Super Dodge Ball (Arcade)

Super Dodge Ball is the second Kunio-kun game and the first one to deviate from its beat-'em-up roots in favor of being sport-oriented.

In this game, you go on a worldwide tour playing not your typical dodgeball, but a variant where the opponents lose when they become unconscious.

Unseen Graphics#

All of the game's courts are 448x224 pixels. However, the game only shows 432x216 pixels of them, as their left, bottom and rightmost 8x8 tiles all get cut off. This is most noticeable on the Iceland (citation needed) court, where the lady penguin's "hair" flower goes totally unseen.

Regional Differences#

Copyright#

The Japanese version displays a standard export copyright notice on boot. The US version doesn't have an equivalent notice, and instead goes straight to the title screen.

Title Screen#

Japan	US

The Japanese version's title screen has Kunio, the fat-type opponent, and the heavy-type opponent behind the logo. The US version only features a greeting Kunio sitting on the logo.

Intro#

When starting the game, the Japanese version shows a sequence that's similar to the one seen in the Japanese version of the previous game; Kunio in his school uniform stands in front of Nekketsu High School, a heavy opponent character comes in and throws a ball at Kunio, and then Kunio's companion characters run after him while yelling "name konoyarou!". This introduction is not in the US version; the game simply goes to the first stage immediately.

Team Nationalities#

In the Japanese version, the player is part of the Japan team. In the US version, this was changed to the player forming part of the U.S.A team. And so the countries that the last stage takes place in were swapped and in turn, the first stage's match being between the players' school, Nekketsu High School (熱血高校) against the rivals' Hanazono High School (花園高校) was changed in the US version to be Dallas vs Chicago respectively.

Japan	US

As such, the Japanese flag seen on the U.S.A court ended up being replaced with another American flag. Two colors in the court's palette were also slightly tweaked; the odd pink color was replaced with an orange that better blends in with the rest of the tileset, and the brightest blue color was made darker.

Characters#

Japan	US

The hair of the player's companion characters was changed from light brown to blonde.

Additionally, in the Japanese version, Kunio says "namennayo" when performing jumping super throws. In the US version, he instead does the same grunt sound that's heard from the heavy-type opponents, but the opponents in the Japan stage still say the quote.

Post-Stage 1 Screen#

'...But what does it mean?' This game has text or audio that needs to be translated. If you are fluent with this language, please read our translation guidelines and then submit a translation!

Exclusively in the Japanese version, there's a screen that is shown after completing the first stage and just before the intermission sequence with Kunio's team taking off on a plane. It shows a newspaper mentioning Kunio and his team.

Ending#

Japan	US

The person who hands the trophy to the player's team in the Japanese version is a Superman-like guy who flies into the area. This wouldn't really make sense with the final stage now being set in Japan (that and potential legal issues), so he was changed into a ninja that teleports into place and walks over to the team.

Japan	US

The trophy itself was changed from a regular-looking one to an oversized shuriken. Also, in the Japanese version, it has two sprites: a vertical one when it's being held by the Superman lookalike and a diagonal one when it's held by Kunio. In the US version, the two tiles for the vertical sprite and the other two for the diagonal one were merged to form the single sprite of the shuriken.

Revisional Differences#

This page or section needs more images. There's a whole lotta words here, but not enough pictures. Please fix this. Specifically: Add comparison screenshots.

In the Arcade Archives re-release, the Red Cross symbol that originally appeared in the angel sprite that denotes a defeated character was turned into a black latin cross, due to the Geneva Conventions.