Armored Warriors (Arcade) Review
Terminate Them!!
~by tankMage (August 2025)
Score: 91/100 (Excellent)
I don’t remember seeing Armored Warriors in arcades back in the 90s, so I really didn’t know what to expect when I started this game up. Things didn’t look good at first, because the opening story flew across the screen rather than crawled as I watched the intro, plus the playable characters had goofy names like Rash and Justice. Then the actual gameplay came up on the demo and it showed three players combining their mechs into a single super-mech. After that, I was pretty much sold on this game and was pleasantly surprised by its virtues, even in single player mode.
The graphics, from the playable mechs to the backgrounds, are beautiful. The action is fun and only pauses for brief story scenes which can be skipped. Gimmicks like the three player super mech and the ability to graft parts from defeated mechs onto your own, distinguish this beat ’em up from the rest. Even the soundtrack is a cut above.
As a critic, I try to peel back everything that’s superficial and look at a game’s core. Beneath all the cheesey goodness, Armored Warriors is a standard beat ’em up. It doesn’t take any big risks aside from the aforementioned super mech and it’s guilty of putting players in situations where they have to pump quarters into the arcade machine if they want to keep going, though these situations are not the norm in Armored Warriors and skill is enough to get you through the game. Beat ’em ups often sag in the middle or get repetitive, but Armored Warriors offers so much in the way of weapons and special moves that it kept going strong from start to finish. In fact, I wanted to play again and ran through the story several more times to get my fill.
Story
It’s 2228, a war between the Earth and the planet Raia has just ended. Just as it was looking like the two worlds would see a lasting peace, a Raian military captain named Azrael (he is also a cyborg) seizes Raia’s capitol with his followers. An elite mech unit called Red Shield is called in to free the capital and bring Azrael to justice. Red Shield has three playable members: Rash, Justice, Gray, and Siren. Each of the soldiers had his or her own little backstory and pilots a mech which reflects their personalities.
As players run through the game, they will be given bits and pieces of the story through dialog. The story and dialog of Armored Warriors isn’t going to win any awards, but they’re compelling enough to pay attention to. Playing as the game’s various heroes adds a bit of variety to the story, since they all have unique dialog. Arcade games aren’t exactly known for masterful story telling, so this one gets bonus points for going out of its way to include an interesting narrative.
Gameplay
Armored Warriors really shines in terms of action. As a beat ’em up, it has players fighting their way through an entire army of mechs. Anyone familiar with the genre will be right at home punching, kicking, and grappling enemy robots, but there are a few surprises that make this title special.
Players will notice each mech comes equipped with a vulcan, which is a bit unusual since ranged weapons tend to be rare in beat ’em ups. Things get really interesting when an enemy mech drops an arm or even its legs and the player picks up the dropped limb and attaches it to their own mech. Tank treads, rocket launchers, and even drill arms can be equipped along with several other weapons.
Being able to attach a new arm instead of just picking up a weapon may sound gimmicky (because it is) but this mechanic is more than just superficial nonsense. Equipping new body parts unlocks new attacks and you can end up with an almost completely different mech if you swap enough parts out. If you count all the basic attacks, combo moves, and combos from special parts, there’s a ton of moves players can pull off.
I wish I had the opportunity to play this with a friend, because it is possible to combine two or three mechs to make a super mech. Luckily, there’s a demo of the super mech and I was able to get an idea of how it worked and it looks awesome. Hopefully I’ll get a chance to test multi-player with friends and update this review…
Aside from all the parts and special moves, Armored Warriors is what you’d expect from a beat ’em up. This isn’t a bad thing either, because its rich movesets make combat interesting. All four mechs handle differently, with some being quick, but weak and others being lumbering tanks that can take a thrashing while dishing out heavy damage. Even fighting the weak trash enemies before the boss feels exciting and boss fights tend to be entertaining, though a couple of them were poorly designed punching bags.
There are seven decent sized missions, making the game is fairly lengthy for an arcade title. The stages aren’t particularly original, but they get the job done and there are secrets to be found in some spots. There are even a couple of sections where your mech has to race around shooting things, which was a nice diversion.
Armored Warriors certainly delivers in terms of gameplay and its got replay value thanks to multi-player mode and four playable characters.
Challenge
It would be wrong to say Armored Warriors is easy, but it kind of is, because you can continue as long as you have coins to feed the machine. That said, enemies hit hard and health refills can be rare. There are also a few bosses, particularly the final one, who are difficult to destroy. While parts of this game can be tricky, it does not take a lot to learn it and I found myself dying far less on my second and third playthroughs. Trying to beat this game on a single credit would take practice, but it would not be too difficult, so I would say the difficulty of Armored Warriors is just right for a casual beat ’em player (like me) and somewhat easy for veterans of the genre.
Graphics
The sprite and tile work are excellent, which is about what one would expect from Capcom. Most of the colors are kind of dingy, but they set the mood of the game perfectly and make the effects of weapons like lasers and missiles stand out all the more. But it was the variety of moves the mechs can use and how they change visually when equipping new weapons that really impressed me.
I can’t really think of anything bad to say about the graphics aside from how the cast is very generic and could belong to just about any military anime. This isn’t really a bad thing as far as I’m concerned, because it lends the game an air of familiarity.
Sound
While I was not enthralled with the soundtrack, it was composed competently and there were a few songs I really enjoyed. It also had that distinctive Capcom style thanks to Qsound technology. I have probably said this before, but I really miss the days when technology was more limited, because consoles, arcade cabinets, and PCs all had their own unique sound chips that made them stand out from one another. Musicians were forced to work within boundaries and (ironically) produced better work because they had to innovate.
Anyway, the sound effects are great too. It’s easy to forget how important they are, but all the chaotic noise this game pumps out breathes life into the action. There’s a bit of voice work, particularly a clip of someone saying “Terminate Them!” which plays every time you drop a quarter in the machine. In not sure why, but I thought it was a funny line and something you’d only see in a mid 1990s game.
User Interface
Here’s another game with nearly perfect controls. So far this is the third arcade title I’ve reviewed and all three have had great UIs. I’m kind of worried that I’m going to encounter some really bad controls soon to make up for all the good luck I’ve had recently. The only problem I encountered was that it was very difficult to pull off certain attacks with the special weapons. This was probably my fault for not really understanding the cryptic instructions I found in a walkthrough.
Final Thoughts
At the end of the day, Armored Warriors is a lot of fun. While it can be completed in a single sitting, it has enough meat on its bones to be worth revisiting and is a game I would like to learn to 1CC if I ever get the time. Give this a try if you like mechs and beat ’em ups, you won’t be disappointed.
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