The game is a modification of the Japanese Mark III title, Hokuto no Ken[a], based on the manga series of the same name, which is known as Fist of the North Star outside Japan.

While commonly compared to Irem's Kung-Fu Master in both visuals and mechanics, Black Belt received mixed reactions from critics with some consensus on its boss fights being a positive highlight and its levels being too repetitive.

Black Belt is a beat 'em up in which the player takes control of a martial artist named Riki[b], who sets out to rescue his girlfriend Kyoko[c] from his rival Wang[d].

The game is composed of a series of left-to-right, side-scrolling stages (or "chapters") in which Riki must utilize punches, kicks, and jumps to defeat different types of minor underlings and the occasional sub-boss.

[1] Power-ups containing health, time, or temporary invincibility will also sometimes cross the top of the screen, requiring the player to perform a high jump to reach them.

[7] Naka revealed that the team questioned if it was appropriate to integrate certain parts of the story into requirements for defeating bosses if some players were unfamiliar with the source material.

[10] The Black Belt localized version was first shown the month prior at the Summer Consumer Electronics Show alongside the Master System and its starting lineup of software titles for regions outside Japan.

[22] The western release of Lost Paradise retains the original Japanese rendition of Hokuto no Ken rather than its Black Belt counterpart.

Combined with "fantastic visuals" such as its "extremely impressive" use of parallax scrolling for backgrounds, he declared Black Belt one of the Master System's finest games in the console's early line-up.

[2][4] Computer Entertainer editor Celeste Dolan positively likened the protagonist's superhuman abilities to those seen in some martial arts films, concluding that the game contained "good, frenzied action with plenty of challenge".

The magazine commended the game's inclusion of a basic plot and its instruction booklet's differentiation of oriental combat styles but mocked its translation.

Sega Power contributor Steve Jarrett found the end-stage bosses to be decent but the stages leading up to them to be "painfully repetitive".

[32] Another duplicate assessment in Console XS and Sega Pro likewise described the objectives as "unexciting and repetitive" as well as "criminally easy" while additionally calling the graphics "incredibly poor".

[3] Websites including IGN, CBR, Screen Rant, WatchMojo, and Sports Illustrated all mentioned the localized box art of Black Belt as being among the worst of generally bad Master System game covers.