World Heroes features a scientist named Dr. Brown who discovers the secret of time travel and decides the absolute best use for this monumental breakthrough is to yank historical figures from across time and make them beat each other senseless in a tournament to determine who is strongest. Proof, if ever it were needed, that great power does not always come with great responsibility.

There are vague rumblings of an evil corporation pulling the strings, led by a man named Zeus, and if you’ve played Neo Geo Battle Colosseum, you’ll probably recognize the final boss, Neo Dio, who is sadly not of the JoJo variety. The story is about as barebones as fighting game plots tended to be at the time, delivered through a brief intro cutscene and character endings, which is really all it needs.

If you haven’t gathered already, the roster here is wonderfully unhinged. There are 19 playable characters in total, three of which were originally locked boss characters. Beyond the previously mentioned Rasputin and Jeanne d’Arc, you’ve got a pirate named Captain Kidd, a Viking called Erick, a surprisingly punk rock looking Jack the Ripper, and the gloriously Real American coded Muscle Bomber. Heck, even Son Wukong from Journey to the West shows up. Yes, Dr. Brown creating a time machine solely to assemble this tournament remains an objectively terrible use of scientific progress, but my God, the man had excellent taste in roster picks.

The roster is easily my favourite part of World Heroes Perfect (Neo-Geo Premium), and the fact this re-release unlocks Zeus, Son Gokuu, and Neo Dio for both single player and multiplayer is a massive bonus, adding even more to an already delightfully odd cast. Massive props, once again, to the person who looked at Street Fighter II and decided what the world really needed was a game where a robot Nazi could square up against an American football player named Johnny Maximum. It’s quirky, it’s bizarre, and yes, it gets my seal of approval.

World Heroes Perfect feels rather floaty and chunky, for want of a better description, especially when compared to something like Street Fighter II. It’s much closer in feel to other SNK titles like Fatal Fury and Art of Fighting, so if you’ve played either of those, you’ll have a rough idea of what to expect. The pace is noticeably slower, inputs have a bit more delay to them, and jumping feels like everyone trained on the moon before showing up. It lacks the buttery smoothness you’d associate with many modern fighting games, particularly ones not developed by NetherRealm Studios.

That’s not to say it plays badly, quite the opposite, it just takes some adjustment if you’re coming in from other fighters. It uses a four button layout, with light and medium punches and kicks mapped directly, while heavy attacks are performed by pressing both corresponding buttons at once, so both punches for a heavy punch, both kicks for a heavy kick. It feels a little odd at first, but once it clicks, it fits the game’s deliberate pacing surprisingly well.

You’ve got all the things you’d expect from the genre here: super moves, desperation moves, and basic combo systems. Granted, this is a 1995 release, so we’re still relatively early in fighting game history, but World Heroes Perfect holds up surprisingly well. The real selling point, though, is the sheer absurdity of the concept paired with the fact that it’s actually a genuinely fun game to play. It’s one of the better Street Fighter/Fatal Fury imitators, elevated by a completely bonkers premise and a roster whose special moves often feel just as unhinged as the characters themselves.

This re-release also brings over the quality of life improvements introduced in previous Neo-Geo Premium titles like Real Bout Fatal Fury 2: The Newcomers and Kizuna Encounter: Super Tag Battle. That means rollback netcode for online multiplayer, an extensive concept art gallery, and a genuinely robust training mode complete with frame data, which is basically the minimum requirement for getting a fighting game noticed in 2026.

Visually, this game is a gorgeous showcase of the Neo-Geo’s sprite work at its finest. It looks fantastic in motion, with crisp animation and some of my favourite stage designs in the genre. The wonderfully oddball nature of the roster seeps into the arenas as well, giving each stage plenty of personality, and it never fails to get a smile out of me.

This new port of World Heroes Perfect is easily the best way to experience this cult fighting game series. Code Mystics has once again put together an excellent package for both longtime fans and curious newcomers, giving players the chance to take this gloriously strange brawler online against others. My only hope is that, somewhere down the line, we get a full console bundle of the entire series with cross play support so we can properly flesh out the player pool and, more importantly, force each other into endless Rasputin vs. Rasputin mirror matches.