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Season's Beatings!

Crude Buster is a 1990 Arcade Game by Data East which was ported to the Sega Genesis in 1992. Released internationally under the Market-Based Title of either Two Crude or Two Crude Dudes, the game is a Beat 'em Up, and something of a spiritual sequel to Bad Dudes.

The year is 20XX. A nuclear weapon combined with chemicals made by a mad scientist explodes in the city of New York, turning many of the city's inhabitants into savage mutants under his control. The madman establishes an organization he calls "Big Valley," consisting of these mutants and many advanced military weapons, and takes the ruined city by force. Desperate, the US government hires two super-powered mercenaries to enter the city and eliminate the villains occupying it.

Players control either Ruth or his partner Sid by jumping, dodging and attacking their way through legions of enemies. Because the main characters are muscle-bound brawlers, they have the ability to pick up objects well beyond their own weight (e.g. cars and traffic lights) to use as weapons. While playing co-op, it is also possible for one player to pick up the other to use as a projectile.

The game later received a Genesis port which, along with the inevitable graphical and sound downgrade, featured subtly different stage designs and enemies, and also added bonus rounds where the player could heal in real time by punching vending machines filled with "Power Cola," causing consumable soda cans to fall out.


Tropes include:

  • After the End: The setting is a post-apocalyptic New York, albeit with cyborgs, mutants, and monsters.
  • The Ahnold: Both of the protagonists.
  • Bad Santa: Psycho Santa runs around pulling bombs and syringes out of his sack and throwing them at you.
  • Bonus Stage: The Genesis port adds them. Instead of getting a health refill automatically at the end of the stage, you now manually beat up a vending machine and pick up the drinks it drops to boost your health little by little. Not so obvious - smack the machine around until it blows up, and the bonus stage will end early, but you'll get a 1-Up for doing so.
  • Boss Rush: The final stage has you re-fight most of the bosses (the tall guy with scythes for hands is left out) AND several mid-bosses from the first five stages, in no particular order. At least the ones that come at you in packs typically have less health and less access to their more dangerous attacks and gimmicks.
  • Bullfight Boss: The Stage 3 boss.
  • Color-Coded Multiplayer: Ruth is gold and Sid is green.
  • Gender-Blender Name: Player 1 is a man named Ruth.
  • Degraded Boss: Some of the midbosses of the earlier levels reappear as regular enemies in later levels. Unusually, one boss first appears as a regular enemy earlier in the stage, but by the end, one of them has apparently learned a new trick it can pull.
  • Grievous Harm with a Body: You can pick up and throw enemies, damaging both them and the people they hit.
  • Head Swap: Player 1 (Ruth) has a faux hawk and Player 2 (Sid) has a bald mohawk hairstyle.
  • Hyperactive Metabolism: Implied in the arcade version since the drink apparently restores your health between stages, but explicit in the console ports where you have to pick the cans up yourself (and actually find a few vending machines in the stages themselves).
  • Improvised Weapon: Constantly. In every level, you're rarely more than a few feet from a convenient car, pole, traffic sign, rock, or other heavy object that you can chuck (or swing) at an enemy.
  • Mad Scientist: The leader of Big Valley, and the final boss of the game. He has found ways to work around being a tiny, aging man with no strength to speak of.
  • Mercy Invincibility: Hahaha. You will be HOPING that attacks knock you down because that's the only way you get any, and attacks that don't have a tendency to cause multiple hits that pile on the damage very quickly. Not so much the case in the Genesis version, though; where everyone gets it.
  • Monumental Damage: The wrecked Statue of Liberty is visible in one level.
  • "Number of Objects" Title: The Two Crude or Two Crude Dudes Market-Based Title, referring to the two player character options.
  • One-Hit Kill: Most of the bosses have at least one cheap attack that can kill you even at full health due to the issues with Mercy Invincibility, but the fifth boss has one attack that does this no matter what - hint, if he's skulking around the ceiling, you REALLY don't want to stay under him longer than you have to in order to get to the other side of him - he's apparently a twinge hungry.
  • One-Winged Angel: The mad scientist appears at the end of the game as the final boss, which is initially comical because he's half the size of the musclebound Crude Dudes, who can slap him across the room with any attack. But then he transforms into his monstrous form, and the final battle is on!
    • The Stage 4 boss has a similar transformation once he's the last guy on screen and you slap him around a bit more.
  • Product Placement: In between stages in the Japanese arcade version, the characters beat up a Budweiser vending machine for drinks. Averted in the non-Japanese versions, where "Power Cola" replaced Budweiser.
  • Snake Whip: The boss of the first level wears a giant snake that he can both whip you with and throw at you.
  • Super-Strength: The Crude Dudes can pick up and throw cars, enemies, and each other without breaking a sweat.
  • Telephone Polearm: Larger poles are thrown while smaller ones are used as clubs. You can also throw cars.
  • Vertical Kidnapping: The signature move of the spider boss.
  • Victory Pose: After beating the boss of each level, the Crude Dudes do a victory pose that wouldn't look out of place in a bodybuilding magazine.
  • Wall Crawl: Some of the enemies crawl along the stage's background wall before dropping down to fight you.
  • Walking Shirtless Scene: The Crude Dudes don't wear shirts, only open vests that leave little of their HeroicBuilds to the imagination.

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