Today's contribution to the 2025 edition of The Twelve Days of Wu-Mas is an exclusive-to-the-free-site brief write-up for a Wu-Tang side project that, somehow, it just occurred to me to write about this month. I must be slipping in my old age. Anyway, I hope you enjoy it!
The Wu-Tang Clan might just be the most obvious rap crew to have their own video game, given the outsized presence of its membership and their volumes of lore, some lifted from their beloved kung-fu flicks and comic books and the rest stemming from their mythical daily lives, and yet it still took a company until 1999 to actually get one onto store shelves. That company was Paradox Development, who crafted the fighting game Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style (or Wu-Tang: Taste the Pain if you’re outside of the United States) using the discarded ashes of a cancelled “adult” fighter (“adult” in this instance meaning blood, guts, and S&M) that happened to utilize the same game engine that they wanted for the Wu license, reskinning all of the characters into the various members of the Clan and the (fictional) enemies they would face in the game.
Not the most promising beginning for any video game, but as far as lore goes, that’s pretty fucking funny.
Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style is brawler that supports up to four players, which was a revelation back in 1999 when their distributor, Activision, published the game for the original Sony Playstation. I remember the storyline being on the weaker side, consisting of the bare minimum necessary to compel the nine group members (Cappadonna wasn’t yet officially a part of the Clan at this time, so he’s not included) to enter into a battle to help save their recently kidnapped master. Or something. It’s all very Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles-esque, except this game came with a “mature” rating, so there’s much more bloody violence and the like to see here. (Although you have to enter a code to actually see any of it, but whatever makes the parents happy, right?) The unlockable achievements came in the form of “chambers”, so obviously there are thirty-six of them, all of which need to be earned in order to enter the final battle, and it’s all so… clunky.
So clunky.
I remember liking this game enough, but nostalgia glasses having been removed, I’m certain I only gave Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style a second look because of the group itself. The characters didn’t look much like their real-life counterparts (I mean, Masta Killa was a fucking ninja for some reason), and the fighting was merely alright. I do remember Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s character model constantly swaying as though drunk when you weren’t moving him, which was kind of fun, but not enough to recommend the game. I never bothered trying to complete it, losing interest after the first few fights in a solo campaign, but co-op was kind of fun. It’s about high time for the Clan to give this whole video game thing another shot – come on, release Rise of the Deceiver already!
However, the game isn’t the subject today. One of the biggest selling points used by Activision’s marketing department was how Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style featured original music from RZA, and given his involvement with the game (hell, the entire group had at least a little bit to do with this one), it would have made perfect sense for him to contribute some background music or whatnot. What’s more, the full soundtrack for Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style came with the game as a bonus – all you had to do was pop the disc into a CD player. I realize that last sentence is so fucking antiquated in 2025, but I trust the two of you know what I’m referring to.
So about that wish for RZA to contribute background music, though…
1. [DATA TRACK]
The track where all of the game data is “stored”. Nothing to see-slash-hear here, folks.
2. WU WORLD ORDER (LA THE DARKMAN & RZA)
The first “exclusive” (unless you live in Japan and/or own a copy of the Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai score that was only sold in that country), “Wu World Order” is the closest we’re getting to a full-on never-previously-released “song” this evening, and even then there’s a lengthy instrumental portion toward the end that implies participation by other artists was originally a part of the plan. Anyway, “Wu World Order” is a two-hander featuring relatively well-regarded but criminally underused affiliate La the Darkman alongside RZA himself, who also provides a bombastic, melodramatic loop that sounds fine, if not objectively banging. The Darkman’s opening verse is brief but full of nonsensical coded braggadocio, but he sounds good, while Prince Rakeem’s lengthier stanza follows his standard blueprint of writing at the imaginary crossroads of religion and science. “I enter through the chamber of your ear / In a high-pitched silent tone only a dog could hear,” is how RZA kicks off his verse, a weird flex that reduces his audience size significantly, and that’s before he talks about the body of Christ and “Wu multimedia”. “Wu World Order” is a neat little bonus for picking up the game, and it’s pretty easy to locate online these days, but given how it doesn’t quite make it as a fully completed song, it stinks of a throwaway track that wouldn’t have made the cut on any proper Wu-Tang project. Still, could be worse.
3. RUMBLE (U-GOD FEAT. INSPECTAH DECK, LEATHAFASE, & METHOD MAN)
“Rumble”, the unofficial theme song for the game, is the same posse cut that graces U-God’s solo debut album, Golden Arms Redemption, except censored for whatever reason. (Given that the game itself has a ‘Mature’ rating, you’d think that would transfer to its accompanying soundtrack. Alas.) True Master gifts Lamont a banger, a rollicking donnybrook in the squared circle that still sounds as exhilarating in 2025 as it did upon release. The weakest link by far is U-God himself, although he doesn’t sound bad (except for the Freddie Mercury cosplay at the beginning of his verse – the fuck was that about?), he just doesn’t hold a candle to Deck, Meth, and even his then-weed carrier Leathafase, one of the brighter spots in the Wu-Tang Clan ancillary menu. “Verbal onslaught, bring forth physical force / Of a hundred wild n----s piled in a Trojan horse,” Rebel INS drops, and he’s right, he sounds aggressive as shit here, as does every other participant. A successful “Rumble”, indeed.
4. KILLA (MASTA KILLA)
This glorified freestyle can also be found online under the name “Shaolin Temple”, but either title is decent enough. The instrumental loop is simple, but hypnotic in its way, worming its way into your brain with its guitar plucks and ethereal synths, and you’ll be so pleased that you won’t mind so much that the second verse Masta Killa offers here is exactly the same as the first. (So, again, not really a “song”.) Jamel Irief sounds confrontational and calculated throughout his threat-filled stanza, and he meshes with the RZA beat well, although you’ll be left wishing there was more to this track, which I believe appears in-game during either character-select or level-select, I’m not sure, I haven’t played the game in a while. (I could also be way off on the song placement, folks, don’t hold me to it.)
