If you think that all of the above controls should be enough to get you started, you are sorely mistaken. The following button combinations will need to be put to memory before successful play can be achieved:

Down + B = Uppercut
Back + Right C= Leg Sweep
Back + Top C = Roundhouse Kick
Forward + A = Throw
Left C (press twice) = Shove
Back + Left C (while on ground) = Evasive Get Up
Forward + B + A (while getting up) = Get Up Attack
Forward (press twice, holding down the second press) = Run
Up + B = Unblockable Pounce Attack
Press and hold Bottom C (or L) + Left C (or R), then press Up or Down = 3D Jump
Press and hold Bottom C (or L), then press Up or Down = 3D Walk
Press and hold Bottom C (or L), then press Up, Up, or Down, Down = 3D Slide

What's it like to play?:

My first impressions of the game were rather favorable. The graphics are smooth and really do seem like an arcade game. War Gods' big gimmick is that the players are made of polygons with digitalized texture maps of real people. This is supposed to make the graphics more realistic. To a small degree, this works. The funny thing is, the characters look a lot like the B movie characters featured on MST3K. The animation is OK, but lacks the flair of Tekken or Virtua Fighter. The action also takes place a good distance from the characters, so you don't see much character detail during the average fight.

In the department of sound, the game's announcer is very cool. I think I've heard his voice in a few cartoons and commercials. The music is pretty standard arcade fare, but it's not bad. The sound effects of some special moves and punches are pretty good, but the effects of the characters (like their voices and grunts) could be better.

Getting started with War Gods is fairly difficult for a fighting novice like myself. Unlike KI Gold, there's no practice mode to help a player get comfortable with War Gods' gameplay. In fact, there isn't even a list of special moves in the manual. It's all up to you to figure it out.

The control scheme is overly complex and I found it extremely unintuitive. I wanted to jump in and play using just the basic punches and kicks, but these attacks are of little use against a CPU opponent with an arsenal of special moves at its disposal. The 3D button is gimmicky and difficult to use, resulting in mostly 2D fighting action.

Another flaw in War Gods is the lack of options. There isn't even an option to turn off the game timer without first knowing a special code (that isn't given in the manual). You can mix the sound volume, change the difficulty, adjust your credits and controller setup and turn on/off the fatalities. That's about it.

During my time with War Gods, I was unable to adapt to the play. At times it felt like no matter what button I pressed, nothing would happen. Other times the CPU would unload on me with little for me to do to change the situation. Every once in a while, I'd stumble on a special move or two, but unfortunately it wasn't enough to keep the game from getting frustrating.

If you normally practice fighting moves using the two player mode of a fighting game, you may also be frustrated by War Gods. As I said before, there's no way to turn off the timer, so you have to practice quickly. There's also no way to increase the matches needed to win a two-player bout. In fact the whole two-player mode consists of player two buzzing in before the character select screen times out. Then if whoever loses the bout doesn't hit continue, the game reverts to one-player mode.

Using a code I found on the net (see the Daily Web Updates in the News Section for links to War Gods codes), I was able to view most of the fatalities (some still wouldn't work). They are very gross, so if you don't like Mortal Kombat-like violence, War Gods may not be for you. The one where Ahau Kin feasts on his opponents heart is particularly disturbing.

Overall, it's difficult for me to asses what die-hard fighting fans may think of War Gods, but here's my take on the game: While graphically nice, War Gods lacks the playability, options, and multi-player value to make it worth purchasing. In addition, I'd guess that fighting fans would enjoy KI Gold more than War Gods, despite KI's lack of a 3D feature. If you're a fan of games like Tekken and Virtua Fighter, then War Gods most likely isn't going to be your kind of game. However, if you're looking for a new fighter to play around with during the weekend, you could do a lot worse than War Gods. It's barely worth a rental.