Fighter Maker 2 (PlayStation 2) review "If you put enough time and effort into it, you have a chance of enjoying RPG Maker 2 and making something decent with it. But no matter what you do, Fighter Maker 2 is always going to be a piece of crap. "

Tempting as it may be, don't compare Fighter Maker 2 to RPG Maker 2. There's a world of difference.

With enough time and effort, you'll enjoy RPG Maker 2 enough to make something decent. Fighter Maker 2, however, is going to be crap regardless.

There's just three steps here: Design characters, make moves, have fights. The problem? Every step sucks.

The clothing's anime-ish; spikey hair, schoolgirl skirts, and queer turtle outfits abound. If you're looking to make a Dragon Ball Z reject or a skanky catgirl…perfect. You're screwed otherwise, and since you can't change the body type's size, the variety's lacking. For a game that relies so much on customization, that's a staggering blow.

Of course, with the first-generation Playstation graphics, your character's ugly no matter what. So it's not that big of a lose.

When you’re done designing your hideous, stereotypical warrior of choice, the time comes to create the moves. Every axis has to be taken into accounts; X, Y, and of course, Z. Attacks need tweaking; even something as simple as a weak punch requires you to move the shoulders, the legs, waist, the head…almost every body part has to moved in perfect tandem for things to have a shade of normal.

This is just for one frame. Even the simplest attacks can have around twenty frames, and error's not an option. Get careless, miss a frame, and your character moves like a black belt paraplegic. Working on a single move takes hours. Tweak it. Test it. Work every parameter. Make sure it hits like you want it to, make sure it hits at all, make sure it works with the other moves, make sure it can be used in a combo, make sure to make sure of everything.

100+ hours spent and you've made a working fighter. So? He looks like crap. You’ll only be able to fight with him in the game's generic levels, against the game's generic pre-made fighters, in the game’s generic tournament mode.

Fight Maker 2 is only good for one thing: Proving that fighting-game development is best left to the professionals.

Staff review by Zack Little (December 24, 2005) A bio for this contributor is currently unavailable, but check back soon to see if that changes. If you are the author of this review, you can update your bio from the Settings page.