I remembered this game as possibly the greatest beat-em-up ever. I still think the presentation is perfect, especially for 1991, and the gameplay is pretty decent. Just the number of moves you have and the variety of enemies and weapons makes it fun to play.

But I had forgotten how slow and sluggish your movements are. A lot of enemy attacks are nigh-impossible to avoid. It's also very difficult to gauge the distance between you and your enemy's grab area. Often it feels like your enemy can grab you from longer distances than you can grab them. And, when you're punching them, they'll break out of their stun and hit you somehow, even though the timing between your hits is always the same. But one of the most annoying aspects is how, when you're holding a weapon and get hit, it falls underneath you, and while you're trying to hit your enemy back, your character tries to pick up the weapon, since these two actions are done with the same button. So this always means that, if you get hit once, you have no choice but to take a whole series of hits afterwards. And you better just stand there and do nothing, cause otherwise you'll lose the weapon too.

The re-used bosses and models are also something I had never really had an issue with, but now I find annoying and lazy.

While a lot of the game is an exercise in frustration, I did finish it, which already means it wasn't bad. I actually had more fun than frustration when replaying it, and I do remember it being even more fun in co-op/hotseat.