5. BACK TO 36 (TAKE IT BACK) (TEKITHA)
Misleading to a fault, because while “Back to 36 (Take It Back)” is exclusive to Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style / Taste the Pain, is a RZA production, and does feature Tekitha vocals, this is essentially an instrumental, so the guest’s vocal runs lead nowhere, and the music, which sounds pretty solid, is looped up in order to fit the needs of a fighting game. This is too bad, since “Back to 36 (Take It Back)” is a cool-ass song title that would also work for a full-on Wu-Tang comeback. Ah well.
6. WU WORLD ORDER (INSTRUMENTAL)
RZA’s beat for “Wu World Order”, fully unencumbered by braggadocio and pseudo-scientific religious randomness. By itself, this instrumental was never one of my favorites, as it sounds kind of hollow without the performances on top of it, but it’s still nice to have.
7. RUMBLE (INSTRUMENTAL)
True Master’s instrumental for “Rumble”. Pretty self-explanatory, really.
8. THE FURIOUS ONE (BRIAN “CHUCK” NEW)
This is where things get a little weird with the credits, because while a good chunk of the Interweb is convinced that RZA handled the entire soundtrack for the game, including all of the in-game music that doesn’t feature any other members of the group, other (including myself) are less inclined to believe that. The instruction manual credits only Keith Arem with “additional in-game music” without getting too specific, so I’ll present the info as accurately as I can. (Side note: Howard Drossin is also credited on Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style with “original music/cutscenes”, which makes sense given his primary work as a musician is in the game sector, and the fact that he would later go on to co-compose film scores with RZA himself is just a fun bit of trivia.) After a bit of digging, I’ve determined that “The Furious One” appears to be the work of Bryan “Chuck” New, an artist who isn’t credited in the instruction manual at fucking all, and the track performs its primary function (a musical loop that plays in the background of a fight) well enough.
9. TURN IT UP NOW (BRIAN “CHUCK” NEW)
This New production isn’t especially Wu-esque, but that clearly wasn’t the task at hand, and if you heard this shit in the background of, say, Street Fighter II, you’d likely dig it.
10. VENGEANCE (UNKNOWN COMPOSER)
Keith Arem is likely the creator behind “Vengeance” (it’s hard to say without tracking these guys down and directly asking), which could make sense given how this sounds nothing like “The Furious One” or “Turn It Up Now”. It hews closer to the hip hop sphere to the point where one could easily imagine someone breakdancing to this beat, which is to say, it bangs. It’s simple, as it’s mostly drums with the occasional bassline, but it kind of rocks?
11. JUNGLE INSTRUMENTAL #1 (UNKNOWN COMPOSER)
Mostly just sound effects.
12. JUNGLE INSTRUMENTAL #2 (UNKNOWN COMPOSER)
See the previous song review for a description of this title.
13. JUNGLE INSTRUMENTAL #3 (UNKNOWN COMPOSER)
Of the three “Jungle Instrumentals”, all of which should likely be credited to Arem, number three is the only one that could be looped up into a coherent beat, although that would be doing it a disservice, given how it clearly exists to set the tone and nothing else. Kind of dope, though.
14. WU WORLD ORDER (CHORUS ACAPELLA) (LA THE DARKMAN & RZA)
You already know what this is going to sound like.
15. EARTH MAN (BRIAN “CHUCK” NEW)
“Earth Man”, which absolutely isn’t a RZA beat given how it appears on a project released by Brian New and the recently-disgraced disc jockey Tim Westwood (as do “The Furious One” and “Turn It Up Now”), is my favorite of the non-Wu bunch, as it’s an instrumental that stretches out over three minutes, giving the listener time to acclimate to their, er, new surroundings, and it also sounds really fucking good. In a different world, New would have composed the score for Steven Soderbergh’s Oceans films instead of Dave Holmes, and I don’t mean that as any disrespect to Holmes’s work, this shit is just fun to listen to, that’s all. Does it fit the Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style vibe? Kind of, but it also stands alone, as it should.
THE TAKEAWAY: I can’t critique Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style as a legitimate album because, of course, it isn’t one, so I’ll keep this brief. The non-Wu stuff is decent-to-good – hell, now I want to track down that Brian New project just to see if he was always in that headspace or if his three uncredited contributions were anomalies in his catalog. Keith Arem mostly gives us sound effects, so that doesn’t help. As for the actual Wu-Tang tracks, there’s only really two you might not have heard prior to today’s write-up: “Wu World Order” and “Killa”, and there’s no need to seek out an original copy of the game for those, since they’re both readily available online, and besides, both sound rather incomplete anyway, as though RZA literally gave Paradox Development some throwaways he had lying around, because why would he have wasted the good shit here, am I right?
As a lifetime Wu stan, listen to me when I say this: don’t track this shit down. There’s really no need for anyone to add Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style down today. (If one wants better playable versions of Method Man and Ghostface Killah to fight with, might I suggest Def Jam: Fight for NY, a far superior game?) There’s especially no need for anyone to seek out this disc just for its soundtrack, which is mostly not Wu-Tang material anyway. However, those of you who already have this game in your collection, I suggest you hold on to it for dear life, just in case it appreciates in value, and as for the music contained wherein, well, it made me want to look for some more stuff from Brian New, so it wasn’t a complete and total loss. If you absolutely positively want to hear a single verse from RZA, La the Darkman, and Masta Killa that somehow passed you by, just use the Interweb, folks.
-Max
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