Yie Ar Kung-Fu

Yie Ar Kung-Fu (Japanese: イー・アル・カンフー, Hepburn: Ī Aru Kanfū) is a fighting game developed and published by Konami for arcades. It first had a limited Japanese release in October 1984, before having a wide release nationwide in January 1985 and then internationally in March. Along with Data East's Karate Champ (1984), which influenced Yie Ar Kung-Fu, it is one of the games that established the basis for modern fighting games. The game was inspired by Bruce Lee's Hong Kong martial arts films, with the main player character Oolong modelled after Lee (like Bruceploitation films). In contrast to the grounded realism of Karate Champ, Yie Ar Kung-Fu moved the genre towards more fantastical, fast-paced action, with various different characters having a variety of special moves and high jumps, establishing the template for subsequent fighting games. It also introduced the health meter system to the genre, in contrast to the point-scoring system of Karate Champ. The game was a commercial success in arcades, becoming the highest-grossing arcade conversion kit of 1985 in the United States while also being successful in Japan and Europe. It was ported to various home systems, including home computer conversions which were critically and commercially successful, becoming the best-selling home video game of 1986 in the United Kingdom.

Source: Wikipedia CC BY-SA 4.0 — Yie Ar Kung-Fu · retrieved October 19, 2026

Developer

Konami

Publisher

Imagine Software

First release

January 1, 1985

Series

Not recorded

Cover

Official thumbnail

Record ID

Q91220