Progress is out of control in Killer Instinct for the Super NES. The game takes place in a bleak future in which a powerful corporation by the name of Ultratech produces weapons to sell to other corporations bent on destroying one another. To test these weapons, the company provides them to combatants in a popular game show called the Killer Instinct Tournament. Produced by Ultratech's entertainment division, this tournament is a bloody series of one-on-one, Mortal Kombat 3-style fights in which the winner gets anything he or she wants and the losers get to meet their maker.

Fights are organized into rounds consisting of 100 seconds each. Your goal as a contestant is to eliminate the other fighter's two life bars by pummeling the fighter senseless. You can jump, duck and block, and you can thrash your opponent with punches, kicks, sweeps, uppercuts and other standard moves. Each standard move has one of three levels of intensity: quick, medium and fierce.

To maximize your score, you should pull off combos and special moves whenever you can. When your opponent is near death, you can pull off a Danger Move or an Ultra Combo. Ultra Combos are sometimes in excess of 20 hits!

There are 11 different aliens, mystics, undead creatures and other fighters, each endowed with numerous moves and weapons of his or her own. For example: Riptor, a hybrid of a dinosaur and a human being, can spew flaming venom, release dragon breath and execute a claw uppercut; Saberwulf, a being afflicted with lycanthropy, can release a flaming bat, pull off a sabreslap and let loose with a howl; and Cinder, a creature of living flame, has a killer heatfist, a wicked fireflash and a devastating inferno move.

The manual lists 10 special moves for each fighter, but players can discover more advanced moves (such as Air Doubles, Shadow Moves and Post Breaker Specials) by experimenting with the controls. There are three basic ways to pull of special moves. Prior to pressing an attack button, you must hold a control pad button down for a couple of seconds, perform a rolling motion on the pad or tap on the pad.

The last enemy you will face in this game is Eyedol, an evil warlord who was once banished from Earth. Ultratech has plucked him out of the past to do battle with the finalist in the Killer Instinct Tournament. A practice mode is available if you're not ready for the rigors of tournament play.