Sonic Blast Man is a series of video games created by Taito. It first began in the arcades where you play as the titular superhero in a "Test Your Strength" style game where you must punch targets by hitting a pad hard enough. Each target will have a certain amount of resistance, and you're only allowed three hits. It came to the SNES in the form of a Beat 'em Up with the arcade's levels being treated like bonus stages after each round. Both versions of the game got a sequel, which are Real Puncher, featuring a redesigned punching bag, new characters and scenarios, also the ability to take pictures of yourself via the mounted digital camera above the screen to "punch yourself", but only released in Japan and Europe possibly because of not meeting American safety standards, and Sonic Blast Man II, featuring new characters and improving the gameplay mechanics.
No relation to a certain blue insectivore, or even one of his games.
This game has the following tropes:
- Absurdly-Spacious Sewer: The third stage.
- Action Girl: Sonia in the second game.
- Adaptation Expansion: The bonus stages in the first SNES game are the actual arcade game.
- Alien Invasion: The second game on the SNES has you facing off against an invading alien race known as the Yafu empire.
- Battleship Raid: The last stage of Sonic Blast Man 2 for the SNES.
- Bowdlerise: The Japanese version of the first game had you fighting female thugs. The were replaced with male thugs in the overseas versions.
- Color-Coded Multiplayer/Competitive Balance: In the second game only:
- Sonia: Fragile Speedster
- Sonic Blast Man: Jack of All Stats
- Captain Choyear: Mighty Glacier
- Evil Twin: Heavy Blast Man, who's featured in both SNES games.
- Elemental Powers: Fire for Sonia and Electricity for Captain Choyear.
- General Gaming Gamepads: The arcade games used the punch pads.
- Giant Enemy Crab: Sonic Blast Man had one as the Level 4 enemy. This one was particularly horrifying since it could crush SBM to death with its claws even after losing them.
- Kick Chick: Sonia.
- Mecha-Mooks: The fourth stage in the first game.
- Megaton Punch: His speciality.
- Nonstandard Character Design: The second boss of the second SNES game looks more like something from a Mega Man game.
- Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs: One of Sonic Blast Man's Finishing Moves.
- Reformulated Game: The original arcade's gameplay wouldn't work well for consoles, so they made it a Final Fight styled Beat 'em Up instead with the 5 arcade stages being bonus rounds by mashing the D-pad and pressing the button.
- Superman Substitute: Sonic Blast Man is a rather generic one, especially in the arcade editions.
- Turns Red: The third boss in the second game.
- When All You Have Is a Hammer…: Sonic Blast Man proves that all problems can be solved through gratuitous use of the 100-Megaton Punch. Gangster stealing a lady's purse? Hit him with a right cross through the jaw. Meteor threatening the Earth? Body-blow that sucker straight out of orbit.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: The third boss of the second game foolishly leads you to the jungle base in retreat. When you reach the fourth boss, he turns him into a frog and gets eaten by a T-Rex.
