YMMV / God Hand

• Anti-Climax Boss: After so many challenges, the final boss comes out as an easy opponent that repeats a selection of highly-telegraphed attacks over and over. He even spawns enemies who die in two or three basic attacks each, and drop power-ups upon dying. The only difficulty is the fact it has two life bars, and even that is counteracted by Gene having both God Hands at his disposal, complete with Shaolin Blast getting upgraded to Double Shaolin for the express purpose of shaving off even bigger chunks of the boss's health.
• Awesome Music: Pretty much all of it. Masafumi Takada knows his business. See here for specific examples.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment:
  • Every mini-boss you fight (with the exception of The Three Evil Stooges and Azel) comes out of nowhere, has nothing to do with the "plot", and are never mentioned ever again after you beat them.
  • Special mention goes to the Psychic Midget. Gene even quips after the fight that he picked the wrong game to appear in.
  • A minor moment, but the opening sequence counts. Gene walks into frame, falls over himself and screams "WAAAAAATEEEEERRRRRR." The next time he's into frame he stands back up and acts as though nothing happened. It's likely he was only doing that to mess with Olivia, though.
• Breather Boss:
  • Ravel is a Dreadful Musician with a very damaging long-range combo, but with the lowest health of any boss and an exceedingly easy-to-dodge knockback move, the fight is pretty much over the second you manage to get in melee range. The rematch is only slightly harder because you have to learn the moves of his drummer buddy Debussy, an equally long-ranged fighter, but a God Hand release and adequate pressure can knock them down without even letting them fight back.
  • Dr. Ion, coming after Azel and before Demon Elvis, doesn't block and has very telegraphed attacks. He also can't be juggled, knocked down, and launch moves only disassemble him temporarily, so there isn't a lot of interesting things to do with him; he's a completely straightforward beatdown. When he returns, the only new thing he brings to the table is a claw he can grapple you with. And that encounter comes right before The Flying Pyramid.
  • After the titanic fight against Azel that puts to the test everything you know about the game, the fight against Angra is more just a cathartic beatdown of a giant monster using the unfathomable power of two God Hands.
• Breather Level: Several sub-stages like the second pass through Shannon's Dance Party (which has only two mooks), and the immediately following Puppy Kingdom (which has literally no enemies but there's a ton of crates to smash for items) in Stage 3, while Stage 4 has Kissing a Hot Chick, which is little more than a puzzle where you have to chuck crates at four enemies who die in one hit that are tormenting a villager you can't get to directly. Other than that, there are only two enemies you fight head on (one of which can be baited from the other with a thrown object) and plenty of stuff to break if you're hurting for health or Orbs. The titular hot chick is also a guaranteed Tension boost, making it a tempting room to Save Scum for items to recover if you need to. Generally any short area without a lot of enemies to fight you and a decent supply of boxes and barrels to smash.
• Complete Monster:
  • Demon King Angra — SATAN in Japan (yes, in all caps) — is the ruler of all demons, and the true leader of the Four Devas. Originally a Fallen Angel cast down to Hell for his pride, Angra sought revenge against the humans who he felt betrayed him, forming a demon army to enslave mankind. Eventually defeated by the man with the God Hands and sealed away, Angra allowed the Four Devas to send their demons out to murder and enslave countless humans in their plan to revive him. Hiding in Azel's Devil Hand, Angra betrays his loyal follower to be the sacrifice needed for his revival, hoping to destroy the God Hands and rule over humanity.
  • Azel is a human who desires the God Hands for their power. Originally a member of the clan tasked to protect the God Hands, Azel slaughtered his entire clan to claim one of the God Hands for himself. Selling out humanity by joining the Four Devas, Azel isn't afraid to kill his own minions or mock those he deems weak as he assists the group in Angra's revival. Kidnapping his fiancée Olivia to be used as Angra's sacrificial vessel, Azel also uses her as bait to lure in Gene, hoping to kill him and take his God Hand for himself.
• Cult Classic: Unlike the universally acclaimed Ōkami, God Hand was initially tainted by the infamously bad IGN review that made it fade into obscurity soon after. Even so, or rather because of it, the game received a dedicated fanbase that loved its deep mechanics allowing tons of customization and surreal, off-the-wall humor that doesn't take itself too seriously and is delightfully tongue-in-cheek. Nowadays, while the game is still relatively unknown when compared to other games from the same era, it's mostly fondly remembered as one of the few great 3D beat 'em ups of its generation.
• Evil Is Cool: Invoked and lightly parodied with Azel, Gene's rival who wields the other God Hand, wears Sunglasses at Night, is Olivia's fiancée, and is a member of the Four Devas despite being the Token Human of the bunch. Fan reaction is that he still ends up playing this straight, thanks in part to the incredibly challenging yet fun Mirror Boss nature of your fights with him and Azel's snazzy battle theme, "Devil May Sly".
• Faux Symbolism: Asuras? Devas?
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: It was (and still is) regarded as a genre classic in Indonesia.
• Good Bad Bugs: It's possible to get the Great Sensei into a stun loop.
