Super Variable Geo

Super Variable Geo, also known as Super V.G.: Variable Geo, is a Japan-exclusive Super Famicom fighting game released by Technical Group Laboratory (TGL) on July 21, 1995. It brings the Variable Geo series’ tournament setting to Nintendo’s 16-bit system as a one-on-one, all-female martial-arts fighter. The Japanese title is スーパーヴァリアブル・ジオ, and this is the series’ sole Super Famicom installment. TGL developed and published the game, which arrived after earlier Variable Geo releases on Japanese computer and console hardware.

Its setting centers on the annual Variable Geo competition, an unarmed contest held to determine the strongest waitress. Restaurant sponsors use the tournament’s contestants as promotional representatives, while the Jahana Group oversees the event. The defending champion, Reimi Jahana, stands at the center of the competition, and the prize gives the entrants an immediate reason to put their individual skills to the test. This premise frames the game’s fighters as rivals in a formal tournament rather than as participants in a conventional fantasy or military conflict.

Super Variable Geo uses a four-button fighting layout: light punch, heavy punch, light kick, and heavy kick. Light attacks are generally quicker, while heavy attacks trade speed for greater force. Directional inputs combined with the attack buttons produce each fighter’s special techniques, and close-range throws add another option for breaking an opponent’s defense. Players can walk, jump, dash forward, retreat with a backdash, guard high or low, and look for openings after a blocked or landed attack. The result is a side-view fighter built around spacing, timing, and the different ranges of its cast’s moves.

A match is won by emptying the other fighter’s vitality gauge, or by holding the larger remaining total when the timer expires. Every character has a Super Art: a powerful move that becomes available once her health falls to roughly the final third, rather than through a separate meter that must be charged. Specials can also inflict chip damage through a guard, creating pressure even when an opponent blocks. The game supports chaining attacks into combos, but its combat still emphasizes grounded exchanges, careful positioning, and recognizing when a heavy strike, throw, projectile, or special move is the safer choice.

Nine fighters are selectable: Ayako Yuuki, Chiho Masuda, Eleanor “Elirin” Goldsmith, Jun Kubota, Kaori Yanase, Manami Kusunoki, Reimi Jahana, Satomi Yajima, and Yuka Takeuchi. Their move sets give the roster contrasting approaches, from projectiles and quick pokes to throws and close-range pressure. In Normal Mode, a chosen competitor faces a fixed sequence of nine opponents in best-two-of-three-round bouts; beating Reimi unlocks that character’s ending sequence. The mode’s structure makes the character choice meaningful, because each fighter follows a different order before the final challenge.

For head-to-head play, V.S. Mode offers player-versus-player, player-versus-computer, and computer-versus-computer matches, with all nine fighters available. Players can select a stage and adjust handicaps before a best-two-of-three contest, while the configuration menu includes CPU difficulty, timer, sound, and button-mapping options. Super Variable Geo is therefore a focused Super Famicom adaptation of the Variable Geo concept: a compact tournament fighter with a defined nine-character lineup, accessible local competition, and a low-health Super Art system that can change the momentum of a round.