E for Effort: King of Fighters Maximum Impact
SNK is an interesting company to research and write about, especially because they’re completely downplayed and have been outside the public scope of knowledge for a long time.? Despite this they used to produce some of the most advanced gaming hardware of the “Golden Era” that is the age of the Nintendo Entertainment System, Sega Genesis, and Super Nintendo.? In the mid ninties comparing the arcade and home console version of the Neogeo was like comparing a Nintendo 64 to a Playstation 3.? Ironic turn of fate that SNK later became famous for being a company behind the times.? SNK tried more than once to catch on to the new trends of the gaming world.? They made a CD based system, they made a color handheld system, they even made a 3D system.? None of that really caught on compared to the original Neogeo, that arcade system that my generation will remember as the machine that had 4 games at their local pizza place.
Sometimes I really wonder if SNK’s had it too rough.? It seems like they get shot down no matter what they do. ? I can’t think of any other company who’d been shot down as many times as SNK and still got back up.? Sega’s a close contender, and one I used to really love on the same level as I do SNK.? Sadly they’re a company whose spirit I think is not what it used to be.? It’s a hard thing to explain, especially because I’m not one of those people who hates Sonic the Hedgehog.? I work in a gaming store.? I see lots of happy little kids who love their Sonic the Hedgehog games.? It’s just my general impression that Sega has somewhat lost its spirit.? Super Monkey Ball Step and Roll’s attempt to ride on the Wii Fit trend and the amount of protest it took to release Yakuza 3 to the United States simply speak to me and say that the creative minds in the company now have less say than they used to.? Sega is willing to close the doors to a project they feel is a risk.? It’ll be a sad day for me when when Sega finally admits they’re never going to bother with Shenmue III.
This is why I love SNK.? They do what they love for better or worse.? Fighting games were a dying market that SNK never stopped making games for.? Not everything the company produces is golden, but they always work with what they have.? SNK is an E for Effort company that never gives up.? SNK’s only limitation is their fans and those fans’ willingness to support the company.? When their fans supported them they released a slew of magnificent games with all the frills available.? There was a time when SNK would hire bands to re-record their game soundstracks live, something they probably didn’t need to do.? How many companies in those days would go through that trouble just so your Sega Saturn game would sound better?? Not many because they didn’t need to.? Look at King of Fighters XII.? That game was expensive to produce, moreso than if SNK had simply made the game 3D.? Supposedly each character took an individual employee nearly a year and a half to complete.? Love it or hate it, without KOF XII we wouldn’t have KOF XIII.? KOF XIII looks magnificent.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3xlKfKsRWw[/youtube]
Today I’m looking at a game that failed to impress most reviewers, was generally snuffed at by the gaming public and was even ignored by the many of SNK’s supposed fans:? King of Fighters Maximum Impact; or in other words a pretty good example of how people typically react to an SNK game.? I think Maximum Impact is a terribly ironic example because this game actually went out of its way to give people something they wanted:? A 3D KOF that didn’t rely on the low-resolution graphics that the King of Fighters series had become known for.? It was a relatively early PS2 and XBox game and for a first effort it was not that bad at all.? It was actually a pretty great effort when you consider SNK hadn’t really touched a 3D game for half a prior to Maximum Impact.? I recently gave this game a shot because of fellow Podsumaki host KD Alpha. The special edition box set of the game rolled by my store used for dirt cheap. As a collector I was tempted, so I started playing it and actually had a good bit of fun. It reminded me of a simpler time when I wasn’t a snob about fighting games. Even though the game gets me waxing nostalgic and remembering my earlier days as a fighting game enthusiast there’s still some things I don’t really care for about it, but regardless I can respect it. I think maybe other people could too if the fighting game community were a little less stuck up.
