Gingo Fighting Royale

Fighting Royale, branded as Gingo Fighting Royale and known in Japan as 'Gingo Animation All-Stars! Ikari no Tatakai Rowaiyaru' (ギンゴアニメーションオールスター！怒りの戦いロワイヤル, lit. "Gingo Animation All-Stars! Battle Royale of Fury"), is a crossover fighting video game developed by Gingo Interactive and published by Universal Interactive for GameCube, PlayStation 2, Xbox and Microsoft Windows. The first installment in the Fighting Royale series, it was first released in North America on November 19, 2002, in Europe on December 6, 2002, and in Japan on March 27, 2003. The game was later added to the Backwards Compatibility program of the Xbox 360 for original Xbox games.

Fighting Royale is a crossover between several different Gingo Animation properties, including Gabriel Garza, Hatty, Niz Chicoloco, Chrysocolla, Jenny Zoom, Planetokio, Paint World, and Fiox. The stages and gameplay modes reference or take designs from these franchises as well. It is similar to the first Super Smash Bros. game by Nintendo, in that the main objective is to use each character's unique skills and the stage's hazards to inflict damage, recover health, and ultimately knock opponents off the stage.

After completing Fiox while concurrently working on Gabriel Garza: Vio's Return and Chrysocolla: Battle for Nitropolis, development of Fighting Royale began in 2000 under the working title of Gingo Fighters and was extensive. The Gingo Interactive team sought to differentiate the game from other Gingo-developed games, deeming their new entry into the franchise required a different direction. The game was heavily inspired by Super Smash Bros., and the development team re-purposed the fighting design and nuanced character development for the game.

Upon release, it received generally favorable reviews from video game critics, with praise particularly focused on the interpretation of the Gingo brand as a video game, its multiplayer mode and graphics, while criticism mostly surrounded its lack of content and some aspects of gameplay, such as bugs and glitches, as well as some similarities to Super Smash Bros.. The game was also a commercial success, with recorded sales of over 3 million worldwide. It received the award for Fave Video Game at the 2003 Nickelodeon Australian Kids' Choice Awards, and is widely considered the best Gingo game. Like Super Smash Bros., the game spawned a series of sequels, starting with Fighting Royale 2 which was released in 2008.

Gameplay
Fighting Royale is a crossover fighting game bringing together eleven playable characters from several Gingo franchises, such as the Gingo mascot Gabriel Garza and Hatty Weasel, in one epic battle on an arena that plays very similar to the Super Smash Bros. series. Up to four players (human or CPU controlled) can control a character and fight on a multi-tiered 2D stage. Players may use various items that appear randomly to get the fighting edge over their opponent. Additionally, the stage may use set elements in order to take out other players. For example, in the Sinking Spring stage, players can open a door from Gabriel's house. Each playable character has their own special move set that uses different elements from their respective franchises. Each has an up, down, side, and neutral attack. Most characters have a projectile attack. Vio is the only character who has a disabling attack.

The game features a traditional single-player arcade mode, in which players must defeat several randomly-selected opponents, followed by a character-specific rival battle and, ultimately, a battle against the game's main antagonist and final boss, the Collector. A "Training Mode" is also available in which players can manipulate the environment and experiment against computer opponents without the restrictions of a standard match. Multiplayer modes include time-based matches, where players compete to achieve the most kills within a time limit; stock-based matches, where players attempt to be the last one standing; and kill-limit matches, where players compete to be the first to reach a certain number of kills. The game also features a single-player challenge mode, in which players attempt to complete specific objectives.

Completing matches and fulfilling objectives with a character will gain them experience points; leveling up a character will unlock bonuses such as character bios and a special video.

Playable characters

 * Gabriel Garza (character)
 * Hatty Weasel
 * Niz Chicoloco
 * Chrysocolla Reed
 * Jenny Zoom
 * Iken

Unlockable

 * Vio
 * Allo Frog
 * Fiox
 * Sam Reed
 * Deon Splatt

Non-playable characters

 * The Collector
 * Fighting Doppelgangers

Stages

 * Sinking Spring
 * Fozzville
 * Chicoloco Place
 * Nitropolis
 * Grand City
 * Planetokio

Unlockable

 * Vio's Fortress
 * Paletton
 * Garden Valley
 * Icy Island
 * Blannetkio

Plot
Coming Soon...

