The game follows the formula of the
Street Fighter series. The player competes against each opponent in best-of-three matches. Each fighter has their own set of standard attack moves and special moves. Due to most Amiga joysticks of the time having one single fire button, the controls for special moves are largely simplified: one special move per character is performed by keeping the fire button pressed while holding still, while others are performed by moving in one of the eight directions and pressing the fire button. There are no
combos or throws. Unlike
Street Fighter and other similar games such as
Mortal Kombat, blocking is performed by holding the fire button while moving away from the opponent. One characteristic gameplay feature is that, when an opponent is knocked down, the fire button of the other player is locked until the opponent gets back up and moves. This mode was labelled
mercy when it became optional in versions of the game following the original Amiga retail release. There are three modes of play in
Body Blows. One player arcade mode allows the player selects one characters and battles all the others in sequence until the final showdown against Max. Two player mode allows two players to take control of joysticks and fight each other using a character they desire. Tournament mode lets four or eight players play a tournament against each other. There are 11 characters in
Body Blows. In one player mode, the player can choose from the four characters to play as, namely Danny, Junior, Nik and Lo Ray. In other modes, players can select from 10 of the characters in the game. ==Release==