Killer Instinct and Primal Rage comic books. Why? - A 1UP classic from December 8, 2010

While digging through the comic book collection to share with the little gal I came across a few odd comics that probably won't impress her very much, but for older gamers represent the fighting game hype of the mid 1990's. Street Fighter II brought arcades back to life and inspired countless clones from Japan and abroad. Gamers couldn't wait to try out the latest illegal hack for SF II in liquor stores, or the next big fighter from the USA in arcades. Studios learned that money could be made not only from the games but also from licensing. The demand for anything with a fighting character was great enough to see characters turn up on cheap plastic toys, games, puzzles, clothing and even comic books. The marriage of the two sub cultures, gaming and comics goes way back to the days of the Atari comics in the early 80's. I dug out two comics that were particular to their niche.

The Killer Instinct comic was published by Armada (who?) and most notable because the art was by Bart Sears, one of my favorite comic book artists, and used advances in computer coloring and effects. The series, like most fighting game-turned-comic books, featured fan-favorite characters performing signature moves. The popular "Combo Breaker" was even performed in one of the battles in the first issue. The toughest part for any fighting game comic to pull off is weaving a story that connects all of the game characters and then placing them in a universe that frames the game world. Whether the KI comic succeeded in this is open to debate. I liked the art and took the random story as an afterthought.

Even fighting games with cult-like followings managed to get their own comic book. Sirius published the four-part Primal Rage comic, revolving less around the dinosaur characters that made the games great and instead around the human avatars that Atari was pushing for in the never-released sequel. The story was more fantasy than the arcade title had led gamers to believe and the art and coloring were sub-par.

The only reason I picked up the comic was to take a look at the character designs for PR II. Aside from the fan value there was little else behind most fighting game comic books. What about you, do you have any lemons in your collection that you'd like to share?

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