Final Vendetta Review

Final Vendetta tells the story of the notorious Syndic8 gang is slowly taking control of the capital and have kidnapped Claire Sparks’ younger sister. In order to save her sister and take down the evil gang, Claire teams up with retired pro-wrestler Miller T. Williams and Duke Sancho, the streetwise bare-knuckle fighter. They will battle through the streets of London to save Claire’s sister and restore peace in the streets.

Final Vendetta is a 16-bit beat’em up title where you go from left to right beating up every bad guy that stands in your way. At the end of each level, you’re treated to a boss fight along with his minions. Unlike Final Fight and Streets of Rage, games that clearly inspired this one, Final Vendetta includes a block button along with its punch and kick button.

Another interesting thing here is the addition of a power move meter akin to the meter found in later Street Fighter games. As you punch and kill enemies, the meter fills up and you can use a special attack to get a bit of a breather should you find surrounded by enemies. It’s pretty fun and useful, albeit it barely does any damage and given the number of buttons on today’s controllers, it’s baffling that it requires pressing two buttons at once.

Alas, not everything is perfect with Final Vendetta. The first problem are the weapons. They are practically useless. All three characters will take a while before launching an attack with a weapon as if they weighed a ton, even a tiny knife. It also leaves you open to enemy attacks. Additionally, the weapon has a 1-time use; no matter if you’ve used it or not. If you’re carrying a weapon and drop it by getting it, it will vanish. Another nuisance is the Special Attacks. While they are used mostly to clear space when too crowded, they barely do any damage to enemies.

The game does have question detection. Oftentimes, it looked like I was on the same level as the enemy, so I’d try to hit them, but my hits would miss. But for whatever reason, enemy attacks would land. Also, the jump kick attack is borderline useless as attempting to use it, enemies will swipe you away like an annoying fly.

The game looks great in all of its 16-bit glory taking cues from both Final Fight and Streets of Rage series. Enemies somehow both look familiar and new at the same time. The game’s soundtrack, while extremely good, also takes inspiration from the Streets of Rage; so much so that some tracks I thought I had heard before in an SoR game.

Final Vendetta is a great, albeit hard, entry in the long-running beat’em up genre. Sadly, releasing it so close to TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge might have hurt the game. It’s a great game that both feel new and familiar at the same time given the games it was inspired from. While the game does have a few annoying flaws, it’s definitely worth your time and attention.