Sinful City

Sinful City is a Japanese fighting game developed by and published by  on June 8, 2008. The game was originally a exclusive, but due to good sales, it was later ported to PC and released on. The overwhelming and unexpected success of the series eventually spawned a series of games.

Gameplay
Like Arc System Works' other games, Sinful City is a 2D fighter. Fights are split into three timed rounds, with a "best two out of three" system placed in. In order to win a round, the player must either reduce their opponent's health to zero or have more health than them by the end of the round. Every character in the game has a very light, light, hard, and very hard attack, with light attacks being faster but doing less damage while hard attacks are slower but do more damage. However, all attacks can be charged by holding the button used to perform them, which makes them deal slightly more damage. While charging attacks, an additional bar will appear below the health bar, indicating how charged up the attack is. The bar can be filled three times, with damage increasing each time it fills up.

Characters also have a dash ability that allows them to quickly move forwards towards the opponent and backwards to dodge an incoming attack. By combining light and hard attacks (and sometimes also dashes) in a specific order, the characters will perform special attacks which do much more damage than traditional attacks. However, if the character is damaged while performing a special then their special will be cancelled and the character will be temporarily stunned. It is also possible to block incoming attacks and if the player blocks at the moment an attack collides they will perform a "Perfect Block Counter", where the character will counter attack the opponent. However, if the character is hit too much while blocking then their block will break, which will also stun them.

A more powerful form of specials also exists referred to as an Ultimate Attack, with it being represented by a bar at the bottom of the screen that slowly fills up each time the character takes damage, which encourages players to defeat the opponent as fast as possible in fear of accidentally filling the bar up. When it is full, the player/opponent may then perform a cinematic attack which is far more powerful than all of their other attacks. Like the charged attacks, the Ultimate Attack bar can be filled up three times, with the attack becoming longer and dealing more damage based on how full it is.

Plot
The setting of Sinful City is based heavily on 1920s-40s America, though it is actually set in a dystopian future. In this future, the only city left in the United States is a massive one, the entire state of New York. However, citizens have forgotten the name of the city and instead of begun referring to it as "The Sinful City". In this city, crime is high, moral is low, and the only people who have it good are the rich and influential. A mysterious event only ever referred to as "The Incident" has also rendered most of the city a dangerous place to live in, swarming with bizarre forces, whether they be supernatural, technological, or otherwise, who all either come to or travel through the city for their own goals and purposes.

The story mode of the game is unique in comparison to other fighting games' stories, with the player being presented with a character select screen and being allowed to choose whose story they wish to play through. However, all of these stories are canon and happen on the same day, with the player being allowed to choose what order they see the story in. As a reward for completing all characters' stories, a new option on the character select titled "Endgame" is unlocked, which is around 2-3 hours long and shows the true ending of the game. This non-linear approach to story telling would become a staple of the series, which subsequent games following track.

Characters
Playable Non-Playable
 * U.S.A., the main protagonist of the game and the protagonist of most of its sequels. Uriah Samuel Armstrong is a travelling trucker from unknown parts who traveled to the Sinful City in search for his missing sister. While there, he uncovers the truth about his mysterious past.
 * Giovanni, the son of the biggest crime lord in the city and is constantly in his father's shadow. He and the rest of his family have the mystic ability to turn their own emotions into physical energy, with Giovanni specializing in manipulating his own malice.
 * Satsuki, the last person alive who trains in the "Path of the Open Palm" martial art technique. She has traveled to the Sinful City in search of a strong husband to have children and keep her art alive.
 * Akuma Kuma, a professional wrestler living in the Sinful City who always wears a cloak and mask designed to look like a bear. While attempting to entertain his fans, he is accidentally dragged into the greater secrets and conspiracies of the city.
 * Sammy & Yarum, a man and a demon who is stuck to him. Sammy is a feminine-looking man who forcibly had the demon Yarum attached to him when he was young. Now an adult, the two travel to the city in search of a way to separating from each other.
 * Dandelion, a mysterious vigilante in a completely black outfit who has made it his mission to battle the criminals of the Sinful City. However, he is also hunted by police for these actions.
 * Ashley, an android and the second in command of the Governor. She does her best to keep the city running, but things have gotten increasingly more chaotic under her watch. Now, under threat of destruction, she does her best to keep order in the city.
 * Scarlet Remy, a former mob enforcer working for the Baldini Mob who has developed a mysterious disease that is slowly mutating his body. Now, he spends his time burglarizing and murdering his way to a cure.
 * 5-Alive, an android created as a member of the "Coppers", a series of robotic police officers. After a failed case, he has begun questioning his role in the world, which has caused stress among his superiors and peers.
 * Specter, an amnesiac ghost woman who suddenly manifest in the slums of the Sinful City and is on a quest to find out who she was before her death and, eventually, to figure out who murdered her.
 * Wendy, the heiress of the Green Family, owners of several energy companies, who goes out into the wider city in search for her long lost father.
 * Enoch, an occultist obsessed with demonic rituals who traveled to the city in search of new forms of power, though this causes him to clash with many of the more lawful forces of the city.
 * Clergy Jed, a follower of the Vindication Church and a member of its "Clergy of Fists", who finds himself trapped in the middle of a war between his church and the supernatural forces of the city.
 * Dummy, a secret character. Originally a simple android the player beat up in Training Mode, Dummy realized how poorly his android brethren were being treated and set out on a quest to liberate his people.
 * Bobby Bluesky, a young, upcoming superstar in the game Blast Ball, which is similar to European football but played with a bomb in place of a ball. Just before a big game, his teammates suddenly disappear and he sets out to find them.
 * Doctor Khan, a scientist working for the company OverCorp who helped in the creation of Adam. After many years, he has decided to come forward about the truth, which has made him public enemy number one for the company.
 * Ingrid, an orphaned teenage girl whose father was murdered in front of her at a young age. Believing her father's killer to be located in the Sinful City, she travels to it on a quest for revenge.
 * Nobody, a bizarre Frankenstein-esque creation with a mix of human and animal parts across his body. After being released from a stasis pot, he sets out on a morally questionable quest to murder his own creator.
 * Adam (DLC), the central antagonist of the game. They are an artificial god created by the blending of magic and technology. They are also the one responsible for The Incident. In the base game, they are a non-playable boss character.
 * Ozymandias Kincaid (DLC), also called Ozzie, he is the secondary antagonist of the game and the CEO of the company OverCorp. His father was responsible for the creation of Adam and ever since witnessing it as a child, he has been driven mad with a want for power and influence. In the base game, he serves as a boss character, but he was later made playable via DLC.
 * The Governor, the main antagonist of the game and the final boss of the game's "Endgame" story. Most of the events of the game can be linked back to him, which makes him the primary target for many characters. He is also a cyborg with a skeleton of steel and oil instead of blood.

Reception
After its announcement, fighting game fans looked forward to the release due to Arc System Works' reputation in the community. However, outsiders were skeptical, claiming that the gameplay looked simplistic in comparison to its competitors. However, upon its release, it received overwhelming praise from critics, claiming that the fast paced nature of the game and its fun game modes and compelling story more than made up for what seemed like an overly simple combat system. However, the game did not sell very well in Japan, its native country, though it made up for it in the Western market, which kick-started a trend of the games being more favored by the west than the east.