Bruce Lee: the powdered drink, the "button masher" and the inevitable fan backlash

Bruce Lee Siu-lung would have turned 74  on November 27, and although the kung fu icon has been dead for more than four decades, he had a big week with the launch of Bruce Lee Instant Drinks and then, on his birthday, the release of a new mobile phone game for iOS and Android.

Already downloaded more than a million times, Bruce Lee: Enter the Game is, in essence, a sidescrolling “beat ‘em up” – a popular genre in the 1980s and '90s – that sees a digital Bruce punch, kick and nunchuck his way through the game. 

Lee’s hard-hitting moves are performed via swipes on a phone or tablet screen, and they’re mostly self-explanatory – a straight forward swipe is a punch, while a slightly upward swipe results in his trademark lightning-fast kicks. If you brush your finger up, then forward? That’s Lee’s jump kick.

Even during the peak of its popularity in the early '90s (with Capcom’s Final Fight leading the charge), “beat ‘em ups” were not known for their depth – the games were dismissed by critics as “button mashers”, a derogatory term for games that require little skill – and Enter the Game is no exception. While kicking butt with a digital Lee offers an initial visceral sense of joy, the game eventually becomes highly repetitive. It is, essentially, a “button masher” without the buttons.

What’s likely to inspire the most discussion is the consumerism behind Enter the Game. Last year, his daughter Shannon Lee was criticised by fans for licensing his image in an alcohol advertisement. And with not one but two products out for her father’s birthday, Lee junior will be in for more of a backlash.