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Double Dragon is a series of side-scrolling Beat 'em Ups that helped popularize the genre back in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

The original 1987 arcade game, developed by the now-defunct Technos Japan Corp. and distributed by Taito, featured a rather simple and standard premise: twin martial artists Billy and Jimmy Lee must save their lady friend Marian from the clutches of the Black Warriors, a ruthless gang that controls the city.

While not the first of its kind, as Double Dragon was originally intended to be a sequel to their previous game Renegade, the game improved upon its predecessor's formula by allowing up to two players to play simultaneously and adding the ability to pick and use weapons against the enemies (both features would become standard in subsequent games in the genre). The 2-Players Mode also provides a twist in the end: if both players manage to make all the way to the end, then the two are forced to fight each other to the death, with the survivor getting to claim Marian for himself.

Double Dragon was followed by two arcade sequels and numerous home versions for various platforms. The three NES versions (along with the first two Game Boy games and the SNES-exclusive installment) were actually developed by Technos themselves, while most of the other versions were licensed out and developed by other companies. The series died out after Technos went out of business in 1996 (long after the beat-'em-up boom ended), despite attempts to adapt it into a Fighting Game format. The series was revived when Million Corp., a company founded by former Technos staff members, bought the rights. The rights was later bought, alongside other Technos properties by Arc System Works. While the series is nowhere near as prevalent as it was back in the day, it still gets an occasional new game once in a while.

In addition to the games, there was also an animated series and a live-action movie, as well as a comic where their dad was Stan Lee. Yes, that one.

Games include:

  • Double Dragon (1987, arcade)
  • Double Dragon II: The Revenge (1988, arcade)
    • Ported to Amiga, Windows, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, Atari ST, NESnote , Japanese Mega Drive, PC Engine Super CD-ROM2note , and PlayStation 4.
    • An unrelated Double Dragon II was released for the Game Boy in 1991. It is actually a localization of a Kunio-kun game.
    • There was also a handheld LCD Double Dragon based on The Revenge, though (being a '90s LCD handheld) it was extremely stripped down.
    • Double Dragon II: Wander of the Dragons (2013, Xbox 360): A 3D reimagining of the arcade original.
  • Double Dragon 3: The Rosetta Stone (1990, arcade)
    • Ported to NESnote , Commodore 64, Amiga, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, Atari ST, Windows, Game Boy, and Sega Genesis.note 
  • Double Dragon (1992, Game Gear): An original game developed and produced by Virgin Interactive, also known as Double Dragon: The Revenge of Billy Lee in Europe.
  • Super Double Dragon (1992, SNES)
    • Return of Double Dragon (1992, SFC): An updated releasenote .
  • Battletoads & Double Dragon: The Ultimate Team (1993, NES): Crossover with Battletoads. Developed by Rare and published by Tradewest. Technos had very little involvement with this one.
    • Ported to Game Boy, Sega Genesis, and SNES.
  • Double Dragon V: The Shadow Falls (1994, SNES): A Tradewest-developed one-on-one fighting game based on the animated series. Once again, Technos had very little involvement with this one.
  • Double Dragon (1995, Neo Geo): A one-on-one fighting game based on the movie. Unlike Shadow Falls, Technos actually made this one and it was the last one they made before going out of business.
  • Double Dragon Neon (2012, PlayStation 3 / Xbox 360): An extremely Affectionate Parody of the series developed by WayForward.
    • Ported to Windows.
  • Double Dragon Trilogy (2013, Android / iOS): A Compilation Rerelease of the three arcade games by DotEmu.
    • Ported to OUYA and Windows.
  • Double Dragon IV (2017, PlayStation 4 / Windows): A Double Dragon game by Arc System Works that features a retro art style reminiscent of the NES versions. Set after Double Dragon II.
    • Ported to Nintendo Switch and iOS.
  • Double Dragon Gaiden: Rise of the Dragons (2023, PlayStation 4 / PlayStation 5 / Nintendo Switch / Xbox One / Xbos Series X / Windows): A new alternative story in the series that focuses on the Lees who must drive several criminal gangs out of the city with the aid of Marian and franchise newcomer Uncle Matin.

See also Rage of the Dragons, a 2002 Fighting Game that, while not a part of the series, was originally meant to be.


This series provides examples of:

    open/close all folders 

    A-L 
  • '80s Hair
  • Acrofatic: Chin Seimei (and his Palette Swap brothers who appear only in the third arcade game), as well as McGuire from Super.
  • Action Girl: Marian and Rebecca in the Neo Geo fighting game.
  • Adaptation Dye-Job: The series was never consistent as to which Lee brothers had which hair color. In the first arcade game, Player 1 (or Hammer, as he was originally named) wore a blue outfit and had blond hair, while Player 2 (or Spike) had a red outfit and brown hair. This was changed in the NES version, where Billy wore the blue outfit and had reddish brown hair, while Jimmy wore the red outfit and had blond hair (aside from a brief scene where it's blue). Their respective sequels followed suit, although the arcade version of Double Dragon II deviated from this pattern a bit by having the Lee brothers wearing black and white during gameplay while depicting them with their "switched" hair colors from the NES version during the ending photograph. Later games in the series tend to switch back and forth between one set of hair colors or the other, depending on the developer.
