Metamorphic Force

Metamorphic Force is an arcade Beat'Em Up made by Konami released in 1993, and their final foray into the genre along with Violent Storm.

An evil emperor rose from his grave to rule the world once and for all. A sword-wielding goddess called upon the souls of four ancient beasts, whose corresponding powers lie within the four men who are able to defeat the emperor.

---

This game has examples of:

• Acrofatic: Ban.
• Boss Rush: Stage 5 in the American version, where you'll fight the first four of five bosses in Dual Boss format. In the Japanese version, the whole stage is just a fight with the fifth one.
• Captain Ersatz: Stage 3 has a boss resembling a Sentinel, while the Amazoness boss of stage 5 resembles Prairie Dawn.
• Color-Coded Multiplayer
  • Ban- The Lancer and Lightning Bruiser
  • Claude- The Hero and Jack of All Stats
  • Max- Kid Appeal Fragile Speedster
  • Ivan- The Big Guy and Mighty Glacier
• Cool Sword: Claude and the second stage boss.
• Difficulty by Region: The Japanese version of the game uses lives and a life bar, while the American version replaced this with health points that would go down by one every ten seconds. You can restore your health points with whatever health item you picked up or every token you inserted in.
• The Dragon: The skeleton knight sub-boss from stage 6.
• Elevator Action Sequence: The second half of stage 6.
• Extreme Omni Goat: Stage 1 boss.
• Extremity Extremist: Max is most likely a boxer, although his werepanther form subverted this.
• Fingerless Gloves: Ivan.
• Helpful Mook: The weremice similar in function to the Golden Axe elves. They occasionally show up, carrying golden statues and other items that can be dropped when you hit them.
• Improbable Weapon User: Ivan's log. However, he will remain unarmed when in his werebear form.
• No Guy Wants an Amazon: Stage 5 boss.
• Our Orcs Are Different: The two mid-bosses in Stage 4, who even proceed to put themselves together and form a two-headed boss at the end.
• Our Werebeasts Are Different: Picking up a golden statue puts you in a mutated state that turns you into a specific one:
  • A Load of Bull: Ban
  • Our Werewolves Are Different: Claude
  • Panthera Awesome: Max
  • Everything's Worse with Bears: Ivan
  • Our Dragons Are Different: The final boss in his second form.
• Palette Swap: Lizard-like mooks are color-coded to indicate their weapons of choice.
  • A "Konami seizure time" variant of this comes to bosses running low on life, thanks to their alternate palettes.
• The Phoenix: Stage 2 boss.
• Pre-Ass-Kicking One-Liner: Each boss starts with one of these.
• Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs: The final boss does a variation of this with short-ranged energy blasts when in his first form.
• Sequential Boss: The last boss has three phases.
• Shoryuken: The final boss in his first form.
• Space Zone: The Final Boss will be fought IN SPACE!
• Suspiciously Similar Songs:
  • The boss theme from stage 2 and the first half of stage 6 sounds like the first-person levels music from the first Contra game.
  • Stage 5's boss rush theme has a Double Dare feel. The Amazoness boss theme is basically a modification of one of the Gradius III boss themes.
  • The final boss' first theme is perhaps much like one of The Simpsons boss themes.
• You Get Knocked Down, You Get Back Up Again: Once again, like most other Konami beat 'em ups, averted. You can attack enemies that are knocked down.