Just because I’d never actually played this game before doesn’t mean I don’t know something about it. I’m an SNK nut. I know more than I really should about a game I’d never touched before this article. During SNK’s bankruptcy there were several heavy losses to the company’s staff, among them lead concept artist Toshiaki Mori. Toshiaki Mori is otherwise known as Shinkiro. Many of you can still enjoy Shinkiro’s excellent work as he continues his career at Capcom. Just recently he did the illustrations for Tatsunoko vs Capcom. What this meant is that when SNK rose from the dead they needed a new head artist King of Fighters 2003. A popular fan-artist who called himself Falcoon was elected. While he’d worked with SNK at prior to their bankruptcy his return seemed to be dictated by fans. It was a rumor at the time that a contest was held to choose the lead artist and Falcoon was the winner.
KOF 2003 was the only official King of Fighters game that Falcoon worked on.? After that he was tasked as the head character designer for a side series: Maximum Impact. Love him or hate him, this guy is responsible for all the new faces in the game and reflects a bit of the attitude this game was made with. Even though he wasn’t actually in a controlling position for the first game, he identified the series for me. I can respect him to a degree, but for a long time the fact that he was a fan-artist reminded me of something: I really dislike the idea of fans being put in charge of professional projects because I really don’t trust fans. I’ve gotten over that.
KOF Maximum Impact is not a serious fighter in the least and would have been something I appreciated before I became a fighting game snob. As much as I may dislike Falcoon’s style I’ve come to appreciate what he has to offer SNK as a whole.? He and the Maximum Impact games added variety to SNK’s library.? King of Fighters Maximum Impact was not made with the intent of killing off the 2D SNK games. King of Fighters XII and XIII make it obvious that just about nothing can kill 2D KOF. Maximum Impact was something simpler; something more accessible. It could be easily compared to Street Fighter EX, another series that was snubbed quite a bit by the gaming public. Ironically enough King of Fighters Maximum Impact and Street Fighter EX 3 have the exact same metacritic score, and they’re not glowing. Really goes to show you how much people hated the idea of a 3D fighting game that wasn’t exactly like what had come before it. I’m betting the grand majority never gave either series a fair chance.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TQ78N38FaQ[/youtube]
The idea for this game was very simple: take popular King of Fighters characters and inject some common 3D gameplay mechanics into the KOF formula. Special moves were still performed the same way and things like rolling were still included. When we talk about injecting 3D what I mean is things like alternate costumes, semi-automatic combos, side-stepping and wall juggles defined Maximum Impact. It was pretty interesting to see it in action. There were even some unlockables. Beating the game with any of the 20-ish characters would award you with a character profile and bonus costume items. Beating the game’s challenge mode would award you with genuine alternate costumes and extra color schemes. Realistically it wasn’t much compared to a series like Soul Calibur, but I can’t say I mind that. I’ve only got it in me to play like that once and never again. Maximum Impact was fresh enough that I found it in myself to beat the game with every character, if only just to see how all the characters played. I’m actually thankful the game wasn’t obnoxious about hanging some unlockable carrot over my head. If I wanted to play the game forever, I would. When I feel like playing this game I think I’ll just crank up the difficult and hit arcade mode. This is the sort of game you can enjoy by yourself for a while but the real fun is in dicking around with friends.
I think the main problem with the game was that people were expecting Maximum Impact to be some solid competitive game. Definitely not if you can’t tell from the video above. Maximum Impact was one of those games that kind of fell apart if you got hardcore about it. Then again, that never stopped some fighting games from being fun. It’s what hardcore types would refer to as a “broken” game, but there’s something really fun and fascinating about learning a broken game. Sometimes the most broken fighters are the most fun; you ever play a game called Marvel vs Capcom 2? Just playing with the combo system and seeing what you’re capable of can be some pretty good times. Maximum Impact got snubbed pretty hard for being broken and having ridiculous combos, but I think it was blown a bit out of proportion. Ever seen what you’re capable of doing in a series like Tekken? Not as bad in a case by case comparison, but still pretty ridiculous. Really often hardcore fighting game players act like they’ve never indulged in any guilty pleasures before. It’s not like this game doesn’t know that it’s competitively broken. The game’s computer opponents are fully aware that they can pick you up off the ground even if it’s not as brutal as the videos linked here. The game still knows its own system well enough to steal a good 50% of your health in one combo.
