In contrast to the grounded realism of Karate Champ, Yie Ar Kung-Fu moved the genre towards more fantastical, fast-paced action, with various different characters having a variety of special moves and high jumps, establishing the template for subsequent fighting games.

[11][12] The player can perform up to 16 different moves,[13] using a combination of buttons and joystick movements while standing, crouching or jumping.

Yie Ar Kung-Fu was subsequently widely ported to platforms including the MSX, Family Computer, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC and BBC Micro.

An emulated version of the game was released in 2005 for PlayStation 2 in Japan as part of the Oretachi Geasen Zoku Sono-series.

In 1987, the game was included on the compilation Konami Coin-op Hits with Hyper Sports, Green Beret and Mikie.

[16] The Famicom version was relaunched for the Game Boy Color (as a part of Konami GB Collection Vol.

The arcade version of Yie Ar Kung-Fu was made available on Microsoft's Game Room service for its Xbox 360 console and for Windows-based PCs in July 2010.

The MSX version of Yie Ar Kung-Fu was released for D4 Enterprise's Project EGG service in October 2014 in Japan.

In Japan, Game Machine listed Yie Ar Kung-Fu on their March 1, 1985 issue as being the second most-successful table arcade unit of the month.

Another fighting game by Konami, Martial Champion, was originally planned to be released as Yie Ar Kung-Fu 2.