Primal
Rage
STORY:
Before there
were humans, gods walked the earth. They embodied the essence of Hunger,
Survival, Life, Death, Insanity, Decay, Good, and Evil. They fought countless
battles up through the Mesozoic Wars. Then Balsafas, an arch mage from a
parallel dimension, anticipated the threat that Earth's gods posed. He
was not powerful enough to kill the gods, so instead he banished one to
a rocky tomb within the moon. This disrupted the fragile balance between
the gods; pandemonium ensued, and a great explosion threw clouds of volcanic
dust into the atmosphere. The dinosaurs died out, and the surviving gods
went into suspended animation. Now, the impact of a huge meteor strikes
the Earth. Its destructive force wipes out civilization, rearranges the
continents, and frees the imprisoned gods.
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Primal
Rage character selection screen.
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REVIEW: Releasing in arcades in 1994, Primal Rage is a unique 2D fighting game created using 3D clay models and stop motion animation, all animated by hand. The game's playable characters are giant
prehistoric creatures known as "gods" to the humans. While the
"gods" are fighting, human
tribesmen
wander nearby and worship their gods during battle... the giant beasts can toss the humans around or even feast on them to regain strength.
In addition, eating
your opponent's humans will add to your score, while eating your own will
penalize the player. 
Pretty twisted... yeah? In any case, Primal Rage was definitely a "head-turning" arcade fighting game in 1994, followed by fairly decent console ports.
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Jurassic Park meets
Mortal Kombat.
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Primal Rage
plays similarly to other 2D fighting games of the mid 90's, especially Mortal
Kombat. The game has a noticeably "slower" pace than some, but features fundamental mechanics and a combo system that's easy to understand. Like Mortal Kombat, each fighter has their staple
priority attacks, throws and special moves, in addition to a unique fatality AKA "Domination" move.
Unlike
most fighting games, where special moves are performed by moving the joystick - followed by pressing one or more buttons, Primal Rage's control scheme
requires the player to hold down attack buttons, then perform the joystick
movements. Later revisions of the arcade version enabled the ability to perform
special moves the more traditional 2D fighting game way, with motion followed by button presses...
but kept the original method in place as well.
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Apparently not the giant
ape.
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Also a technique borrowed
from
Mortal Kombat, the game's animation was stop-motion captured by hand (using a similar technique to how Midway animated Goro in MK1). The result is a very unique animation style, making Primal Rage look unlike any other fighting game. The overall graphics of Primal Rage were definitely eye-catching for a 1994 arcade game, but
unfortunately most home
ports didn't live up to the original arcade version, visually. In the 16-bit console ports, the character sprites were a much lower resolution and lacked the most impressive details from the arcade version. However, the 32-bit faired much better in visuals / animation. The home versions also featured exclusive bonus games like human volleyball and "human bowling".  Gotta give the devs some credit for their twisted sense of humor...
Primal Rage achieved a fair amount of success at arcades and
retained its popularity when it was ported to a variety of home consoles. A
sequel was actually planned (Primal Rage 2), but Atari games abandoned
the project in fear that the game wouldn't make a profit. A few test cabinets of
Primal Rage 2 were actually created, and rare footage of the prototype
game can be found on YouTube.
The canceled sequel featured giant "human" gods who could turn into various
beasts during gameplay.
FUN FACTS:
 Similarly to
the Mortal Kombat series, Primal Rage sparked some mainstream controversy at the time due to its level of violence and gore. Even though Primal Rage featured blood, Fatalities, and vore, the game was originally rated "T" for Teen by the ESRB.
Eventually, the game was withdrawn by the developers, then re-programmed and re-released numerous times. The later versions of Primal Rage featured a toggle switch for "Gore" or "No Gore"
— disabling all blood and Fatalities.
In 1996, a grassroots campaign led by Ellie Rovella was launched in protest of the Genesis version's "golden shower" fatality. This campaign resulted in Best Buy pulling the game from over 250 stores across the United States of America. After Atari Games re-released an
updated version, Best Buy put the game back on the shelves... except for the
Genesis version, which they stated they would only sell if it received an "M for Mature" rating. However, most home versions of the game contain all the same fatalities and gore as the Genesis version.