To me this game should be considered a lesson to play first and judge later, it’s actually pretty fun in a casual sort of way. Playing Maximum Impact brought back memories of the time where I was really into Bloody Roar: Primal Fury on the Gamecube. It was a great gateway fighter, especially because it retained some of the spirit of 2D gameplay while producing some nice 3D eye candy. It wasn’t meant to be played in the tournament scene because it was quite clearly broken on the competitive level, but if all you intended to do was play the game with friends there wasn’t a better gateway drug out there. Bloody Roar: Primal Fury and other games of its ilk were just fun. Casual fighters like this are what got me into the genre in the first place. Were I a bit younger and had given Maximum Impact a chance it could have easily replaced Bloody Roar: Primal Fury as one of my favorite “for fun” fighting games. What ever happened to just being able to have fun with a fighting game? There’s a lot of reasons I think the fighting game genre died out; I think one of them is the fact that fighting game players in general tend to be real snobs. I’ll make a bet with you that if you can find a hardcore fighting game enthusiast he’s got some fighting game he never actually played that he’ll tell you isn’t worth touching. The bet is on right now; go find somebody that plays fighting games see if you can’t get them to verbally crap on a few games they’d never even played.
Like I said, Maximum Impact was never intended to replace the 2D King of Fighters games. If you wanted to play a really solid game meant for competition SNK was still making sure its players had the option. Maximum Impact doesn’t even connect with the official King of Fighters storyline. Some people have actually confused this for an unofficial Fatal Fury game because the setting is Southtown, an extremely central location in both the Art of Fighting and Fatal Fury games. It’s an interesting and understandable misconception but Maximum Impact is one of those “alternate dimension” type deals. Don’t you love it when gaming companies do that? The storyline in the game is kind of a mess but the main characters in the game are Alba Meira and Soiree Meira, a pair of street orphans looking to avenge their adoptive father who was killed by a gang leader named Duke. Remember how I said people confused Maximum Impact for a Fatal Fury game? The fact that Alba and Soiree basically have the same backstory as Terry Bogard and Andy Bogard from the Fatal Fury games doesn’t really help that. The main thing I really don’t care for in this game happens to be Falcoon’s character designs:? I just didn’t think the new Maximum Impact characters were anything to write home about.? I thought the same thing about Street Fighter IV and I still like that game too, but it won’t stop me from talking about it.
The main boss Duke I’m actually a bit fond of as a design. The basic story of the game is that Duke is the current ringleader of the gang that controls Southtown’s streets. Duke gained this position after killing Fate–Alba Meira and Soiree Meira’s adoptive father–and of course Alba and Soiree want to reclaim control of the town from Duke. Duke’s a stylish but simple design and the scar he has across his neck really helps distinguish him as a badass. You’re not about to forget it as his trademark when the camera zooms on his neck.? The man should clearly be dead.? From a distance you don’t really notice it, but once you see it up close you don’t forget.? Even Duke’s voice is pretty badass, and Maximum Impact typically has horrible voice acting. Likely the main reason this game has English dialog in the first place is because SNK and Sony have had a turbulent relationship here in the States and Sony demanded it. That aside we have a simple but relatively cool antagonist for Maximum Impact. The man is quite serviceable as a villain so it’s too bad he doesn’t have very great competition. The main characters come off as pretty dull, at least in my opinion, while the rest of the cast can be interesting but insignificant.
How should I put this? I just find Maximum Impact’s poster children to be kind of boring.? Honestly most fighting game protagonists do tend to be plain, but I at least find something to be a little sentimental over.? Duke has some kinda punch to him.? Alba Miera for me, not so much.? He technically looks cool with the elaborate design of his costume, but for all his zippers and belts and what have you, the guy’s just kind of boring.? I guess I don’t dig main characters that don’t show any emotion.? He lacks an identity, he doesn’t even express much of a personality when he fights or speaks in the game. Ultimately I find him a forgettable lead character. He’s supposed to be a strong and righteous figure who wants to take his father’s place and protect Southtown from danger, but you’d never really guess it.
