OG Flyer featuring Ramaya, Sinbat and Goldor
Arabian Fight is a 1992 Beat 'em Up "Arabian Nights" Days-themed arcade game developed by Sega.
In an unnamed Middle-Eastern medieval kingdom, the princess, Lurana, has been kidnapped by an Evil Wizard named Sazabiss, and four heroes are sent on a quest to save her:
- Sinbat (yes, that's how it's spelled), a young sailor seeking adventure, intending to rescue the princess for the fame and glory that follows;
- Ramaya, a warrior priestess who had a secret backstory with the princess and her own personal reasons for joining the quest;
- Goldor, a retainer from the Sultan's guards assigned to the task;
- Datta, a Shaolin-esque monk who somehow ended up in the Middle East.
The game is often compared with Taito's Arabian Magic, another Middle-Eastern-themed arcade actioner released in 1992. Both games actually shared a lot, a lot of overlapping tropes, as you can see in the list below...
Arabian Fight contain examples of:
- Action Girl: Ramaya, the woman in the playable roster, is as much of a fighter as the men in the group.
- Airborne Mook: The winged lizard-people and mooks riding on flying carpets during the carpet chase stage, who will pursue you in an attempt to knock you to your death.
- All Monks Know Kung-Fu: Datta the kung-fu fighting monk certainly does.
- Barbarous Barbary Bandits: The stage on a slave galley have you facing Middle Eastern slavers, culminating in a boss battle against their captain, Shoul-der.
- Bedlah Babe: Ramaya the priestess is dressed like one, and unsurprisingly she's the one character most remembered from this game.
- Big Bad: The Evil Wizard Sazabiss who abducted Princess Lurana for a Human Sacrifice ritual, and uses his magic to summon monsters, create sandstorms, and revive legions of undead in the tombs to hinder your progress.
- "Blind Idiot" Translation: The English translation of the game is way off in this one, especially in the "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue scene after the Final Boss. To the point where it's migraine-inducing..
- Sinbat added to his bounty are treasures captured during the journey. Thereafter, his soldier of fortune life continued and a book describing it under the title of "Arabian Fight: Sinbat's Adventures" was published, and is said to have become a best seller.
- Bonus Stage: There are stages between levels which contains no enemies, with areas filled with crates, barrels, objects and assorted stuff you can destroy for points within 30 seconds. On multiplayer mode one can challenge their friends to destroy the most amount of objects for scores.
- Booze Flamethrower: The fire-breather boss from the market, who will occasionally grab his liquor bottle, take a swig, and breathe a stream of flames that does higher damage than kicking or punching.
- Breakout Character: The only character in this game which is still remembered is Ramaya, due to her being the resident Ms. Fanservice. Sega seems aware of it, too, giving Ramaya a spot in their Sega Gals Collection and a guest appearance in Sega Ages as score card girl. As well as her own plastic minifigure
alongside other Sega chicks. - Collapsing Lair: In the final stage, after Sazabiss is defeated, his fortress then begins collapsing, followed by a cutscene of the four heroes - and Princess Lurana - fleeing from the area as everything crashes, followed by a brief clip of the five of them watching from a safe distance.
- Damsel in Distress: Princess Lurana, who gets kidnapped by Sazabiss in the backstory, kicking off the game's events.
- Deadly Dust Storm: The desert stage have a desert storm occurring just as you're in the middle of fighting various enemies, including two bosses, one at a time, with most of the difficulty coming from the storm obscuring the screen.
- Degraded Boss:
- The first three bosses - El-bow the burly mercenary, Captain Shoul-der of the slave galley, and the fire-breather from the market level - returns, all three at a time, as a Wolfpack Boss right before you fight Sazabiss.
- Also, the fire-breather boss comes back in later stages as an Elite Mook enemy, with slightly slower firing rate and a fraction of the health.
- The Lizard-man and Snake-woman boss from the desert encounter comes back in the final stage as minor enemies summoned by Sazabiss.
- Dem Bones: Skeletons shows up in the desert, the derelict ship and the crypts as a recurring foe.
- Dual Wield: One of the recurring mook varieties wield twin scimitars in combat, and can perform rapid slashes with both blades if left idle for a while.
- Interface Screw: The game does this in multiple instances. One stage have you crossing a desert and being caught in a dust storm, and to simulate that effect the screen immediately becomes cluttered with pixelated sand. There's also the fight in the palace where dark magic at work makes the entire screen go cloudy and obscuring your vision, and when the fire-breather decide to spam his flames... covering the foreground preventing you from even seeing your player.
- Living Drawing: While exploring the pyramid stage, the hieroglyphs in the background can come to life and attack you.
- Living Shadow: In the final stage, there's a chamber where the shadows of your character(s) get animated by Sazabiss' magic and starts attacking you. Unlike most other examples of this trope, you can actually defeat the animated shadows by punching and kicking.
- Lizard Folk: A Lizard-Man (who crawls on all fours, unlike other examples of this trope) is the first boss encountered in the desert. Later on there are winged lizard-men attacking during the flying carpet chase, and degraded copies of the lizard-man boss in the last stage.
- Magic Carpet: There's a few stages where you get on a flying carpet, only to be attacked by mooks on similar carpets in an aerial chase.
- Ms. Fanservice: Ramaya wears a short blouse that exposes her midriff and cleavage, and wears a loincloth that shows off her legs.
- Multi-Armed and Dangerous: There are animated Hindu statues with four limbs in the temples, each of them armed with multiple scimitars to attack your characters.
- Mummy: Another enemy in the desert and tomb stages, revived by Sazabiss to deal with your heroes.
- Punny Name: The first boss is El-bow, the mercenary leader. And the second is Captain Shoul-der, who leads the slavers. Elbow and shoulder, get it?
- Snake People: While crossing the desert, one of the bosses you need to fight is a giant snake-woman who slithers all over the place and attempt to shoot you with poisoned arrows. Later on degraded copies of the snake-woman reappear as minor enemies in the final stage.
- Spin Attack: The player heroes all have a special spinning move that knocks enemies around them off their feet, with varying range.
- Storybook Opening: The game's opening cinematics is depicted as an unfolding Quran, before segueing into the game's title screen.
- "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: After the Final Boss, Sazabiss, is defeated, and the heroes have returned the Princess back to the Sultan, the game then throws an animated clip detailing what happened to the four heroes years after:
- Sinbat continues his journey as a sailor, his reputation bolstered by the fame he attained from rescuing the Princess. After spending an unknown amount of time on the seas, he returns home and wrote his adventures in a book titled, "Arabian Fight: Sinbat's Adventures"...
- Ramaya, revealed to be the Princess' sister, married into royalty three years later, dominating the land as a wise queen;
- Goldor was promoted by the Sultan from a mere retainer in the army to the Captain. But as he couldn't stop bragging over his escapades, he was ultimately demoted back to a retainer (you know, the rank he was at the start of the game?); and...
- Datta continues his journey Walking the Earth and 40 years later, is the head of his own temple where he teaches martial arts to the public.
