The movie wasn't going to have MA action in the first place, but that changed once Donnie Yen was on-board and asked the producer to put additional funds in order to shoot them accordingly to the story. The result became the now famous alley fight and the last fight with Jacky Wu and Sammo Hung Kam-Bo respectively.
Wilson Yip originally planned to shoot a lengthy intro sequence, showing a close relationship between Sammo Hung Kam-Bo and Jacky Wu, but the budget was not enough so the idea was scrapped.