  • Adaptation Expansion: Double Dragon Advance is a remake of the original arcade game that not only features almost all the stages, moves, and enemy characters from the arcade version, but also feature quite a few stages, enemies, and moves clearly inspired by later ports and installments.
  • Adaptational Villainy: Jimmy Lee in the first NES game, who went on from being the Player 2 character to becoming the "shadow boss" of the Black Warriors.
  • After the End: "In the year 199X, violence ruled the streets of New York after the nuclear war."
  • Alliterative Title: Double Dragon
  • All There in the Manual: The names of the enemy characters are never mentioned in-game in most of the titles (except for the NES version, where all the bad guys except Willy are playable in the Versus Mode, although Williams' name is shortened to "Will" and Chin Taimei is only referred by his surname). This was before Final Fight introduced the idea of giving the enemy characters life gauges with their names.
  • The Apunkalypse: The nuclear war has caused societies to collapse, allowing roving band of raiders to take power, leaving only dojos as a form of law to combat against the lawlessness. The only nations spared are those that lack nuclear capabilities such as Japan.
  • Artifact Title: The NES version of the first game ran the risk of having one due to the developers' inability to include a 2-Player co-op mode at the time. Since having a game titled Double Dragon with just half of the titular duo wouldn't had made sense, Technos decided to subvert this by taking a cue from the arcade version's twist ending, in which both brothers fought over Marian, by having Jimmy (Player 2 in the arcade version) as the final boss.
    • The Game Boy version plays this straight by lacking a co-op mode as well and ending the game with the final boss fight with Willy.
    • The arcade version of Double Dragon 3 introduces a previously-unseen third Lee brother named Sonny exclusive to that game. Apparently "Triple Dragon" didn't have quite the same ring to it.
  • Asian Rune Chant: When Amon from the Neo Geo fighting game is performing his super move.
  • Ass Kicks You: Marian in the Neo Geo fighting game.
  • Attack Reflector: In Super, hitting a knife will launch it back towards the enemy.
  • Badass in a Nice Suit: The Steves in Advance.
  • Barrier-Busting Blow: Abobos and Burnovs punch through walls. The Lee brothers themselves do this in the intro of PC Engine version of II.
  • Bash Brothers: Guess who.
  • Battle Boomerang: In Super; makes a return in Neon.
  • Batter Up!: Whenever anyone uses a baseball bat, they always swing for the fences.
  • Big Applesauce
  • Boomerang Comeback: Possible in Super and Neon.
  • Boss Rush: Most of the games have a boss rush before the final boss shows up.
  • Bottomless Magazines: Willy.
  • Bottomless Pits
  • Bribing Your Way to Victory: The third arcade game had power-ups... that the player had to buy with actual credits.
  • Broad Strokes: The NES version of the trilogy took certain liberties with the original plot. Namely: the first game made Jimmy Lee into the true leader of the Black Warriors, II has an additional final boss countering the Lee brothers' Sousetsuken technique and clearly depicts the full recovery of Marian in the ending, and III expands the plot and changes Cleopatra into "Princess Noriam" (outside Japan). Subsequent games are standalone for the most part and completely drop all these plot points except the middle one, as confirmed in IV (which is specifically post-II and mentions the Gensatsuken and shows Marian alive and well).
  • Bruce Lee Clone
    • The Lee brothers are somewhere between this and being Kenshiro expies. Billy Lee is even named after Billy Lo, Bruce Lee's character from the Game of Death.
      • They are at their Bruce Lee-est in Super Double Dragon, even aping Lee's stance and Billy's in-game sprite sporting a very Lee-like hairstyle.
    • Chin Taimei in the NES version of the first game.
    • Li Chenglong, the Mission 2 boss in the third arcade game is a rather blatant example.
    • The Japanese version of the Game Boy Advance game flat out gives a dedication to Bruce Lee in the ending.
  • The Cameo: In Amon's ending in the Neo Geo game, you can see Shaia and Ballboy near him.
  • Catchphrase: A real weird word, "Chikky!" seems to be getting like Abobo's Catchphrase, especially in the the Neo Geo fighting game, and gets carried over in his Spiritual Successor Abubo in Rage of the Dragons.
  • Catch and Return: In some games it's possible to catch a knife, leading to this trope.
  • Charged Attack: In Super, the Lee brothers can charge up a special meter that alters their attacks, starting with the stunning backhand and knock out jumping kick, then with the moving Cyclone Kick, and finishing with the Super Mode when fully charged.
  • Clean Dub Name: In the second NES game, the enemy gang was changed from the Black Warriors to the Shadow Warriors in the English version. The "Shadow Warriors" name would later be used in Super and Advance, but the iOS version went back to using the "Black Warriors".
  • Color-Coded Multiplayer: Billy is blue and Jimmy is red (except in the second arcade game, where they wore black and white). Gets a bit silly in the third arcade game with the introduction of a yellow-clad Lee brother (Sonny) as the main Player 3 character, along with other palette-swapped siblings (essentially an excuse to allow all three players to use the same character).
