Super Punch-Out!! - Reception

Reception

Super Punch-Out!! received coverage in GamePro magazine, where it received mostly positive reviews. The reviewer appreciated the game's good controls and challenge, which he describes as "deceptive". Though its graphics were simplistic, he said that they were "knockouts just the same". He also gave praise to the game's sprite layouts and animations and its sounds; he said that "crowd noises and the whack of landed blows juice the game's intensity level". The only criticism noted was its two-player mode; he notes that "two players can take turns fighting by saving their individual records. However, they each have to reset the game and access their records to do so." As a bonus, the coverage included reviews by Fred Doughty and Mark Guinane, winners of the 1994 Blockbuster Video World Game Championship. Guinane praised the game's easy-to-learn controls and graphics but criticized its sound for not being exciting enough. Doughty, who reminisced playing the arcade version of Punch-Out!!, said that Super Punch-Out!! was not very difficult at the beginning, but the challenge level rose as the player progressed. Like Guinane, he praised its controls and its artistic design of the characters.

Several reviewers praised Super Punch-Out!! overall for not trying to be realistic, for the originality of its different opponents, and for its simple controls. Chris Scullion from Official Nintendo Magazine praises the game for its outlandish characters, addictive gameplay, and simple controls. He adds that Super Punch-Out!! is "superb way to prepare for the upcoming Wii title". Scullion states that "the thing that makes Super Punch-Out!! interesting (along with the rest of the games in the series) is that it's not a realistic boxing game". He adds that the opponents in the game are "the real stars of the show", with each opponent having a unique personality, traits, and boxing styles. Skyler Miller from Allgame, like Scullion, praised the game for its simple, responsive controls, for its colorful, detailed opponents, and for its usage of the Super NES's transparent color palette for the fighter, which facilitates the "behind the back" perspective. He also appreciates the game's sound and music, in particular the usage of real voice for the announcer. Game Players magazine applauded the game's "large, colorful graphics and easy-to-learn controls".

Reviewers have praised Super Punch-Out!! for its other unique features and for its rewarding difficulty. Game Informer magazine praised the game for its time attack mode, which recorded and kept track of the fastest knockouts for each opponent. Miller also commended the time attack mode, adding to the game's replay value. Another review from VideoGames & Computer Entertainment magazine lauded the game for a fair difficulty curve, stating that it "is a really tough game, but it's one in which repeated playing (and you will be playing it a lot) really pays off". Lucas Thomas from IGN, while praising the game overall, says that the game lacks the overall appeal that the NES version had and that he recommends the NES version over this version. He notes that the sound is "Not as memorable as the music from the NES game, but more varied". He says that many people who are familiar with the NES version have to relearn new attack patterns from different opponents. Thomas also notes that the game did not have as large an audience as the NES version enjoyed.