Soiree Meira on the other hand plays the role of the loudmouth little brother. If it weren’t for Alba acting as a stern figure to chide Soiree (on very slight occasion) there would be almost nothing to define Alba.? Soiree seems to exist in order to reveal that Alba is a responsible and caring person.? Soiree is very much so a complimentary character and individually he’s what I would consider a better design, but he also fails at what he’s supposed to really be.? He really fails to compliment anything beyond what I just mentioned. Soiree dresses like a Texan who just hit his mid-life crisis and decided he was going to go ranching to prove what a man he is. That Texan isn’t pulling a very manly vibe rocking the teal and baby blue outfit either.? To top that off Soiree uses Capoeira of all things; how does that even go with his style? Forget about complimenting himself, though. Soiree is clearly supposed to add to his brother Alba. How exactly does this guy’s wannabe cowboy look mesh with Alba? My only guess is that Soiree is supposed to look rural and Alba is supposed to look urban, thus making them opposites. I feel it comes off as forced, especially when Alba and Soiree had a pretty good way to compliment eachothers’ designs already: their tattoos. When Alba and Soiree Meira stand side to side there is a tattoo of a cow’s skull with wings that begins on one brother and ends on the other. They both have half of the same tattoo. It’s a shame Alba Meira in his primary costume couldn’t be wearing any more clothing short of squeezing some pantyhose over his head and robbing a liquor store.? That tattoo could have been a very strong and distinguishing character trait along the same line as Duke’s scar.? Instead it seems more like an untapped frill.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYLj2233nWI[/youtube]
So clearly I have my issues with the game’s character designs. Falcoon as I saw him just didn’t have it in him to design characters of the same quality as other SNK fighting games. That’s all my opinion, though. For all I know there’s quite a few people out there who think the entire cast of new characters in Maximum Impact are badasses. Maximum Impact very clearly has its own sense of style, whether it be expressed through the characters or even the music. It’s good that the series has some way of distinguishing itself. Disliking the new characters really shouldn’t be enough to spoil the game considering there’s a nice variety of SNK favorites littering Maximum Impact’s roster. Whether or not I actually liked this game I still think it had some value to it. The funny thing is that all the people I’ve ever talked to who openly expressed enjoyment for the Maximum Impact games were people who previously had never played a King of Fighters game. That’s what’s great about Maximum Impact; as I’ve said these are excellent gateway fighters. The fact that hardcore players snub new experiences is their own problem, but unfortunately it becomes a problem for everyone when the fighting game community backs itself into stagnation. Games like Maximum Impact were good for the industry. It’s really too bad that we’ll probably never see another Maximum Impact game made.
Fighting game fans in general bought the first game and hated it, then never bothered to get the sequel. I really doubt SNK can afford to make another, though who knows.? An updated version of Maximum Impact 2 called King of Fighters Regulation A can be found in some arcades right now. Both Maximum Impact and its sequel King of Fighters 2006 can still be bought brand new for pretty dirt cheap. Hell, I’ve seen the collector’s edition that I have brand new for less than 20 bucks.? Supposedly King of Fighters 2006 is far better than the original, so that sounds pretty nice.? If you were ever looking for a game to try and get somebody into the King of Fighters series, I’d say find them a copy of King of Fighters 2006 for the PS2. Not much to lose. Like most SNK fighters on the PS2, it’s pretty cheap.
Ratings
- The King of Fighters ’95 4Gag Battle
(5.00 out of 5)
- The King of Fighters ’95 4Gag Battle
About Oyaji
I love KOF
@SonicTempest: I’m aware about the whole producer thing. The article itself links to an interview with him stating that he would become one. I also linked to a job description showing exactly what his job entailed. He wasn’t a game designer.
98 is a game where the tiers have really seemed to change a lot over the years. I was looking up recent tournament matches from Japan and the level of destruction players have learned to tap into with Chizuru was pretty frightening.
2003 is admittedly a pretty weird game in certain respects, but I’ve always found it offputting that fans can consider it such a betrayal, especially when it’s what led into KOF XI. It was the first KOF I played and it’s what got me into the series. I still play it once in a while. At the time that the game had just come out many people did play and enjoy it and while it’s still not an exceptionally balanced game it can be played competitively. It was a fighting game that came out and was replaced and that was the end of that. That’s not so uncommon for fighting games.
