There was a time when you could spit in an arcade and hit at least four or five fighting games before you got kicked out for spitting in an arcade. Apparently this isn’t the case anymore. From the herds of carbon copy and “me too” fighters of yesteryear there are merely a handful of competitors still in the battle.
Sticking to the arcades, but more than likely to be released for the home consoles, is the most recent edition to the series King of Fighters: King of Fighters XII. So far it’s only being previewed and considered a Japanese arcade release, but that doesn’t remove it entirely from washing up on western shores at some point.
Those unfamiliar with the KOF series would do well to check out this twelfth volume simply to appreciate the gorgeous graphics. Much like the graphic style change that took place between Street Fighter II and Street Fighter III, KOF XII takes full advantage of the ridiculous amount of processing power available to developers and cranks out visuals akin to an animated movie. One of the most off-putting aspect of the last dozen games from SNK-Playmore has to be the stagnant quality of the their graphics. Many of their hit series were created in the late ’80s to early ’90s, but that’s no excuse for the presentation to remain unchanged decades later. This Hi-Def visual approach may very well shift the KOF series back into the public eye and be less of a hardcore exclusive.
The biggest competition for KOF XII, according to its director, is the long-awaited Street Fighter IV. 1UP.com did a great four-week feature on the game which I highly recommend checking out if you count yourself as a SF fan. The most notable change to the series is the shift from 2D-sprites to 3D-models. The gameplay is assuredly still the same, high-quality 2D fighting just with 3D characters and backgrounds. This may sound pretty familiar to anyone who’s played any of the Street Fighter EX games. The producer of SF IV seems to understand how that association might bring some doubt, but reactions from members of the media who’ve tried the game first hand say it feels “right.” Street Fighter IV is currently slated for arcades first, followed by ports to both the PS3 and Xbox 360.
For those like their Street Fighter good and flat there’s a remake of Super Street Fighter II Turbo finishing up development pretty soon. The remake features completely redone graphics by the artists over at UDON Studios. Years ago, when I was still in high school, there was a high-quality illustration of Chun Li done by an artist named Long Vo featured in PSM. I was really impressed by the picture and hoped the artist would produce more works that would reach outside of being featured in the fan art page of the old (unofficial) Playstation Magazine. As it would turn out he would have hand in UDON Studios and online community Gaia Online. I wonder if he’s had any input or made a contribution to the remake.
There are a couple of other big fighting game titles coming out either this year or next like Soul Calibur IV or Tekken 6. With almost everyone running some sort of broadband Internet connection and all of the major home consoles connecting online, there may be a renewed interest in punching people in the face for fun.
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