PatmanQC brings the history of the Renegade – Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun (Japanese: 熱血硬派くにおくん, loosely translated “Hot-Blooded Tough Guy Kunio”), released as Renegade in the West, is a beat ’em up video game developed by Technōs Japan and distributed by Taito for the arcades in 1986. In the original Japanese version Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun, the game revolves around a high-school delinquent named Kunio-kun (or just Kunio) who must stand up against a series of rival gangs frequently targeting his classmate Hiroshi. In the Western version Renegade, the player controls a street brawler who must face four different gangs in order to rescue his girlfriend being held captive by a mob boss.
Created by Yoshihisa Kishimoto, the game was semi-autobiographical, partly based on his own teenage high school years getting into daily fights, with Kunio partly based on himself. He also drew inspiration from the Bruce Lee martial arts film Enter the Dragon (1973), which inspired the game’s “knock-down-drag-out” fights, along with his own altercations as a youth. In order to make the game more appealing for the West, Technos produced a graphically-altered version with a visual style inspired by the 1979 film The Warriors, changing the looks of some of the game’s characters and scenery.
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