@Wry Guy: Falcoon was the art director on MI1, but he was promoted to full-blown producer for MI2 as well as MI Regulation A. If you go to the MI2 official website (http://game.snkplaymore.co.jp/official/kof-mi2/) and click on ‘development diary’, it lists him as the producer. The same can be inferred from watching the MI2 credits where his name pops up several times.
I’ll accept that your friends got into fighting games because of MI, but I really think that if you’re going to try and get someone interested in a genre over the long term, showing them some of that genre’s least impressive games is not a great way to do it. I personally started on KOF’99, but I only really got hooked on the game when 2002 rolled around and I went to an arcade for the first time and realised how much I had to learn.
As for what Iie-Kyo’s beef with KOF2003 is, balance is only a part of it. Most people regard Duo Lon in 2K3 to be far more overpowered relative to the rest of the cast than Athena was in 2K2 (keep in mind that DL had an infinite that was relatively easy to set up). That said I also know a lot of people who play ’98 regularly, and while Chizuru is a strong character in that game I don’t think anyone puts her on the same tier as say, 2K2 Athena.
That said, even without Duo Lon the game just felt terrible in several ways. Lag added in weird places throughout the game (a lot of characters have no real safe pressure options due to lag added everywhere, and the ones that do like Jhun, Daimon, K’ and Malin are the ones near the top of the tier list, surprise surprise).
For some reason they also removed invincibility from command grabs on wakeup, which made grapplers rather frustrating to fight against because of the 50/50 wakeup games that ensued. In particular Iori was only really considered good in 2K3 because of this bug and because his LDM comboed very easily. And of course our good friend Duo Lon also had a command grab, making his mixups even more terrifying than they already were.
To top it all off they added a half-assed damage scaling system that screwed over anyone with 1-hit DMs, making it pointless to try and combo into them. You can do stuff like Kyo’s classic Shiki Kai combo into Orochinagi (with some difficulty, thanks to the lag), but you’re rewarded with pathetic damage for your efforts.
So yeah. 2003 = broken in many ways. XI = vastly improved sequel that basically invalidates 2003 in every way.
It seems to be a widespread theme related problem. Normally html breaks would be the workaround. Not quite sure how to fix this one…
@Gunsmith: Say, would you happen to know a way to get WordPress to play nice with line breaks in the comments? When they start to get longer it turns into a wall of text sometimes.
@SonicTempest: I’ve already met several people who played Maximum Impact the most out of any King of Fighters game and were open to playing more from that point on. Likewise I’ve met people who gave KOF MIRA a shot in the arcade just because it was fun to play. I don’t know what to really say. I’ve already seen the proof that these games work, and it probably would have worked on me too considering what types of fighting games I played when I was just getting into the genre.
Not everyone is going to be led into the genre by stuff like KOF 98 or Guilty Gear. You really have to consider what exactly hooked their interest in the first place. Personally I was interested in Guilty Gear because of the style, not the complexity.
Iie-Kyo: The fighting game community more or less died for every genre and company around that time. Likewise I don’t quite understand why people make the case that KOF 2003 is so incredibly broken. Duo Lon is an extremely dangerous character, but his overwhelming strength was overrated. There’s many dangerous characters in that game, and despite the earliest match videos there are many more teams that are viable than K Dash, Duo Lon, Daimon. The people who actually did continue to play the game have produced match videos that display the game as being no more broken than something like King of Fighters 98, where Chizuru is easily capable of KO’ing an opponent in about 15 seconds with an overwhelming offense. Or 2002 where Athena can dominate people with frame traps, teleports, and high priority.
The Neogeo Pocket was actually the most successful handheld to fight against the Gameboy since the GameGear, which is actually a credit to SNK. The system was cut short because Azure pulled them off the shelves after buying out SNK. They were actually pretty great. I’m playing one right now.