English

 * Debi Derryberry as Gabriel Garza, Iken
 * Rob Paulsen as Hatty Weasel
 * Dee Bradley Baker as Niz Chicoloco
 * Grey DeLisle as Chrysocolla and Sam Reed
 * Ashley Johnson as Jenny Zoom
 * Jonathan Lipnicki as Deon Splatt
 * Corey Burton as Fiox
 * Jim Cummings as Vio, Allo Frog, The Collector, Announcer

Japanese

 * Megumi Hayashibara as Gabriel Garza
 * Kōichi Yamadera as Hatty Weasel
 * Sachi Matsumoto as Niz Chicoloco
 * Mika Kanai as Chrysocolla Reed
 * Sanae Kobayashi as Sam Reed, Fiox
 * Jun Mizusawa as Jenny Zoom
 * Yū Sugimoto as Iken
 * Kazuhiro Shindō as Deon Splatt
 * Jurota Kosugi as Vio
 * Tomohisa Aso as Allo Frog
 * Daiki Nakamura as The Collector

Development and release
Development of Fighting Royale began in 2000 under the codename Gingo Fighters when Gingo's in-house video game development team was in the middle of the development of Gabriel Garza: Vio's Return and Chrysocolla: Battle for Nitropolis after finishing Fiox. During development, Gingo wanted to steer every franchise they own in a different direction by giving the game engine a complete overhaul. The developers decided to add their characters from each different franchise into a fighting stage and battle each other, so that the game offered a better experience of the Gingo properties. The internal development name for "Fighting Royale" was simply "Gingo", as referenced by the executable file of the game.

Fighting Royale, along with Chrysocolla: Battle for Nitropolis, was originally intended to be designed by Mark Cerny, who had designed all of the Gingo Interactive games thus far, and published by Sony Computer Entertainment under its four-year deal with Gingo Interactive to develop games exclusivity for Sony-produced consoles. However, Sony and Gingo's deal expired after the release of Fiox, leading to Gingo's then sister company Universal Interactive Studios to take full control of the game's publication, as well as obtaining the rights to Fiox. On September 21, 2000, Universal Interactive and Konami announced that they had entered an agreement that would enable Konami to publish several Gingo games for next-generation game systems, with Universal Interactive handling the production of the games. Konami revealed that the Xbox version of the game would be titled Gingo X.

Michael Wildshill, CEO of Gingo and Universal Feature Animation, oversaw the game's development. During Fighting Royale 's development, Universal Studios, DreamWorks and Gingo Animation played important roles in bringing every Gingo franchise into a 3D environment. All character voices were supplied by the actual cast from those franchises, and Gingo writers wrote the entire story for the game, including dialogue. Jim Wilson, the CEO of Universal Interactive, considered it a blessing to have the opportunity of working with voice cast, along with the writers, whom Wilson called "the best there is [sic]".

As with Super Smash Bros. Melee, the developers explain reasons for making particular characters playable and explain why some characters were not available as playable characters upon release. Initially, Wildshill wanted some of his Universal-only characters such as Ama from Ama and the Mysterious Crystal to be in the game, but she was cut due to time constraints. The game's creators later included Ama in the game's threequel, Fighting Royale 3. Animator Bob Jaques originally requested the inclusion of Universal cartoon character Woody Woodpecker to Wildshill, but the game was too far into development. As with Ama, development time allowed for his inclusion in Fighting Royale 3.

Fighting Royale was first shown at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in 2002. During the showing, Gingo promised unlockable characters, stages, bonus levels, and power-ups. Before the game's release, the official website included weekly updates, including screenshots and character profiles. Gingo followed this trend with the sequels, in which there were daily updates by the game's developer, Geo G.. IGN reported that Universal advertised the game in between showings of The Gabriel Garza Movie across movie theaters in the US. Originally scheduled for a worldwide release in October 2002, the game was delayed and released on November 19, 2002 to coincide with the DVD and VHS release of The Gabriel Garza Movie (where it was advertised) in North America, December 6, 2002 in Europe, and March 27, 2003 in Japan. A Game Boy Advance port was planned to be released alongside the console versions, but was scrapped for unknown reasons.

Critical reception
Coming Soon...

Legacy
Main article: Fighting Royale