KoF and SS card games coming

SNK Joins UFS Brand - 5/12/2006

(MEMPHIS, TN) – Sabertooth Games Inc. (STG), creators of WarCry: The Warhammer CCG (Collectible Card Games) and the renowned Dark Millennium: The Warhammer 40,000 CCG, announced today a partnership with SNK PLAYMORE CORPORATION, a leading worldwide developer and publisher of video games, to create the SAMURAI SHODOWN V TM and THE KING OF FIGHTERS 2006 TM Collectible Card Game, which will be part of the Sabertooth Games’ Universal Fighting System. The initial release, which will have both Starters and Booster trading card packs, will bring a collection of classic characters and new favorites from both SAMURAI SHODOWN V TM and THE KING OF FIGHTERS 2006 TM to player’s hands, allowing them to pit their favorite SNK fighters against a friend.

“SNK’s SAMURAI SHODOWN V TM and THE KING OF FIGHTERS 2006 TM is the next step in our quest to bring the best fighting games to our UFS CCG,” said Steve Horvath, CEO of Sabertooth Games. “As long time fans of these products, we are honored to be bringing SAMURAI SHODOWN V TM and THE KING OF FIGHTERS 2006 TM to the world of collectible card games.”

"We are very excited to be working with Sabertooth Games and their Universal Fighting System," said Eric Feiner, VP of Sales and Marketing for SNK PLAYMORE USA. "We believe that they will do great work with our premiere brands of THE KING OF FIGHTERS and SAMURAI SHODOWN. We're looking forward to seeing them in the CCG marketplace."

The initial release of Sabertooth’s SAMURAI SHODOWN V TM and THE KING OF FIGHTERS 2006 TM CCG will include 16 characters as well as their classic signature attacks and fighting styles. They join characters from previously announced properties within the Universal Fighting System, the premier one on one fighting experience in the CCG genre, allowing great cross-over opportunities for players to pit their favorite fighting game characters against each other.

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http://www.sabertoothgames.com/ufs/ufs_news.asp

From what we're hearing at the weekly Monday evening tournaments at Las Vegas' Dark Tower Comics, the UFS CCG has turned out to be quite the success story for Sabertooth Games, especially where the SF and SCIII installments are concerned. Dark Tower's been unable to restock booster packs for a couple of weeks now, due to the fact that Sabertooth is selling out of them as fast as they can be made. Previously, the manager (who's privy to alot of inside info due to his relationship with the game's designers) had indicated that he knew what the next couple of licensed properties would be, and that we'd be seeing a 2nd round of SF characters/cards (Blanka, Honda, Guile, Bison/Balrog, Balrog/Vega, & Vega/Bison) and SCIII characters/cards (I forget who, besides Ivy) around July and a 3rd round by the end of the year. Hopefully, I'll get the chance to talk to him today to see if, now that the official announcement of the SNK license has been made, maybe he can fill us in on which SS and KOF characters will be in the upcoming release.

It's nice to see not everyone has their head firmly planted up their ass at SNK USA. If they're going to drag their feet on releasing US ports of NBC and Tenkaichi, then at least somebody there is willing to let 3rd parties make products utilizing their intellectual properties. I'm very curious to see which 8 characters are selected from each of the games. The first rounds of SF & SCIII had 6 characters each (4 in starters, and 2 only available via booster packs), and the 2nd round is supposed to work the same way. Will Sabertooth stick with 4 starters from each SNK game and up the booster-only character count to 4? or will they go with a 5-starter/3-booster split? As far as long-standing, time-tested favorite characters go, I'm honestly not concerned. Obviously, the KOF:MI2/KOF2006 characters will have to include a few of the new characters (Alba, Soiree, Lien, etc.) who have had a spot of trouble ingratiating themselves with a large portion of this website's population (to say the least). If this license were being handled by Score Entertainment (makers of the Epic Battles TCG -- Mortal Kombat vs Street Fighter), I'd be worried. The first round of Epic Battles was drawing on the casts of the latest games in each series: SFIII3rd and MKeception. I didn't have much problem with the SF characters they utilized for Round 1, but for an old-timer like me who played the first few installments of MK when it hit arcades and hasn't touched the newer games, I found myself asking "who the hell are these losers?" Sabertooth has been making some good balance choices with the SCIII and SF characters: a good mix of popular and not-so-popular faces, "good guy" and "bad guy" types, etc. With 8 character slots available for the first round of KOF:MI2/KOF2006, I have no doubt that Sabertooth will give me and the rest of the old-timers plenty of our traditional favorites alongside the newer MI-only characters.

--Chris

I'm not a fan of card games, but this is really good news.

Imagine the decks I could put together... o.o