Monster (sometimes rendered as MONSTER) is a Doujinshi Fighting Game developed by 8105graphics.
With the exception of character blurbs and snippets only present in promotional material, the game has no plot note and is simply about the cast duking it out with each other. Most of the characters are some variety of Beast Man, though there is also a succubus and one human.
In terms of gameplay, Monster is a rather clunky and slow-paced entry in its genre, though it does have some interesting mechanics going for it. A defining feature of the game is its "shift" system, which brings to mind SNK vs. Capcom's Groove system. One of three "modes" can be chosen before a fight and activated during combat, each of which effects a character's abilities in different ways — "Freedom" sacrifices attack strength in exchange for granting more options for move cancelling, "Tranquility" focuses on bolstering defenses & move invincibility, and Monster emphasizes higher damage output at the cost of speed. Most notably, while these modes can be used by every character, the specifics of how their effects manifest in gameplay are unique to each character, necessitating lots of experimenting to find out how each combination works.
The game has an interesting history, in large part due to being stuck in Development Hell since its inception. It was actually tested in Japanese arcades and received a limited physical release for one of the playable (but still incomplete) builds in the mid-2000s, and it was even teased by the developers to be brought overseas at one point — one of them going so far as to maintain an English blog during the game's production, which is still accessible here
. At one point it was also planned to receive a sequel/Updated Re Release known as Monster: Ancient Cline, that would have polished the game's presentation and gameplay while adding a slew of new characters, and simplifying the shift system to simply act as a series of standardized combat buffs. Ancient Cline also received test releases in arcades, but unlike the original Monster it never got a public release of any sort, and development of both games was eventually hampered by Troubled Production as the development team dissolved.
With the project abandoned, the finished versions of both games have been relegated to Vaporware, though the aforementioned unfinished releases have been successfully archived on the internet and can still be played. In 2020, someone believed to be a former member of the original team came forth expressing some interest in revitalizing the project, possibly even leading to a playable release of Ancient Cline, but nothing has come of it yet.
Not to be confused with the the manga, the book, nor either of the films of the same name.
This game provides examples of:
- All There in the Manual: The lion's share of info on everything related to the story and the characters was only ever relayed in promotional material or external profiles.
- Assist Character: Rail's Fairy Companion, Sylph.
- Beast Man: Most of the cast are different varieties of humanoid animal people.
- Breath Weapon: Delga breathes fire for a couple of his moves.
- Bullet Time: Katze's Cat's Eye super briefly slows down time for his opponent.
- Cast from Hit Points: Othello's blood attacks cost a bit of health to use.
- Digitized Sprites: The character sprites were made this way, using 3D models that were converted into 2D sprites.
- Doppelgänger Attack: Othello's Mirage Hunter super creates afterimages of himself that will mimic his moves while it's active.
- Gratuitous English: Some of the game's flavor text and prompts are in English, and much of it is either nonsensical or grammatically questionable.
- The Hero: Katze was likely meant to be this; he features the most in promotional materials, and he's the default choice in the game's character select screen.
- My Blood Runs Hot: Othello has explosive blood.
- Power Floats: Orju levitates just above the ground.
- Running on All Fours: Othello does this for his forward walk and run.
- Spell My Name With An S: Characters' in-game romanized names largely don't match up with their Japanese spellings. For example, the katakana for Rail's name — "ライル" (Rairu) — implies that his name is actually supposed to be "Lyle" or even "Rile", but "Rail" is what they went with and it's stuck ever since.
- Stripperiffic: The main components of both Katze's and Othello's outfits are nothing but gloves, shoes, and a loincloth. Katze does at least wear a pair of shorts underneath his, but they're skin-tight and have holes in the sides to leave his hips exposed.
- Token Human: Maya is the only human in the original game's roster. Ancient Cline would have added another one with Origa.
- Why Am I Ticking?: If Othello splashes a character with his blood, he can blow them up at any time up until the effect wears off.