• Harsher in Hindsight: Spade will mention wanting to be the leader of the Mad Midget V in the sequel when you defeat the aformentioned group for the second (and final) time in Stage 6, which unfortunately never came to be due to IGN's infamous review and the subsequent closing of Clover Studio.
• Heartwarming Moments: The ending itself counts as this, as it ends up being goofily adorable thanks to the upbeat music and the visuals of Gene doing silly dances with the various Mooks, sub-bosses, and boss characters.
• He Panned It, Now He Sucks!: The infamous IGN review that gave the game a 3.0 score is generally regarded as the worst piece of writing to ever be posted up on their site, and part of the reason the game flopped despite having such a cult following. Problems include complaining about things that aren't in the game and saying it's bad because it's too hard, finding the sense of humor to be weak, and other issues that make it seem like they hadn't played the game for more than a few hours. The review itself was also poorly written with multiple spelling errors that have gone unfixed to this day.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: God Hand has "The Reveal" that Azel, the cooler-than-you rival character, is actually the fiancée of Olivia, Gene's love interest. One year later, No More Heroes would pull the exact same thing, only Henry is revealed to be Sylvia's husband. Travis pretty much reacts identically to Gene, completely baffled by the random plot twist.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • There is a widely circulated God Hand fancomic◊ out there on the internet, created by an imageboard regular based on his own experiences with the game as well as Kung-Fu Jesus' LP of the game and featuring two very quotable lines: "OH MY GOD I'M THE MOTHERFUCKING FIST OF THE NORTH STAR JESUS CHRIST!" and (regarding Demon Form Elvis) "FUCK YES! YOU ARE THE BEST BOSS FIGHT EVER!" Said comic has spawned numerous imitations based on other games. God Hand itself also qualifies to an extent.
  • Also, a quote from a review: "It's a game about punching people."
  • There are a few photoshops of characters from other games pulling out a God Reel.
  • The Bragging Theme Tune played during the credits reel, particularly lines such as "Dragon Kick your ass into the Milky Way!" and "God power keeps my pimp hand strong!"
  • "God Hand: 3.0 / Imagine Party Babyz: 7.5◊", a common and still widely used argument to support the supposed incompetence of IGN staff and gaming journalism as a whole. Ironically, while aforementioned review is often cited as one of the reasons God Hand flopped during its release, backlash towards "Imagine Party Babyz" total score and resulted comparison introduced the game to many new players years later.
  • Much of the random chatter in the game, from Gene's responses to picking up items ("I love it!") to the mooks' taunts ("You're not Alexander!").
  • The Dragon Kick is generally the most referenced Roulette Attack in the game due to its effect on enemies.
• Moral Event Horizon: For Azel, killing his entire clan for the Left God Hand and using his fiancé, Olivia, as a sacrifice for resurrecting Angra.
• Presumed Flop: While it certainly didn't sell all that well, the game wasn't quite the Creator Killer for Clover that it's often stated to be. In fact, while its exact budget was never disclosed, it was made on the cheap and didn't need that many sales to break even; in fact, producer Atsushi Inaba noted when it moved 60,000 copies domestically by the end of 2006 that those modest numbers were twice what he had even expected. For better or for worse, the fault of the studio's death lies solely with Ōkami.
• Rated M for Money: The game was rated M by the ESRB, but those who've actually played the game will certainly be puzzled as to why. The back of the box states the reasons to be Blood & Gore, Language, Suggestive Themes, and Violence. The only instances of any blood or dismemberment in the game are when Gene gets his arm cut off (and even then, it's blocked by a Gory Discretion Shot) and when using the Western-exclusive "Head Slicer" roulette move (which more resembles the head flying off a mannequin). The game has minimal swearing, and nothing too bad in terms of language. The violence and suggestive themes are definitely there, but nothing in the game couldn't have easily been in a T-rated game.
• So Bad, It's Good: The voice acting, filled with Narm Charm and ridiculously bad lines at point. However, it fits the game's wacky premise perfectly and just works so well.
• Spiritual Successor: It's no exaggeration to say that God Hand looks like one of the best Fist of the North Star games ever made, considering that we didn't get any good ones at all until Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage. It also doubles as a better 3D version of Final Fight than either of the actual 3D Final Fight games (one of which was a competitive fighting game, and the other a GTA clone).
• Suspiciously Similar Song: The background theme of Area 1 sounds a lot like the theme of Hawaii Five-O without the horns.
• That One Boss:
  • All of them can be, but Demon Elvis and the Mad Midget Five are especially painful.
  • Ditto the Great Sensei. Even in this game, this fight is typically a HUGE speed bump.
• That One Level:
  • Level Five makes many players want to cry. Get past that, and Level Seven's "The Flying Pyramid" will make you wish for Level Five again.
  • Level Eight is absolutely brutal, and the area just before the tower is one of the most soul-crushingly difficult levels in existence.
• Ugly Cute: Elvis in his demon form, as his round body and somewhat silly-looking face on his chest, combined with his overall goofy animations and his silly personality, make him look more endearing and huggable than threatening. He's still a pain to fight, though.
• Woolseyism: As ridiculous as the ending theme is, it is very accurate to the original Japanese.