I can’t speak to you about the “feel” of the games. KOF 1998, 2002, 2003, and Maximum Impact all happen to feel like KOF games to me, because they actually are KOF games. The one game I will grant you deserves real criticism is KOF XII, but I still think people need to lighten up. I’ve likewise met many people who share the opinion that XII was an excellently crafted game. I’ve even spoken to one or two people who are disappointed that some of the gameplay mechanics from KOF XII are gone. Despite that, like I’ve said it’s just another KOF Neowave. You’re lauding KOF XI as being great. KOF 2003 and Neowave were the foundations SNK used to build those, and I’m of the personal opinion that KOF 2003 was still a pretty good game and Neowave if nothing else, wasn’t that bad. KOF XIII is following the exact same pattern using KOF XII as the foundation SNK needs to build their real masterpiece.
To both SonicTempest and lie-Kyo: Falcoon was an art designer for the original Maximum Impact and that was it. He had no hand whatsoever in the gameplay. The Special Edition comes with a DVD that includes a few interviews which includes conversation with the original producer whose place Falcoon took. Falcoon was solely responsible for the visual identity of the series. Likewise this is what a game producer does:
http://www.dperry.com/archives/jobs/descriptions/game_producer_f/
That was Falcoon’s job.
Are you blaming the “fighting game snobs” as you call it for turning down MI ReA?
The logical reaction would be of course they’re gonna turn it down if you slap the King of Fighters logo in front of the game and fail to deliver what the franchise was known for. The problem with the game was, as you distinctly put it, it WASN’T KoF. It was KoF in name only with a bunch of characters that had moves that kinda looked like they did from KoF, but didn’t exactly play like they did in KoF, and it abandoned a lot of the things the players who loved KoF 98 and 2k2 were used to.
Now if you’re arguing that the target audience for MI was different, then perhaps you have a point, but I can’t imagine having a solid fighting game community for a game like this without having some of your hardcore (or as you like to call it, the fighting game snob) base backing it up. Which it did not have, because SNK ABANDONED that base with MI. I’m not going to be able to give distinct details as to why, because that will result in me having to make my own article to counter yours. And I don’t have that type of in depth knowledge of what SNK did blow by blow like you do – I just have the knowledge as a “fighting game snob” (and a fan of all things Kyo Kusanagi) what SNK FAILED to do with its mainstream title and the spinoffs that were released after it.
I see that you fault the fans for abandoning SNK and SNK having the Rocky ability to get back up after it gets knocked down; that SNK should be applauded for such a move because gosh darn it, they never quit. I’d say that the fans never abandoned SNK. The fans LOVE SNK – but they loved the SNK that knew what it was doing, when it was churning out one great title after another, even on a so-called dated system and SNK loved its fans back with those concerts, events, redone soundtracks, etc.
However, SNK seems to have somehow lost its ability to do things properly after 2000, what with its bankrupcy and the failing of the Neo Geo Pocket, among other things. It was a bitter shell of itself, and that’s when the fans slowly faded away, because SNK repeatedly shot itself in the foot; some of that base came back with 2k2, but I can tell you the fighting game community here in Hawaii more or less died after 2k3 was released. SNKP had a chance to get back on its feet and start a new KoF saga after 2k2, but 2k3 suffered the same problems MI did too, with that “broken” gameplay you feel is fun to learn that pretty much ruined the mainstream KoF series. MI exaserbated the problem because it simply put, *wasn’t KoF*. What did the “fans” do when MI was released? They kept playing 2k2 and 98 because why? 2k3 (which I know Falcoon wasn’t responsible for gameplay-wise) and MI didn’t play like a regular KoF did.
Then there was a ray of hope with XI. XI had some stupid problems with its character balance but it really did feel like a KoF at its core. It brought a lot of the players back and had people abuzz about it, it was a bit of a sleeper hit, but nobody said the game was crap, and it still maintained the KoF feel while adding new elements to it that made the game deeper (the skill stock system and the live switchout). The game didn’t feel rushed and had a very polished feel to it. I can tell you some oldtimers came back to play XI because XI, compared to 2k3 and MI, was an actual viable game. Soundtrack was excellent, graphics were upscaled but nice looking, gameplay was solid – three top tiers ruined a lot but it definitely wasn’t MI or 2k3.
