68. Guardians Of The 'Hood

(Arcade, Atari, 1992)
As previously mentioned, I'm a huge fan of games where vigilantes decide it's time to walk through the city, punching men and women in the face as a quick solution to the crime problem, especially when there's a bound and gagged girl waiting to be rescued at the other end. If any game fits that bill, then sign me up and let's bring the beatdowns. In my world, happiness is finding a roast chicken in a barrel.

However, If you want me to save "Da HoOD!" Thanks, but I'd rather let it burn.
Guardians Of The 'Hood is a total shit sandwich of a game. Seriously, take a good look at the above screenshot again. Atari, apparently trying hard to wipe it's own credibility of the face of the earth, tortured gamers with what is essentially a scrolling beat 'em up version of Pit-Fighter. Picking one of four hopelessly un-cool characters, up to three friends (An oxymoron, If you enjoy this game you won't have any friends) can make their way through DA 'HOOD, beating up wave upon wave of the same four blocky digitised badguys, Palette swaps and all.

The game has that horrible Pit-Fighter engine which means everyone floats around bouncing off each other like they're made of rubber, punches and kicks flail through the air, randomly striking characters or ghosting straight through them, floored characters get pushed around the screen and every attack and fruity cartwheel evasion is nailed to two or three frames of animation.
It's like someone took the worst game engine ever, then devised a way to make you hate it even more. The game has droning music that sounds like a walkman when the batteries are running out.

After suffering through some of the longest levels ever farted onto a JAMMA board, our non-heroes come up against the imaginatively titled Big Boss. This is where you are hit with the game's big twist: Big Boss is ACTUALLY A WOMAN! This may have been shocking if it hadn't been for two things:
1. Big Boss looks like a woman
2. Big Boss is clearly a woman
Guardians of the 'hood is a grade 'A' turd. A button bashing mess, the awkward engine doesn't allow for strategy and the broken control system makes the game a total credit muncher, especially considering the ridiculously overpowered bosses. When you look at it's year of release, it's actually rage-inducing that Atari had the gall to attempt to con gamers out of they're hard earned tokens.
Well, people aren't always that stupid, and this game rightfully bombed. I hope everyone involved in it lost their jobs. No, actually, I hope they had to play their own abortion from beginning to end.

I'd encourage you to boot up an emulator and try all the games I post about here, but not this one, straight up, It'd give your PC computer syphilis.
If Guardians Of The Hood was a human, it'd be Gary Glitter. If it was a TV show, it'd be that episode of 8 Simple Rules where the Dad dies, If it was a videogame, it'd be Guardians Of The 'Hood.

Shame on you Atari. You are still unforgiven.