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| Page Updated: |
February
27th, 2023 |
| Developer(s): |
Atari Games
Probe Software Console
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| Publisher(s): |
Atari
Games
Time Warner Int. Console
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| Designer(s): |
Jason Leong Animator / Sketches
Dan Plat 3D Models
Ken Humphries Producer
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| Platform(s): |
Arcade, PlayStation, Sega Saturn, Sega Genesis, Game Gear, 32X, 3DO, Super Nintendo,
Game Boy, Jaguar CD, MS-DOS
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| Release Date(s): |
August 1994  Arcade
Aug. 25th, 1995 SNES, Genesis, GG, GB, MS-DOS
November 1995  SNES, Genesis, GG, GB,
MS-DOS
December 1995 Atari Jaguar CD
1995
/ PS1, Saturn, 32X
1996
PS1, 32X
1998
Saturn
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| Characters: |
Armadon, Blizzard,
Chaos, Diablo,
Sauron, Talon,
Vertigo |
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Featured Video:
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| Related Games: |
Mortal Kombat,
Mortal Kombat 2,
Mortal Kombat 3,
MK3 Ultimate, Killer Instinct,
Killer Instinct 2,
Killer Instinct Gold, Samurai Shodown 2, Street
Fighter: The Movie, Super
Street Fighter 2 Turbo,
Samurai Shodown 3,
Samurai Shodown 4,Tekken, World
Heroes 2 Jet, X-Men: Children of the Atom, Darkstalkers,
Golden Axe: The Duel,
Mace: The Dark Age,
WeaponLord
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Gameplay
Engine
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6.5 / 10
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Story
/ Theme
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8.5 / 10
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Overall
Graphics
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7.5 / 10
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Animation
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8.0 / 10
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Music
/ Sound Effects
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7.0 / 10
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Innovation
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9.0 / 10
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Art Direction
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7.0 / 10
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Customization
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4.0 / 10
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Options / Extras
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6.5 / 10
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Intro / Presentation
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6.5 / 10
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Replayability / Fun
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6.5 / 10
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"Ouch" Factor
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6.0 / 10
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Characters
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6.5 / 10
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BOTTOM LINE
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6.8
/
10
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Review based on Arcade
version
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| Final
Words: |
Primal Rage
was pretty metal. Who would'a thunk the company behind a wholesome, family-friendly game like Asteroids would put out such a violent, borderline-disturbing fighting game?  As a lover of many 2D fighters in the 90's, "Dinosaurs VS Giant Apes: The Game
+ Eating Humans" never really peaked my interest... even as young teenager. lol. But for some
reason, I still (quietly) slipped quite a few tokens into that Primal Rage
arcade cabinet back in the day
(notably at smaller arcades that didn't have better fighting games or because the stick / buttons were broken on those).
In fairness, Primal Rage was a pretty unique fighting game... and no doubt a "technical feat" at the time. While Primal Rage was visually and conceptually unique, the simplistic gameplay and overall gimmick seemed to have a lower ceiling than most other successful fighting games of the mid 90's (and those releasing short after). Simply
put, I remember feeling Primal Rage just wasn't as "fun" or replayable as other comparable fighting games at the time.
It seemed like
the game's principle goal was to "turn
heads" at the arcades and stand out as something completely different; (rather than be a fighting game dedicated players would enjoy playing for years, competitively). Still, Primal
Rage
succeeded in what it set out to be. It was an interesting change of pace to the
typical mid-90's 2D fighting
game, but the long term lasting appeal just wasn't there.
The fact that the sequel, Primal Rage 2, never released also killed whatever potential this game had. It also didn't help that there
were only 7 playable characters (which included 2 sprite clones).  Other than that, I had some good times playing and watching Primal Rage at arcades.
~TFG
Webmaster | @Fighters_Gen
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