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'Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn' lives up to the quality of the original

By Tanner Kinney Disclaimer: This review is of the PC version and was conducted on a PC with an Nvidia GeForce GTX 960, i7, 8GBs of RAM. Shaq Fu is sort of a legend in gaming culture. This bizarre 16-bit fighting game featured East-Asian culture, mysticism, magic, and Shaquille O'Neal in the middle of it all. If that at all seems interesting, the more interesting part is that the game is completely irredeemable. Shaq Fu was buggy, slow, unfair, and easily one of the worst fighting games of the 16-bit era, possibly of all time. Yet, its infamy garnered a significant following among an internet culture obsessed with ironic enjoyment of things. So, in March 2014, at the height of a fundraising craze sparked by Mighty No. 9, Big Deez Production (yes, that’s the real name) launched an Indiegogo campaign to create the long-awaited sequel, Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn. $473,000 and four years later, it was finally released. The best thing that can be said is that it is better than the original. But that’s a bar so low, it’s buried underneath Shaq’s wine cellar. This game doesn’t deserve to be graded on a curve.

One-button gameplay for a one-note game

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Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn Double Dragon Streets of Rage Castle Crashers Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn
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Castle Crashers, play Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn

Horribly dated writing, music, and art style

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Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn Castle Crashers,
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Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn four years ago

Laughable length that overstays its welcome

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Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back, Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn
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