Then SNKP shot itself in the foot again by creating MI2, and even announcing a person who DOES NOT KNOW GAME DESIGN to be the main creator. The part I couldn’t understand here was there was all this production money poured into this game, but why couldn’t they have used that money to make the game better, refine the gameplay features to make it MORE like KoF and less like some slapdash mutant baby child of a 2D and 3D fighter. They even pushed enough money into it to make an arcade version. All they did was just let Falcoon go nuts on the game and direct it in a matter that made it feel more like a poorly designed doujin game with more emphasis on single player content and little to no consideration for tournament competitive play. And what happened to it? Well by golly, the “hardcore fighting snobs” rejected it. Well isn’t that a surprise?
Then years later, they announce XII – again I had hopes for XII, and again it turns into an unfinished project that abandoned its roots by removing the things that made XI at least somewhat successful and implementing new gameplay with bare bones non-single-player-friendly features with horrible netcode and characters with movelists that had tons of moves removed to a point where it was no longer fun anymore. This combination of bad moves by SNKP is what caused, once again, the loyal SNK fanbase to abandon them. Read: it’s not the fanbase’s fault that the game had huge issues. It’s SNK’s fault for releasing an unfinished game to a public that would obviously be critical of a mainstream title that they’ve been waiting years for.
Every time SNK does something that gives it hope to move on ahead as a game developer, it does something afterwards that simply make you scratch your head and makes you wonder what the heck both the executives and game designers are smoking. Two steps forward, one step back. SNK pretty much has one last chance to bring in a new set of fans with this “last attempt” at KoF, otherwise they’ll have to turn to the UM series to continue making money off the franchise. I have a very guarded optimism about XIII, but I’ll be quick to lay the hammer on SNKP if they make like their 2k3/MI selves and mess up the game with retarded gameplay/additions.
There is one thing SNKP needs to be lauded for, however, and that’s their Unlimited/Ultimate Match series. Look at what 98 UM and 2k2 UM did. They’ve both done reasonably well, because the game developers went over them with a fine toothed comb to tweak the game into something that’s playable competitively, and on top of that they added features to appeal to the “non hardcore” crowd: awesome intros, more characters, beautifully redone stages, kickin soundtracks. The two UMs made it feel like SNKP was back in its groove – their presentation was done extremely well and had shades of 96 (which despite the fact it was a broken game, had the rest of these features) written all over it. I would have NO qualms about recommending someone who is new to the SNK series to play these games because of the amount of spit and polish that were in the UM series, and I hope they continue to redefine probably the two best selling KoFs they have to date because that was SNK when they knew how to create games with good gameplay.
I honestly think they have some of the developers from the 98/2K2UM team working on this game, because the gameplay really, finally, looks like it’s going in the right direction. Only time will tell.
Honestly, I gave MI and its sequels a fair shot but they never really grew on me. The slapdash combination of 2D and 3D fighting mechanics never felt very coherent, and the lack of things like hitpauses just threw me off with regards to combo timing. Even little things, like the size of the characters relative to both the viewable area and the size of the stages, have an effect.
I did buy the MI collectors edition when it came out (probably because I didn’t know better at the time), but I skipped out on MI2 and MIRA because it seemed to me that Falcoon had no idea how to design a solid fighting game system – he just tossed in zillions of stylish arts (hey look, free high-low mixups!) and special moves/DMs, and half-heartedly added a counter move to try and prevent ‘spam’.
You made the argument that these games weren’t meant to be serious tournament fighters – I would agree with that if it weren’t for the fact that they tried to release MIRA in the arcades, where it predictably sank like an anvil. And in any case intentions are irrelevant; the game is what it is.
I don’t think they’re particularly good ‘gateway fighters’ either – for that I’d probably pick something like KOF’98 or even KOF’98UM. That said, I have friends who got into fighting games after playing complex games like Guilty Gear XX, so I don’t think learning curve is an issue here. I mean, why introduce someone to a genre with some of its least impressive games? It’s like trying to get someone interested in cars by showing them a Trabant or a Pinto.
I didn’t really like MI but when MI2 came out, I was very much addicted to it. I quite enjoyed that one a lot. 😀
@om3g4prism: If nothing else I think Regulation A made it to Japanese PS2s, meaning you could import it if you knew how to modify your PS2.
