Creator of Fire Pro Wrestling series passes away.

[Bikeage]

http://www.giantbomb.com/articles/r-i-p ... 1100-4893/

I bought the GBA Fire Pro release on a whim after getting back into pro wrestling around 2000, and was hooked. Could not believe how much depth it had, and would always tell folks who swore by the (mostly) excellent wrestling N64 games that Fire Pro was superior.

It's weird but Playing Fire Pro 2 via GBA and link cable against a real human who knows how to play rates somewhere on my bucket list. Circumstances never allowed, and none of my friends ever gave a toss about even the PS2 game.

Too bad it took the guy's passing for me to be aware of his name and contribution to gaming. Not many games feel "personal" to me, but I got quite wrapped up in Fire Pro years back... gonna have to fire it up again.

[FerretGamer]

I used to play the crap out of the Dreamcast version.

It's a shame about his young age though.

[Violent By Design]

Damn, Fire Pro was awesome. Rip.

[Betagam7]

I beat Special (with that infamous Suda ending) and Queen's Special about a month ago and like the other poster probably sunk over 500 hours into Fire Pro D back in the Dreamcast's twilight years.

It's a true shame that a proper online version of this series was never raleased as finding someone who knew how to play it and understood its mechanics was a rare, rare thing and the game just wasn't enjoyable against anyone else.

I have Big Bang Pro Wrestling for NGPC pencilled in as a future import as I've heard that it borrows much from the FP series in terms of its gameplay.

Sad to hear about this person's death. He really understood the concept and mechanics of pro wrestling and gave us the first game that properly emulated those. Certainly every modern wrestling game owes his series a debt.