Way of the Warrior is a fighting game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Universal Interactive Studios for the 3DO. It was released in North America on August 30, 1994. Way of the Warrior features high resolution graphics, characters with detailed storylines, and ultra-violent finishing moves. Players have to combat different fighters, their own character's "shadow", and two bosses to achieve complete victory. Each character has a standard arsenal of offensive and defensive fighting moves, combination attacks, and special moves that kill the defeated opponent in an extreme manner. The game's soundtrack consists of music from the 1992 White Zombie album La Sexorcisto: Devil Music, Vol. 1. Gameplay Similar to Street Fighter II: The World Warrior (1991) and Mortal Kombat (1992), players must fight to the death with any of the World Warriors to be sealed into "The Book of Warriors". Each character has a standard arsenal of offensive and defensive fighting moves, combination attacks, and special moves that kill the defeated opponent in an ultra-violent manner. The game also has several hidden characters that can be unlocked with secret codes. Development Naughty Dog founders Andy Gavin and Jason Rubin, while satisfied with their work on Keef the Thief (1989) and Rings of Power (1992) for Electronic Arts (EA), were discouraged by their loss of creative control and support from EA's marketing division, and decided to take a hiatus from the video game industry. Gavin pursued a PhD at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), while Rubin moved to California intending to take up surfing. Rubin instead established a special effects company, initiating his involvement in 3D computer graphics. Rubin's company soon accepted a contract from Columbia Pictures to create a shot for the film Wolf (1994). Eight months after the start of their hiatus and before Rubin would begin work on Wolf, Gavin and Rubin received a call from EA founder Trip Hawkins, who disclosed his plan for a new disc-based console named the 3DO and offered the pair free development kits. Gavin and Rubin were quickly persuaded by the prospect of games made for a large and readily produceable format, thus bypassing the cartridge-printing decisions encountered with Rings of Power, and accepted Hawkins's proposal. After agreeing to create a game for the 3DO, Gavin and Rubin began development in 1993 without an attached publisher, and self-funded production with the money made from Rings of Power, amounting to