  • Combat Pragmatist: You can utilize hair grabs, stomps and grounded pummeling against your foes in most games. Notable in Advance in that you're not awarded score for utilizing these attacks.
    • Willy uses a machine gun whereas everyone else uses their fists or melee weapons
  • Combination Attack: The Back-to-Back Hurricane Kick and the Triangle Jump Kick in both the arcade and NES versions of Double Dragon 3.
  • Composite Character
    • Jimmy Lee in the first NES game, who not only serves as the new final boss, but essentially replaces Jeff (the head-swapped Lee brother boss from the arcade version) as the boss who uses all of the player's moves.
    • Abore in the second NES game has the same moves as his namesake from the arcade version, but his appearance resembles that of Oharra's, an Abobo head-swap from the arcade version.
  • Conservation of Ninjutsu: The twin ninjas from II and Ranzou from 3 are bosses (the latter becomes a playable character). Ranzou's minions are fodder.
  • Covers Always Lie
    • The promotional illustration for Double Dragon II: The Revenge (as seen above) shows Marian alive, despite being killed in the beginning of the game (the happy ending where Marian is brought back to life was not in the arcade version and was only added in the NES version). Even stranger is the fact that the artwork shows Marian embracing the Lee brother in red, when her boyfriend is established to be Billy, the Lee brother in blue (perhaps a result of Billy and Jimmy having switched hair colors in the console version).
    • The Japanese cover art for the Game Boy version also depicts Billy wearing red instead of his traditional blue. But given that the Game Boy version has black and white graphics, his outfit could be in any color.
    • A much straightforward example can be seen in the cover art for the first NES game, which shows Billy and Jimmy as literal Bash Brothers, clenching their fists together at the background and teaming up against a pair of punks on the foreground, despite the fact that Jimmy was Billy's nemesis in the NES version. The computer versions released shortly after the NES game used the same cover artwork, but most of them had the 2-player co-op mode, so the use of the same artwork was not as misleading in those versions. The Famicom version had an entirely different cover art as well.
    • The American Game Boy version uses the same box art as the aforementioned NES version, even though Jimmy doesn't appear in that game at all.
    • Averted entirely by Double Dragon Neon. Everything that appears on the box art appears in-game.
  • Co-Op Multiplayer: Probably the first Beat 'em Up to feature this.
  • Counter-Attack: Super features an armlock move that allows the player to grab an enemy's arm by blocking his punches and then use the opportunity for multiple punches and kicks or a throw (which only works on some enemies). The Chen brothers can do the same to the player's kicks, while Duke can counter the armlock. In Advance this returns in form of nerfed catch and throw combo.
  • Critical Existence Failure: Downplayed a little, weakened enemies will be more vulnerable to certain attacks (head grab, stomp etc, etc.) and will take more time to recover but otherwise will continue fighting like nothing happened until they're knocked to the ground.
  • Crossover: Battletoads & Double Dragon.
  • Damn You, Muscle Memory!
    • All versions of Double Dragon II use a direction-based attack system where one button attacks to the left and the other to the right, which Technos previously employed with Renegade. This takes awhile to get used to players more accustomed to the original game, since one button does the standard punch combo and the other a back kick depending on the direction the player character is facing.
    • The NES version of Double Dragon uses A+B as the command for a jump kick—if your character has reached Level 3. Until then, A+B is just a regular jump, not an attack. Forget this bit, and you may jump right into a bad guy's punches.
  • Damsel in Distress: Marian in the first game, where the objective was to rescue her. She's worse-off in the second game, where she's killed off instead, although she does return to life in the NES version. The English localization of the third NES game even changed the script in order to make it seem as if Marian was kidnapped once again and ends up being possessed by an evil spirit (even though she never appears in the cutscenes and the final boss who is supposed to be her was actually a different character in the arcade and Famicom versions). Averted in the Neo Geo game based on the movie, where Marian underwent Xenafication.
  • Deadly Dodging: Somebody thrown a knife at you? Just step aside and let it hit the mook behind you.
  • Defeat Means Friendship: Chin Seimei is said to be friends with the Double Dragons after his defeat in the third NES game (despite introducing himself by vowing revenge on them for killing his brother in a previous game).
  • Degraded Boss
    • Happens during the final two stages in both, the arcade and NES versions, where the bosses from the first two stages appear as regular grunts. The "degraded" versions are generally just as tough and sometimes have just as much health as the boss versions.
    • In the arcade version of Double Dragon II, the head-swapped bosses from the previous game appear only as sub-bosses.
  • Delinquent Hair
  • Demoted to Dragon: In the first NES game, Willy goes from being the main bad guy to being the last enemy Billy fights before the final battle with his brother Jimmy. He doesn't even appear at all in the second NES game. Likewise, he's just a lackey to the Shadow Boss (who is not Jimmy like in the NES version, but a completely made-up character who vaguely resembles Burnov) in Battletoads & Double Dragon, where they didn't even get his name right (he is called "Roper" instead).
