Capcom’s Red Earth Was A Fighting Game Ahead Of Its Time

As the games industry is constantly remaking, remastering and reissuing classic games in bundles, collections and compilations, it’s worth remembering that not every trip down memory lane is a worthwhile one. Sometimes it’s nice to revel in the nostalgia, while in other cases noticeable issues or dating graphics and gameplay rear their ugly head, forcing you to remove those rose coloured glasses.

Fortunately, one genre that seems to avoid dating more than the others is the 2D fighter. There’s something about excellent sprite work and solid mechanics that’s more timeless than first person shooter, platformers and other classic gaming genres. There’s no better proof of this than the Capcom Fighting Collection, with ten excellent fighting games (okay, nine and a versus puzzle game, but still) that feel like they haven’t aged a day.

Still, as much as the collection seems to be about renewing interest in the Darkstalkers franchise, there’s one game that sticks out as a particular highlight in an already stellar collection: Red Earth. An admittedly obscure fighting game, Red Earth deserves particular mention just because of the fact this is the first time that the game has ever been ported to consoles. Despite launching in arcades in 1996, Red Earth had never made its way to PC or consoles outside of emulation until this collection.

A departure from the usual multiplayer focused fighting games (there were versus modes available, but still), Red Earth feels more like a fighting game RPG. Players pick from one of four different characters and embark on a quest around the world to defeat evil monsters and ultimately save the kingdom from the grasp of a tyrannical wizard.

On its own, Red Earth doesn’t exactly sound revolutionary, but it goes the extra mile in a lot of ways. Firstly, each character has their own story, with unique endings and even choices during their campaign. While the bosses and fights are the same, the order and context behind them all, along with the cutscenes and conversations before each fight, are drastically different for each of the four playable characters. For a fighting game in 1996, that’s pretty ahead of its time.

As for the RPG mechanics, players gain experience and levels as they deal damage to their foes, complete fights and perform well in mini-games. These level ups in turn lead to additional buffs to your resistance to certain elemental attacks, or can even grant the character new moves. All of this ties into a password system which means that players can make a note of their password after every fight and carry on their progress the next time they play.

Considering how I’ve waxed lyrical in the past about how much I love fighting games with excellent single player modes, Red Earth intrigues me more than any other fighting game in the Capcom Fighting Collection. Capcom fighting games have never been one for including huge amounts of single player content, so a game like Red Earth seems massively out of their wheelhouse.

Elsewhere in Japan during 1996, Namco were also developing the PS1 port of their successful 3D fighter, Soul Blade, which would go on to become the Soulcalibur series. Soul Blade featured traditional fighting, along with a mode called Edge Master that felt more like an RPG. You’d move around a map, complete fights with certain handicaps and obtain new weapons. If anything, it was a more in-depth Red Earth.

It’s interesting to see how Capcom progressed from the release of Red Earth. Most of their fighting games would focus more on tight mechanics while offering the standard fare of modes (arcade, training, time trial and survival if you were lucky). Meanwhile, most Namco games would feature big RPG-esque modes, with Soulcalibur 2’s Weapon Master and SC3’s Chronicles of the Soul modes. Even Tekken 5 had its own, fully fledged 3D beat ‘em up in Devil Within. It wasn’t very good, but it existed.

The closest we’ve come to a mode that truly exemplifies the concepts put forward by a game like Red Earth is Soulcalibur VI’s Libra of Soul mode, which manages to become a proper RPG with leveling mechanics, dialogue options, player creation, weapon upgrades and more, while still revolving around the game’s core fighting mechanics and gameplay.

Now, it feels like Capcom are going back to ideas like Red Earth in the creation of Street Fighter 6. The developers have already promised a World Tour mode which will see players create their own avatar, explore different environments and engage in fights with various characters. It sounds a hell of a lot like Capcom’s own take on the Libra of Soul mode, and if Red Earth is anything to go by, the World Tour mode could be an all time great fighting game mode.

Including Red Earth in the Capcom Fighting Collection is proof of why I’ll always appreciate smart remasters and retro collections. Giving a relatively unknown game the chance to flourish again is always great, especially with a game that feels so genuinely ahead of its own time like Red Earth. Hopefully, with the path that Street Fighter 6 appears to be taking, Capcom will be taking more influence from Red Earth with their fighting games going forward.

READ MORE: 17 Best Switch Fighting Games You Should Play