JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Heritage for the Future (ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 未来への遺産, JoJo no Kimyō na Bōken Mirai e no Isan), simply called JoJo's Bizarre Adventure in the West, is an arcade game developed by Capcom based on the third part of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Stardust Crusaders. It was released on September 13, 1999, on the CPS-3 arcade system. As a revision of [JoJo's Venture], Heritage for the Future adds eight playable characters and adjusts several aspects of the game.
The game combines Capcom's trademark anime-inspired graphics, as seen in the Darkstalkers series, with the colorful characters and events of Hirohiko Araki's creation, resulting in a highly stylized and detailed visual style. It features many of the gameplay mechanics seen on previous Capcom fighting games, such as the use of power gauges for super moves, as well as a brand-new Stand Mode: a character's Stand can be summoned or dismissed at will by the player, resulting in variations in the character's move list and abilities.
Both Heritage for the Future and its earlier revision would later be ported to the Sega Dreamcast under the former's title, allowing the player to choose which revision they want to play. A special edition of the Dreamcast version named JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Heritage for the Future for Matching Service added an online mode to the game, which has since become defunct. In 2012, Heritage for the Future was ported to Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network with upscaled graphics as JoJo's Bizarre Adventure HD Ver., though this version was delisted in 2014.[8]
The basic gameplay mechanics are those of a standard fighting game: one-on-one battles consisting of two or three time-limited rounds, in which the goal is to deplete the adversary's Vitality Gauge using regular attacks and character-specific special and super moves. Special and super moves require the input of button combinations and/or accumulated energy, which is displayed in a Super Combo Gauge that increases every time damage is dealt or taken.
The game uses a simplified four-button control scheme, consisting of three attack buttons (light, medium, and heavy) and a Stand button, which switches the character's Stand Mode on or off. Pressing all three attack buttons triggers a invulnerable forward dodge; pressing the three buttons while blocking pushes the opponent back a set distance. Depending on which button is used to select a character, a different color palette will be used for that character.
Two single-player modes are available: Story Mode, which traces a character's path through a predefined series of battles and cutscenes, and Challenge Mode, which sees the player take on a series of ten battles while having to choose between health recovery and extra energy after each battle. The game's three unlockable characters can either be unlocked via time release or the game's service menu in the original arcade version; in the Dreamcast rerelease, they can be obtained by clearing Story Mode as certain characters. None of the new characters have AI, so they cannot be fought in Story or Challenge Mode.
Stand Mode
Fighting with Stand Mode on enhances a character's offensive and defensive abilities; these improvements heavily depend on the character and Stand, but the most common benefits are double jumping, absorbing residual damage when blocking special attacks, and more powerful special moves.
Stands themselves are physical extensions of their users, and thus damage and attack effects inflicted upon one carries over to its user. Like avatar/puppet-based characters in other fighting games, Stands are able to act independently of their users, allowing for several offensive gimmicks.
Most of the game's unique mechanics derive from the introduced Stand Mode. Many special moves and attacks send a combatant's Stand away from its user, making it more difficult to protect both at the same time; each character's orientation is based on their position towards their opponent, and not necessarily the opponent's Stand. If a character is damaged while their Stand is far away, the damage received is doubled. On top of the Vitality Gauge and Super Combo Gauge, there is a third gauge, the Stand Gauge, which decreases when a character's Stand is damaged and refills when Stand Mode is switched off. If this gauge is depleted, a Stand Crash occurs, leaving the character paralyzed and open to attack for a moment.
Another feature of Stands is Tandem Attack, which can be executed once a character has one stock of the Super Combo Gauge to expend. During the extended startup flash, inputs can be provided for the character's Stand; the Stand will then perform these button inputs on their own as a Program Attack, leaving the user free to do as they please and attack simultaneously. Controlling the Stand directly by performing a special move will cancel the Stand's predetermined onslaught early, however. Weapon Stand users such as Hol Horse and Joseph Joestar, who are unable to separate their Stand from themselves, can instead perform a Real Time Attack, in which most of their moves can be chained into one another until the stock is emptied.
Some characters lack the ability to enter Stand Mode, such as Mariah and Evil Incarnate Dio; these Passive Stand Users introduce their own complex and specific mechanics into the game. The two nonplayable characters that appear in the game's Story Mode (Death Thirteen and N'Doul) are either present in Stand form only or move completely independently of their Stand.
