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Review: King of Fighters ‘97 |
I never was a huge fan of the KoF series. The games didn’t have the beauty of Capcom’s 2D stuff, and I despised the unlimited Desperation attacks. HOWEVER, KoF ‘97 in the arcade changed all that.
The graphics in the multitude of non-Samurai SNK/Neo Geo fighters never really grew on me. The frame rate’s always been kinda mediocre and the resolution’s always been sorta low. The style of art, I love. KoF ‘97 does look slightly better than its predecessors, and it should also be noted that the effects look pretty good as well. However, it’s still not gonna catch the average scrub gamer’s eyes with mind-blowing graphics and sound.
Once again, the voices in the Saturn version are rather cut and muffled. Such a shame. The music is all pretty standard, although there are a couple of tracks that are truly great.
The graphics and sound for KoF ‘97 may not be anything spectacular, but I’ll be damned if this isn’t one of the best PLAYING fighters in a while. Yes, there are a few infinites unfortunately, and the Orochi characters are a little unbalanced, but this game has balance, mechanics, and creativity, something lacking in the majority of games released of late.
The cast consists of 29 immediately selectable characters, ranging from Goro Daimon, a hulking brute with Zangief-quality throws, to Athena Asamiya, the teen pop idol. New on the scene are a whopping 7 characters (Yamazaki, Blue Mary, Billy Kane, Yashiro, Shermie, Chris, and Shingo) with differing styles and personalities. KoF once again uses the 3-on-3 winners stays, loser goes setup, which frankly, has kinda grown on me. A lot of the “Team Battle” modes in other games emulate this well, but KoF has it down, from the teammates sitting in the background cheering their compadre on, to the themed teams, like the New Girls’ Team (Mai Shiranui, King, and Chizuru) and the Heroes Team (Kyo, Benimaru, and Goro).
The character design is one thing I’d like to point out about KoF that deserves mention. With 29 characters (and 5 secret characters), KoF could’ve easily copped out, and had tons of clones, and character that lack any creativity. (Lord knows Midway has some awful problems with this) Out of this huge cast, only 3 or 4 characters can really be considered possible clones. (Shingo’s style is SIMILAR to Kyo’s, Ryo and Robert are Ken/Ryu-ish) These characters have tremendously different styles of play, with grapplers like Clark + Goro, wild, crazy designs like Yamazaki and Chin, speedy females like Mary + Mai, grudge-driven character like Iori + Kyo, and more traditional styles like Terry, Kim, and Ryo/Robert. Such a wide variety of styles allows for more different styles of play, meaning more strategy. Not only that, but there’s a lot of personality given to each character. Through taunts and other various mannerisms (Kensou choking on his rice cake, Yamazaki screaming bloody murder, and everyone’s seemingly constant posing…), the characters in KoF come to life like few other games.
With the addition of a Practice, Survival, 1-on-1, and Vs. mode, KoF has a nice collection of rather standard options at its disposal. However, there’s also a big Art Gallery with a huge collection of KoF related drawings, plus the ability to watch all the endings as you acquire them in a “Demo Select” mode.
Overall, KoF may not be the most aesthetically pleasing game on Earth, but it certainly is one of the best playing. Give it a shot, you 2D fiends just may fall in love.
Bottom Line: Won’t win any beauty pageants, but the gameplay and originality won me over. Only the hardcore need apply.
- Dark Schneider