    • The Mysterious Warrior, an enigmatic figure introduced in the second NES game as the Big Bad, has expies in Double Dragon Advance as right-hand men to Willy.note 
  • Deus ex machina: Hiruko's death while trying to enter Cleopatra's tomb with only three Rosetta Stones in the third game.
  • Difficulty by Region
    • The Famicom version of Double Dragon II allows the entire game to be played at any difficulty level, while the NES version restricts the game's length depending on the setting (3 stages on Practice, 8 on Warrior, and 9 on Supreme Master). The NES version also requires the player to input a cheat codes after getting a Game Over in order to continue, whereas the Famicom version had no such requirement. There are other specific differences between the two versions as well: traps are much easier in the Famicom version on the normal setting than in the NES version's equivalent setting (especially the disappearing platforms in Mission 6), but enemies have more health on the Famicom version's hardest setting.
    • The Famicom version of Double Dragon III starts the player off with more health than in the NES version (10 hit points per character) and there are less enemies to fight. On the other hand, the ending is affected depending on which characters survive the final battle, whereas the NES version always plays the full ending.
    • Super Double Dragon has no adjustable difficulty settings, in contrast to its re-release Return of Double Dragon, which has three settings (Easy, Normal, and Hard). However the Super is harder than Return set on Hard. Super is missing some of the extra moves in Return, like the ability to switch weapons or catch your boomerangs, while the Hurricane Kick only strikes an enemy once instead of the multiple hits it does in Return. Moreover, dynamites and knives are more lethal in Super, and the enemy placement is different, with more recycled boss characters than in Return. However, Return adds two extra areas to the final stage, making it a bit longer.
  • Direct Continuous Levels: The first two arcade games. Missions 1 throughout 3 are set one after the other, with no cut-aways in-between. It is isn't until reaching the entrance to the enemy's hideout that the game switches to a new level.
  • Divergent Character Evolution: Billy and Jimmy in Super, where not only their sprites are different (rather than just being palette swaps of each other like in previous games, they started sporting different hair styles), but their basic punches and kicks were different as well.
  • Do Not Drop Your Weapon: Willy and his machine gun, the stick wielding version of Chin Taimei, the ninjas in the second and third NES games with their throwing stars and blades, the Japanese swordsmen and Roman gladiators in the third arcade game, the dual-sword wielding Baker from Super, and Kikuchiyo and his cronies in Advance.
  • Dragons Up the Yin Yang: The video games included gratuitous dragons in promotional imagery.
  • Drunken Boxing: Cheng Fu from the Neo Geo fighting game.
  • Dual Boss: Quite a few examples.
    • The twin Abobos in the first game (in both, the arcade and NES version).
    • The arcade version of Double Dragon II has the twin Burnovs at the end of Mission 3, plus twin versions of all the previous bosses in Mission 4.
    • The twin ninjas in the second NES game.
    • The twin Lee brother clones in both versions of Double Dragon II (but only when two players are present).
    • Super has the Chen brothers (Ron Foo and Ron Pyo), while Advance has Hong and Wong (the Two Tigers).
  • Dual Wielding: Chin Taimei with the sticks in II, Baker with the swords in Super.
  • Dumb Muscle: Abobo, especially in Battletoads & Double Dragon. 'Bimmy and Jammy', the super-muscular clones of the Lee brothers in Neon, also qualify, complete with stereotypical 'dumb' voice.
  • Easily Forgiven: In the third NES game, Chin forgets about the Lee brothers killing his brother in the previous game after losing to them.
  • Easy-Mode Mockery: The NES version of II, which only allows the full set of stages to be play on the hardest difficulty. The PC Engine version gives different endings instead.
  • Elevator Action Sequence: Super Double Dragon has one, as does the PC Engine version of II.
  • Epic Flail: Lindas from II use these and Rowpers use something that looks like a flail boomerang in the NES version. If the game has a nunchaku, then it's usually the most powerful weapon.
  • Evil Counterpart: Chen Ron Foo and Chen Ron Pyo, the Double Dragons from Chinatown in Super Double Dragon, as well as their expies, Hong and Wong, the Two Tigers from Double Dragon Advance
  • Evolving Attack: The first NES game gives Billy new moves as he gains experience points from fighting enemies.
  • Expy
    • The character illustrations drawn for the first Famicom/NES game makes Billy and Jimmy Lee look like clones of Kenshiro and Raoh. While Billy was depicted more or less the same way in subsequent games, Jimmy's resemblance to Raoh was toned down considerably after the first game.
    • Chin Taimei from the first NES game resembles the Karate Fighter from Mat Mania, a Technos-developed wrestling game, while Abore in the arcade version of II seems to be based on André the Giant from the WWF Superstars arcade game also developed by Technos.
  • Failed Future Forecast: The backstory for the earlier games establishes that the reason why gangs have taken over New York is because of a nuclear war that occurred in 199X, just like Fist of the North Star.
    • The PC Engine version of II, released in 1993, establishes that despite the end of the Cold War someone still launched a nuke, starting a war.
    • The manual for Double Dragon Advance implies that the nuclear war occurred due to The War on Terror.
  • Fat Bastard: Burnov in II and McGuire in Super.
