M.U.G.E.N is a freeware 2D fighting game engine designed by Elecbyte, written in C with the Allegro library.
The engine was originally released in July 17, 2001. Beta versions of it were made to work on DOS, Linux and Windows platforms, distributed through their website. The engine allows users to insert created characters, background stages, and other game objects through interpreted text files, graphics, and sound compilations to create a functioning fighting game similar to commercial games. While the engine is set up primarily for fighting game development, several other game types have been developed using it, including shooter and platform style games. Officially, Elecbyte claims to have forgotten what the acronym M.U.G.E.N stood for, but the readme documentation states that its meaning referred to the days when the engine was meant to emulate shooting games as opposed to fighting games.[1]
The engine allows anyone to create characters, background stages and other game objects through interpreted text files, graphics, and sound compilations. It supports various types of audio formats such as MP3 and MIDI initially, although it can be configured to play various audio formats via Winamp plugins, such as ADX and OGG, as background music during gameplay or at other points such as an introduction or the select screen. The engine allows for most of the same type of functionality found in most any commercial 2D fighting games, up to and including close recreation of those games' characters and gameplay.
Supposedly there's a small subset of people who make characters with the intent of actual gameplay balance, but for the most part it's just for shits and giggles as far as I can tell. :P
I'm not intimately familiar with the community, so I'll just take your word on that. :P
It's only real value as I can see is the abundance of fan-made sprite art to play with. The Mugen engine itself wouldn't be my first choice of 2d engine to use if I were intent on making a 2d game, for instance.
The engine isn't that great, but I have a version that has over 1000 characters to choose from so I forget about the mechanics for awhile. Perfect for those high or drunken (or both) nights. 3.5GB though. Crazy shit.
Some guys in SomethingAwful were attempting to get a reconstruction of the engine up and running. They seem to have succeeded in emulating a good chunk of its behaviour. The fact is, this thing devolved into what it is today because the developers disappeared and left the whole thing closed-source, stopping anyone from picking up the torch.
While much can be said about the overall talent of any modding community, MUGEN is lacking a lengthy list of very useful features.
I can't stand Mugen. Just because how every 3rd strike character is just a little bit off and that makes me shit at Actual 3rd strike after I play with them.
I'm not interested in using the existing resources and it looks too difficult to create new content.
I would like to make a fighting game but sprite drawing is beyond my ability. Fighter Maker looks more my cup of tea but I've stayed clear as it's apparently limited and plays terribly.
I remember there was a bootleg Street Fighter 2 recreation of sorts for the PC back in 1996, which used ripoffs of backgrounds, sprites etc. which however were heterogeneous in quality and even provenience (some were cleanly ripped, others appeared as VHS or photo grabs, and could come from different versions of the game, ranging from Arcade down to NES) and the same for the sounds. Dunno if MUGEN had anything to do with it though.
Here's a video of what it probably looked like (although I remember it being much less clean than that):
I also don't remember my copy being in Korean, but the game could be customized easily via external files to a ridicolous degree, so it could be a translated hack.
Update: wow, so memory didn't fail me after all. It was called SFIBM (wikipedia article, no warez :P ) and was indeed very customizable. Go look for it if you are so inclined, but I definitively don't recommend it.
While it has the option of being a novelty engine just for screwing about with and having a laugh, it depends which characters you download as to how much of a serious game it is. The difficult part is getting characters balanced so it's not cheap.
deathbringer
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uhhhhh
Hmm, i wanted to make a fighting game of my own once, despite having no interest in fighting games whatsoever (i think the purpose of the excercise was to think up amusing characters and moves rather than actually make the game). However i the realised i couldn't sprite for shite and left the idea alone. Also i was trying to do it in Multimedia Fusion, at a time when my skill level extended to very basic space invaders ripoffs.
I tried the everything VS everything pack before. Good for some cheap laughs when playing VS with friends. Then the novelty wears off and you're left with a grossly unbalanced diarrhea compilation of a game.
04-17-09 10:53 
