play. Hopefully, QUByte Interactive can patch these minor faults, as players who appreciate sprite-based showdowns should unearth enjoyment across the Breakers Collection.

Breakers Collection was played on PC with review code provided by the publisher.