  • Fastball Special: In the third NES game, both of the Lee brothers and some of the enemy grunts can perform a Triangle Jump Kick where one character jumps unto his partner. The partner proceeds to launch the first character, who then performs a flying jump kick.
  • Faux Action Girl: Marian, as revealed in the backstory given in the original game's official soundtrack and some of the console game manuals, was a part-time assistant instructor in Billy and Jimmy's martial arts training school. Seeing how she goes down with only one punch to the gut in the opening of the original game without putting much a fight, her qualifications for such a job are debatable. Her Neo Geo incarnation, on the other hand, does have actual fighting skills.
  • Gameplay and Story Segregation: In the second NES game, all the cutscenes between stages (as well as the opening and ending) only shows Billy, regardless of whether the game is being played alone (with either, Billy or Jimmy) or with both Lee brothers. The only exception is made with the cutscene when the final boss appears: if both Lee brothers are being used, both of them will appear; but if Billy dies before the final stage and Jimmy survives, then Jimmy will appear in his brother's place.
    • Sonny, the third Lee brother who appears exclusively in the third arcade game, is absent in the game's opening and ending, while only a single member of each of the other three sibling teams (the Oyama, Chin, and Urquidez brothers) appear in the ending.
  • Genre Shift: Double Dragon V for the SNES and Double Dragon for the Neo Geo are both 1v1 fighting games rather than the side-scrolling beat-em-ups the series is known for.
  • Giant Space Flea from Nowhere: At the end of the second arcade game, after defeating Willy in the end of Mission 4, creepy music starts playing and the player's purple Evil Twin rises out of his shadow and attacks him. The game has no other supernatural elements (except for Burnov, the Mission 1 boss who "teleports" after being defeated), nor does the end reference it in any way.
  • Giant Mook: Abobo and his various head/palette swaps.
  • Glowing Eyes of Doom: Abore in the second arcade game.
  • Grapple Move: In the original (1987) game, it was possible to grab an opponent and throw them over your shoulder.
  • Grenade Hot Potato
  • Hammerspace: The Knife and explosive throwing mooks never run out of supplies.
  • Head Swap
    • The boss characters in the first arcade game. The Mission 1 boss is a black head-swapped version of Abobo with a mohawk, slightly larger eyes and a beard who could easily pass himself off as Mr. T, while the Mission 2 boss is a head-swapped Lee brother in green clothing.
    • Starting from Super Double Dragon, Billy and Jimmy began sporting their different hairstyles in their in-game sprites rather than being limited to just promotional artwork and cutscenes like they did in the NES games, with Billy having spiky brown hair and Jimmy having a blond flattop. Only the Neo Geo fighting game and Neon reverted back to making the Lee brothers into palette swaps.
  • Heel–Face Turn
    • The third NES game allows you to play as two additional characters, Chin Seimei and Yagyu Ranzou, after defeating them as bosses first.
    • In IV, Casey and Shannon.
  • His Name Is...: In the English version of the third NES game, Brett tries to tell the Lee brothers that Hiruko is leader of the villains, but dies before he can do so.
  • Hurricane Kick: Ryuubi Ranbuu Kyaku (Dragon Tail's Storm Wind Kick) or simply the Cyclone Spin Kick.
  • I Let You Win: Shuko in the Neo Geo version, Round 1.
  • I Have Your Girlfriend: Marian is kidnapped in the first game.
  • Improvised Weapon
  • Inconveniently-Placed Conveyor Belt: There is one in the first boss fight, which can instantly kill you and even the boss himself.
  • Kamehame Hadoken: The evil clones from II throw these at sufficient distance. The Lee brothers can do this in the Neo Geo fighting game. Neon has a mixtape to allow the Lee brothers to do this as well.
  • Kick Them While They Are Down
    • The NES version of the first game took a cue from Renegade and added a Sit-on Punch to Billy's attack repertoire, allowing him to pin down fallen enemy grunts and punch them while they're down.
    • The third arcade game allows the player to jump over fallen enemies and stomp them.
    • Both of the above moves were added to Advance.
    • Neon allows you to punch downed enemies (regardless of whether you knocked them down yourself, they fall down from the sky on fire or are thrown off their malfunctioning hoverbike) for large amounts of damage, although with some enemies it often results in you getting hit by their wakeup attack if you don't do it as quickly as possible.
  • Lady in Red: While Marian is established to be Billy's girlfriend in most of the series, Jimmy fancies her as well, resulting a rivalry between the two siblings.
  • Launcher Move: Some moves in Advance, most notably the Hyper Uppercut, which can be followed by the Hyper Knee. Performing a weak attack on a stunned enemy inNeon results in an uppercut, which you can follow up with a variety of different moves.

    M-Z 
  • MacGuffin: A different one for each adaptation: the Statue in the comic book, the Sword in the cartoon series, and the Medallion in the movie.
    • Averted in Double Dragon Advance, where Willy demands the secret book of Sou-Setsu-Ken as a ransom for Marian's safety in order to gain greater power. At the end of the game, the book is revealed to be a Magic Feather, as Billy and Jimmy proclaim that they get their strength from their own skills and training.