The mechanics of each Stand create strong differences between the game's characters, and force different offensive approaches for each one. This "character-dependent gameplay" style would inspire several subsequent fighting games, such as the latter entries of the Guilty Gear series (which, interestingly enough, also contains rock and pop music references).
Clashing
If certain attacks of the same strength and intensity occur at the same time and collide, clashing occurs. This only happens with characters with an Active Stand. It is hard to see this system in action as it happens very infrequently. This mechanic would later be incorporated into future JoJo games, such as All Star Battle.
In some cases, when two certain opposing special moves are performed at the very same time, a Blazing Fists Match can occur. When this happens, both combatants are prompted to rapidly tap the attack buttons to win the duel and decide who will receive damage, a feature first seen in Samurai Shodown. This feature has since been adopted and expanded in All Star Battle.
Bonus Stages and Special Battles
In some battles, special rules are applied in order to reenact certain chapters of the original manga that were unable to be adapted into the normal circumstances of the 1v1 battles.
N'Doul is not fought directly; instead, the player character finds himself on a corridor level and must reach N'Doul at the end of the level. Throughout the stage, Geb will attack, and the player must avoid the Stand's attacks by jumping or dashing.
Mannish Boy (or rather, Death Thirteen) can only be fought in Story Mode if the player clears the first five stages without using continues and while playing as one of the heroes. His attacks exploit the dream-like nature of his stage, as well as the absence of his user. Whether the player wins or loses against Death Thirteen, they are allowed to continue Story Mode.
Changes in Heritage for the Future
Every starting character from [JoJo's Venture] is available from the get-go, along with DIO and five new characters: Hol Horse, Anubis Dual-Wielding Polnareff, Mariah, Pet Shop, and a newly-playable Vanilla Ice. The names of Young Joseph (若ジョセフ) and Shadow DIO (影DIO) were changed to Proud Lineage Joseph (誇り高き血統ジョセフ) and Evil Incarnate Dio (邪悪の化身ディオ!!) respectively. In addition, four new hidden characters have been added, these being Rubber Soul, Khan, Hol Horse & Boingo, and Fearless Kakyoin. Furthermore, several of the returning characters from JoJo's Venture have new moves, such as Jotaro's new Blazing Strike variations or Polnareff's Chariot Requiem super move; other moves, such as Jotaro's Ora-Ora, are now able to be performed in the air. Additional palettes for each character have also been added to be used with the Stand button. Less significantly, Vanilla Ice's boss AI has been toned down, and Proud Lineage Joseph now wears his tank top from Battle Tendency.
Venture's menu systems have been entirely redesigned, and its Survival Mode has been replaced by a variation named Challenge Mode. Sound effects throughout the game have been added or changed, and the startup animations for super moves and Tandem Attacks have been altered. The Super Combo Gauge now resets to one stock after every round, unlike in Venture where it would keep energy between rounds. The input to perform a Guard Cancel was also slightly changed, now resembling the method seen in the Darkstalkers series.
The HD rereleases of the game support online play, including the ability to filter opponents by location and connection speed in a similar manner to newer Capcom fighting games such as Super Street Fighter IV and Marvel vs. Capcom 3. The online mode also introduces a new eight-player multiplayer mode, where players can compete for a chance to battle in the final showdown.
Jotaro removes Kakyoin's flesh bud at the hospital immediately after defeating him as an antagonist. In the manga and anime adaptations, Jotaro takes him to the Kujo household and removes the flesh bud there.
Perhaps due to programming constraints, much of each character's story is not logically explained. One example is in Kakyoin's storyline: after encountering Jotaro, his story immediately jumps to Devo without introducing his victim Polnareff in Hong Kong first.
Some character interactions and scenes were cut in the arcade version, possibly to make the pacing appropriate to a fighting game. Many of these were later introduced in the [JoJo's Bizarre Adventure (PlayStation)|PlayStation port]'s Super Story Mode.
Many character-altering injuries were downplayed or outright cut, such as with Polnareff and Iggy.
The playable villains have very different storylines from the manga in Story Mode. Most minor villains turn on Dio in their storylines, while Dio himself must face a surviving Avdol and Iggy in his storyline.