(spoilers ahead!)
Falcoon had a veryyyy interesting influence on the MI series. Frankly I never thought of him as a real fan as soon as he started placing his created characters as the focus – if you were a real fan you would build on the pre-established, no?
The Professor let me in on some very interesting info where we were left to ponder on the artistic conflict that happens when you have Falcoon, as producer AND director. The writer, Akihiko Ureshino, having written a few novels on incest in his spare time, was left free (or directed) to write the MI2 plot which ends up with the Meira brothers revealed to be aliens… Soiree gets abducted into outer space and er.. yeah. Did you know that the alternate costume of the boss (an alien if you didn’t know already) is a chick with a … um… crotch piece… um…
Still, MIRA was pretty damn nice, imo, shame it had no story mode or challenges for 1P – making it pretty hard to play in an offline environment with you as the only fan for miles around.
Once again you bring a nostalgic tear to the eye of a burnt out old veteran of simpler times who can’t help but long for the halcyon days of his youth, where if you wanted to try something different and exciting in a fighter the fans would take a bite, chew on it a little, and contemplate the texture before passing judgement.
As for kof:mi, I only played the sequel and I had so much fun with it I had to introduce it to my friends, one of whom is a hardcore tekken player and the other would be described as a ‘girl gamer,’ bringing along most of what the term implies. They both loved it so much that it’s become a ritual whenever I see them (which is sadly not often enough due to distance) to stay up until dawn, thumbs raw and with a mad case of the giggles, mostly just playing kof:mi2. I thought it would make a nice gateway to the more traditionally lauded titles, like kof98 or 2k2, and none of them struck the same chord as mi2. I don’t actually know how different it is from its predecessor, but I know we were all three of us supremely disappointed when all the rumors of regulation A making it to the US proved to be so much smoke blown up our collective skirt. So call it what you will, but I call it a good time with my friends that has yet to be duplicated with any other fighters, old or new (though I still hold a torch for BlazBlue’s prospects, but this isn’t about that game).
Street Fighter may be slower, but it does have a lot of good things going for it. Obviously since I wrote this I’m a much bigger SNK fan, but I still really like to play Capcom fighters in general. The other hosts of the Podsumaki Podcast (which I’ll start showing here more often), were showing me the recent NorCal Regional matches for Super Street Fighter IV. It was intense stuff.
lol the reason behind an SF player’s bias
its probably because those that do want to play a more execution intensive game, KOF would be the first thing they check out. And honestly once you get used to the mechanics, fighting in SF is like fighting underwater (no hopping?!)
I myself grew up with SF, and looking at other SF fans it seems like they come mostly in the same variety. And meeting an SF player as a KOF player, the battle is usually over in less than 30 seconds as they’re used to more slow mechanics.
Turning it the other way around though, a KOF player playing SF will usually use tick throws and cross ups earlier than a normal SF player. I see this too often in the arcades, the SF player will then develop a strong hate from the trauma.
on the original topic though, I have to disagree a lot about what you say personally because I’m not a big fan of easy execution games, which I believe most of the newer KOF is turning into. It seems like they’re moving it further and further into the SF territory… I don’t blame them, perhaps there no longer is a market for execution heavy games (even Arcsys, creator of Guilty Gear, made Blazblue to appease this crowd)
I think my favorites are the KOF 98 and 2002 generations. Don’t take my word on it, but it seemed like SF was leaning towards that direction for a while too with SF 3rd strike. The combo system became smoother, faster, more KOF-esque.
KOF never needed a change this drastic IMO… I’m not a big fan of how goofy the characters look now. How Ralf and Clark seem like roid heads.
Great read. I actually have a bunch from friend who are hardcore Capcom nuts. They shit all over KOF and other SNK fighters calling them garbage and when I asked if they ever played any of those games, they said no. Honestly, I never met a hardcore Street Fighter fan who didn’t crap on KOF. However, most of the hardcore SNK fans I’ve come across are not as biased. While they don’t think Capcom fighters are bad, they just simply prefer SNK’s titles.
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