  • Madonna-Whore Complex: An invoked meta-example. In the early games, there are two females: Marian and Linda. Marian is the pure and helpless maiden who can't fight; Linda is the evil bitch who fights with a whip.
  • Martial Arts Headband: Roper in Super. Billy and Jimmy sported some as well in the American cover arts of the earlier games (including the cabinet art for the arcade game), but they never wore any in the actual games (save for a rare Game Gear game).
  • Microtransactions: The arcade version of 3 is the Ur-Example, in which you could insert more real-world coins to get extra lives and power ups. In an arcade machine. It didn't go over well.
  • Mighty Glacier: The giant mooks, with arcade and PC Engine Abore being the biggest and slowest.
  • Named by the Adaptation: The characters in the arcade versions of the first two games didn't have names when the games were originally released, except for the two protagonists (who were initially named Hammer and Spike in Taito's promotional materials outside Japan, rather the names Billy and Jimmy that were later given). The NES version of the original game in particular was the first version to established the names of the Lee brothers, Marian and the members of the Black Warriors gang (at least those who were in that version), which subsequent versions used.
  • Never Trust a Title: The infamous Double Dragon V is not a continuation of the long running beat-'em-up series. Instead, it's a mediocre fighting game based on the short-lived animated series.
  • Ninja: The nameless ninjas from the NES Double Dragon II, Yagyu Ranzou and his minions from Double Dragon 3, Amon from the Neo Geo fighting game, Shun the kunoichi enemy from Double Dragon Neon, Ayumi from Double Dragon IV, and ninja enemies from Double Dragon Gaiden.
  • Nintendo Hard: The third NES game is ridiculously hard due to having slower basic attacks and no lives system (although, the additional characters obtained by the player in later stages serve a similar purpose). The other two NES games could qualify as well, as both of them have some very unforgiving platforming segments in the later stages. In addition, you have a very limited number of lives without much of an opportunity to collect more, and there are no continues (at least not without inputting a cheat that changes after every third stage).
  • No Celebrities Were Harmed: The Abobo head-swap in the first arcade game bear a more than mild resemblance to Mr. T, while Abore in the arcade version of II wears a pair of sunglasses with glowing red eyes underneath them that makes him look like a Terminator clone.
  • No Ending: Super Double Dragon at least gets an text only epilogue, but Return of Double Dragon goes straight from the final boss to the credits.note 
  • No Name Given: The final boss in the second NES game who is known simply as the "Mysterious Warrior", which is more of an identifier than an actual title.note 
  • Oh, No... Not Again!: Exclaimed by Billy Lee at the start of Double Dragon Neon.
  • One-Steve Limit:
    • The names "Billy", "Willy" and "Williams" are all variants of the name "William" (though "Williams" is technically a surname).
    • Both, the arcade and NES version of the third game, introduces Willy's brother Jim, not to be confused with the (usually) heroic Jimmy Lee. The arcade version also has a "Li" as the second boss (no relation to the Lee brothers), as well as two unrelated characters named Sonny (the third Lee brother) and Sunny (the second Urquidez brother).
    • Lopar and Roper were originally different transliterations of Rowper's name, but both names are used in Battletoads & Double Dragon for two different enemy characters — one of them is a renamed Willy and the other resembles cartwheeling incarnation of Williams from Double Dragon II. Ironically, the one enemy character in that game who actually resembles the original Rowper was given another name (Guido).
  • Original Generation: The Neo Geo game gave many original characters that's never been in any of the previous games, namely Amon, Dulton, Rebecca, Cheng Fu and Eddie. They're not even characters from the movie like Shuko was.
  • Palette Swap: In the original arcade game, there are only seven unique enemy characters and two of them are just head-swaps of other characters (namely of Abobo and the Lee brothers). The game simply recycles the same set of enemies for each stage by changing the main palette for all the mooks, including the occasional black-skinned variants. The third boss is also a green skinned palette swap of the first boss, who is nothing more than a black-skinned head/palette swap of Abobo with a Mr. T-like beard and mohawk. The other games in the series also featured palette-swapped versions of the same enemies.
  • Pistol-Whipping: Willy can do this in close range with his gun.
  • The Power of Friendship: Subverted in the 2P mode ending in the original game.
  • Production Throwback
    • The end of Mission 1 in the first arcade game has a billboard for Nekketsu Koha Kunio-kun, the Japanese version of Renegade and Technos Japan's previous beat-'em-up, in the building just before the first boss battle.
    • The red sports car from Road Blaster (a Data East laserdisc game, ported to the Sega CD as Road Avenger), a game designed by the same director (Yoshihisa Kishimoto), can be seen inside Billy and Jimmy's garage at the start of the first stage. In the second arcade game, the sports car is replaced by the helicopter from Thunder Storm (aka Cobra Command, Kishimoto's other FMV game he did with Data East).
  • Progressively Prettier: Linda the female mook started as a boxy, mannish looking woman with an afro in the 1, became a slender but muscular woman with a mohawk in 2, a buxom blonde in camo and a beater in Battletoads and Double Dragon, and finally a dominatrix in a leather teddy and stockings in Neon. The exception to this is in the 2011 mobile version of the game, which parodied her appearance in 1 by making her a muscular ogress.