New scenarios were also written for Fearless Kakyoin, explaining his lengthy hospital stay as a result of Mannish Boy's revenge, and Proud Lineage Joseph, explaining his appearance as a result of Alessi's Stand ability.
Midler is seen with a new character design as the result of a collaboration between Araki and Capcom. She has been drawn by Araki with this new design ever since.
DIO's explosive death is more violent in the game, as only his bloodied lower torso is left. In the manga and anime, his upper torso remains, sans his decimated head.
Localization
The game's English localization changes the names of several characters to avert possible legal issues. Most of these localized names have never been used since.
Proud LineageJoseph (誇り高き血統ジョセフ) was shortened to JoJo (inadvertently making him the titular character).
Devo the Cursed was renamed to D'bo, the Cursed One.
Vanilla Ice was renamed to Iced.
Chaka was renamed to Chaca.
Alessi was renamed to Alessy.
Mariah was renamed to Mahrahia.
Oingo and Boingo were renamed to Oing and Voing.
Rubber Soul was renamed to Robber Soul.
Khan was renamed to Kan.
N'Doul was renamed to N'Dool.
Holy Kujo was renamed to Holley Kujo.
J. Geil was renamed to J. Gale.
Enya was renamed to N-Yah.
In addition, the blood in the game is colored white, and DIO's defeat in Story Mode is changed to him being sent flying off-screen (where he presumably dies). Near the start of N'Doul's bonus stage, an animation of Geb reacting to the dead helicopter pilot's watch alarm and cutting off his hand has been removed,[9] and the blade of Chaka's sword is changed to a wooden brown color in every sprite it appears in. These changes, unlike the name changes, can be reverted in the arcade and HD versions by disabling the game's regulation.
While some of its sound effects have been borrowed from the Darkstalkers series, the unique sound effects used in this game have been recycled several times in other titles from Capcom, including Capcom vs. SNK 2, Capcom Fighting Evolution, Marvel vs. Capcom 2, and even the Street Fighter series.
Regarding the Darkstalkers series, Evil Incarnate Dio uses a voice filter similar to that used by one of the games' characters, Jedah Dohma (from Vampire Savior). In addition, Dio is voiced by the same voice actor as Jedah (Isshin Chiba) in this game. This adaptation is the only time Dio's voice is rendered with a filter; in all other adaptations, he speaks without any notable filters or distortions.
Some of the visual effects used in this game (particularly the sparks, dust, and super sparks) have been borrowed from Capcom's Marvel vs. series.
DIO’s Road Roller super move, which has him pummel a steamroller repeatedly until it explodes, mirrors the 1993 OVA where the tank truck DIO uses explodes after he pummels it. In the manga and anime, the steamroller does not explode.
GioGio's Bizarre Adventure, another JoJo game developed by Capcom, features an orchestral rendition of Polnareff's theme as the background music for Chapter 11-1. In addition, some cutscenes use the villain intro theme from this game's Story Mode.
The underlying mechanics of All Star Battle (and by extension, Eyes of Heaven) borrow heavily from this game. In addition, All Star Battle has two DLC costumes for Jotaro and Polnareff based on promotional material for this game.[11]
Iggy's Sand Storm super move is a reference to the Shun Goku Satsu move used by Akuma in the Street Fighter series. This is further evidenced in the game's debug mode, where an unused graphic shows the kanji for the word dog (犬, inu) stylized in a similar manner to Akuma's kanji for heaven (天, ten).
Four of the game's voice actors return to voice different characters in All Star Battle: Mitsuaki Madono (Kakyoin), Hōchū Ōtsuka (Young Joseph), Sho Hayami (Vanilla Ice), and Toru Okawa (Joseph Joestar). Madono voices Part 8's Josuke, Hōchu voices Hol Horse, Hayami voices Enrico Pucci, and Okawa voices Weather Report.
Okawa voices the narrator in the anime, and reprises his role as Weather Report in Eyes of Heaven.
The game's English logo became the de facto English logo of the JoJo franchise's games until 2014, as All Star Battle adapted the style of this game's logo. However, as of Eyes of Heaven, all English logos of the series now follow the style introduced by Crunchyroll.
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