When the One Punch Man fighting game was announced last month, those familiar with the anime very sensibly asked how a fighting game could work when the main character is a being that can defeat anything with just one punch.
As it turns out, publisher Bandai Namco and developer Spike Chunsoft have come up with a pretty elegant solution that ensures One Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows remains a balanced fighting game while staying true to the fact that protagonist Saitama could spark you out in less than a second.
This is being achieved thanks to something called the “Hero Arrival System”, which is essentially a mechanic that asks players to… survive long enough for Saitama to arrive and deal with your opponent. It sounds brilliant, and hilarious, and I can’t wait to try it out for myself.
Obviously, this is a fighting game, so it’s not simply a case of avoiding your enemy until Saitama gets there – that would be super dull. Instead, you’re encouraged to fight better, block attacks, and pull of combos to get One Punch Man to join the fray and come to your aid faster.
During the fight, you’ll see a little live feed of Saitama literally running towards your location, along with a countdown. If you can stay alive long enough for him to show up, he’ll do his thing and punch your opponent over the hills and far away.
It doesn’t seem as if the Hero Arrival System will be present in every mode, so if you’re worried about Saitama completely unbalancing the entire game for you, you’ll be able to play modes without the looming threat of going down in one punch.
Check it out in action below.
One Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows is “coming soon” to PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. The focus is on 3v3 battles, where players can “form powerful teams using many familiar and fan favourite faces”, including Genos, Fubuki, Mumen Rider, and Sonic. Bandai Namco also recently revealed that Terrible Tornado, Silverfang, and Atomic Samurai are joining the roster.
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Ewan Moore is a journalist at UNILAD Gaming who still quite hasn’t gotten out of his mid 00’s emo phase. After graduating from the University of Portsmouth in 2015 with a BA in Journalism & Media Studies (thanks for asking), he went on to do some freelance words for various places, including Kotaku, Den of Geek, and TheSixthAxis, before landing a full time gig at UNILAD in 2016.