  • Punch-Kick Layout: In the original arcade game, your character can make punch or kick attacks. The punch attack can be used to throw an opponent over your character's head or make attacks with carried weapons. Both punch and kick attacks can be made backwards, thus attacking an opponent behind you. Punch attacks made backwards become elbow jabs.
  • Punched Across the Room: The Lee brother's Hyper Knee and the Mysterious Warrior's backflip kick can send anyone flying quite far.
    • In Neon, the One-Inch Punch special move does a short-range attack that knocks enemies backward.
  • Recurring Riff: The main theme.
  • Recursive Adaptation: Double Dragon V: The Shadow Falls, based on the animated series and Double Dragon (Neo Geo), based on the film.
  • Reformulated Game: All three of the NES games and the first Game Boy game.
  • Ring-Out Boss: Most of the boss fights have a convenient Bottomless Pits nearby to chuck the boss in.
  • Sdrawkcab Alias: The final boss in the NES version of Double Dragon III is called Princess Noiram (who is actually a brainwashed Marion). Averted in all other versions (including the Famicom release), when she is actually a revived Cleopatra.
  • Shoryuken: The Lee brothers are Shotoclones in the fighting game, so they have this practically by law.
  • Shotoclone: The Lee brothers in the Neo Geo fighting game.
  • Shoulders of Doom: Many enemies sport these.
  • Shout-Out
    • The red sports car inside Billy and Jimmy's garage in the original arcade game is the same one from the laserdisc arcade game Road Blaster (aka Road Avenger), an earlier game by Double Dragon creator Yoshihisa Kishimoto.
    • A billboard in Mission 1 features an advertisement for Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun, the Japanese version of Renegade and predecessor of River City Ransom.
    • The second arcade game replaces the sports car inside Billy and Jimmy's garage with the helicopter from Cobra Command, another laserdisc game also directed by Yoshihisa Kishimoto.
    • The series as the whole is inspired by Fist of the North Star, starting from the post-nuclear setting to the character designs.
    • The masked wrestler Burnov from the second game seems to be an expy of Kinnikuman wrestler Neptuneman.
    • Advance includes a freeway battle atop moving semis with suit-clad enemies who straighten their ties between attacks. If it's not a Shout-Out to The Matrix Reloaded, then it should be.
  • Shout-Out Theme Naming: The Lee brothers, along with recurring mooks Williams and Rowper, all take their names from the three main heroes of Enter the Dragon. The name "Billy" is also a reference to Billy Lo (Bruce Lee's character from Game of Death) and the female mook Linda shares her name with Bruce Lee's widow Linda Lee Cadwell.
    • In the second game, there's an Abobo-like Giant Mook named Bolo, a reference to Bolo Yeung (who played one of Mr. Han's two henchmen in Enter the Dragon). The arcade version even has a head-swapped variant of Bolo who was given the name of "Oharra" in the Mega Drive port (Mr. Han's other henchman).
    • Sousetsuken, the fictional martial art style of the Lee brothers, is named after Bruce Lee's self-developed style called Jeet Kune Do (Sekkedō in Japanese). Whereas Jeet Kune Do is the "Way of the Intercepting Fist", Sousetsuken means "Fist of Twin Interception".
    • In the third arcade game, the Lee brothers are joined by the Oyama, Chin, and Urquidez brothers, named after Mas Oyama, Jackie Chan, and Benny Urquidez in that order.note 
    • The second boss in the arcade version of Double Dragon 3 is named Li Chenglong, a combination of Bruce Lee's surname and Jackie Chan's Chinese stage name (Cheng Long).
    • Patrick Dulton/Dalton in the 1995 fighting game was probably named after James Dalton, Patrick Swayze's character in Roadhouse 1989.
  • Sibling Team: Billy and Jimmy Lee.
    • Invoked literally in the third arcade game, where the main characters were grouped by teams of siblings. The Lee brothers are joined by the Urquidez, Chin and Oyama clans.
  • Side View: Stages and areas added to the NES games tend to be set from a side-view perspective and don't feature depth movement. They usually involved platform-jumping in some capacity like the cavern areas in Mission 3 of the first NES game or Mansion of Terror in the second. The Game Boy version also switches to a side-view in some areas.
  • Sinister Shades: Abore in the arcade and PC Engine version of II, Carlem in Super and the Agent Smith-rendition of Steve in Advance.
  • SNK Boss: Duke and Shuko in the Neo Geo version. Particularly Shuko holds back from using his full move set until the player wins the first round.
  • Spared by the Adaptation: Marian, who was Killed Off for Real in the second arcade game, gets better in its NES (and later PC Engine) adaptation.
  • Spell My Name With An S
    • Rowper, one of the enemy mooks, had his name spelled as "Lopar" in the translated manual for the NES version. However, the character's name is actually meant to be a reference to John Saxon's character "Roper" from Enter the Dragon. The name "Roper" and "Lopar" are also used for two different enemies in Battletoads & Double Dragon and neither resemble the Rowper from the original game (one of them being a misnamed Willy).
    • Linda's name is spelled "Rinda" in the promotional brochure for the Famicom version.
    • Chin Taimei's name was shortened to "Chintai" in the NES version's manual.
    • Marian's name is sometimes spelled "Marion" depending on the game. The manual for the Master System version spells it "Mary-Anne" as well.
    • Billy and Jimmy's own fighting style is subject to spelling variations - is it So-Setsu-Ken, Sousetsuken, Sou-Setsu-Ken, or Sōsetsuken? The manual for the NES version even uses the spelling Sosaiken (since the second kanji can be pronounced both ways).
    • The manual for the Neo Geo game spells Burnov as "Bulnov" and Dulton as "Dalton."
  • Spiritual Successor: Rage of the Dragons was intended to actually be a sequel to the previous Neo Geo game, but because Evoga (the developers) were unable to secure the rights to the Double Dragon franchise, the game is instead a loose homage, starring brothers Billy and Jimmy Lewis instead of Lee, plus an Abobo-like sub-boss named Abubo.
    • Double Dragon itself was a spiritual successor to Renegade.
  • Stalked by the Bell: In the arcade games, first NES game, and Advance.
  • The Stinger: In Neon, if both Billy and Jimmy are active, they will fight for Marian's affection just like the original game.
  • Stuff Blowing Up: Various explosives for everyone to throw at someone they don't like.
  • Super Drowning Skills: Water is a deadly hazard since everyone, including the Lee brothers, can't swim.
  • Super Mode: In Super, completely filling the Charge Meter activates this, which makes your attacks more damaging and instantly knock downs enemies.
  • Suplex Finisher: The Lee brothers got a German Suplex in their moveset in the third arcade game.
  • Team Shot: The ending of the third arcade game ends with a group shot of Billy and Jimmy, along with three of their allies (Chin, Oyama, and Urquidez). The same art was actually used as the basis for the cover illustration of the Famicom version, only with Oyama and Urquidez replaced with Yagyu.
  • Temple of Doom: The final stages of I and II. The NES version of the latter had a more literal Temple of Doom.
  • Theme Music Power-Up: The final battle in the original arcade game (and in some of its ports and remakes) uses the title theme as background music, as does Return of Double Dragon (but not Super Double Dragon). Once the final boss of the second NES game is low on health, the creepy theme is replaced by a more epic theme.
  • There Was a Door: Abobo has a habit of breaking through walls, particularly in the first arcade game. Likewise, the twin purple Burnovs in Mission 4 of the second arcade game debut in a similar fashion.
  • Third-Option Adaptation: In the first arcade game, if two players defeat the final boss together, the game will force them to fight each other to determine which of the Lee brothers wins over Marian. The last player standing naturally gets a kiss from Marian. However, she chooses neither in Advance, stopping the fight just as one of them is about to finish the other.
  • Treacherous Advisor: Hiruko in Double Dragon 3.
  • Throw a Barrel at It: The oildrums, along with cardboard boxes and giant rocks, can be picked up and thrown by both, the player and certain enemies (depending on the game, but usually Rowper always uses them).
  • Took a Level in Badass: Marian in the Neo Geo game, where she's not only a selectable fighter, but is one of the higher-tier characters in the roster.
  • Tornado Move: The Mysterious Warrior has a move where he spins like a tornado with his arms outstretched. It does a ton of damage and sends you flying.
  • Turns Red: In Super, if the player performs a throw on Williams or Rowper, they will get angry and will move faster and hit harder.
  • Twist Ending: In the first game. If both Billy and Jimmy get to the end, they turn on each other to fight for the right to claim Marian.
  • Unsound Effect: The NES version of the second game gives us G*R*A*S*P in one of the cutscenes.
  • Urban Hellscape: Double Dragon takes the same premise as Final Fight but also adds in The Apunkalypse. Civilization has collapsed, making martial arts dojos the only law left in the world. Thus the twin brothers Billy and Jimmy Lee fight to clean up the streets of New York (Los Angeles in Super Double Dragon).
  • Villainous Widow's Peak: Willy in the first two arcade games.
  • Wall Jump: Added in Super. The arcade and NES versions of the third game also added a wall-jumping attack for each character.
  • Walking Shirtless Scene: Many mooks, most notably Abobo.
  • "Wanted!" Poster: In the original arcade game, the wanted posters for the first two bosses can be seen in the beginning of Mission 1, offering a reward for $10,000 each. Willy's wanted poster can be see next to the second boss's poster in Mission 3, which shows that his bounty is $100,000, ten times greater than either of the other two.
  • "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: The ending of the third NES game.
  • Wrestler in All of Us: Abobo and Burnov in the Neo Geo fighting game.
  • Wolverine Claws: Chin Seimei's weapon of choice.
  • World Tour: The third game has the protagonists traveling the world to find the MacGuffin.
  • Would Hit a Girl: Pretty much every guy in the game, from the opening intro where Williams sucker punches Marian in the gut and carries her off, to Billy and Jimmy beating the crap out of the whip-wielding Lindas.

 
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Cashing Out

Losing in Double Dragon Gaiden isn't a total loss: while your progress is lost and you need to start again from the beginning, unspent cash can be converted to tokens to unlock new features.

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