KOFXII impressions

Finally found one in Osaka. You won't believe it, but that's true: I found just ONE KOFXII cab in the whole Osaka as for now. Not a single one in Nanba, neither in DenDenTown... just one in poor old Montecarlo Arcade (Umeda), once a temple of 2D gaming, and now mostly reduced to a pachislot, card-medal game shit. Toooo bad.

Back to the topic: is KOFXII great?

Yes.

Basically:

1) The engine seems rock-solid to me. Just forget the SVC-KOF03-KOFXI jerkyness. This is TIGHT! And responsive. Hit detection is sooo precise. Feels wobderfully on your command.

2) The style/art departement is, simply put, top-notch. EVERYTHING in this game is so intensively detailed. Sprite design, animation, stage backdrops, demo cuts, you name it. Most noticeably, all characters are very different one from another since everyone is 100% true to his "true self", but the style is perfectly consistent since is 100% Nona's work.

3) This game is FAST! The system is game really rushing-oriented, and seems to punish hard the turtle players. You (the player, not the character) can easily get stunned by an aggressive, pressing opponent.

Random facts)
-Kyo seems to be really a top\tier.
-Ash is incredible, you can spot his typical frivol face while he's performing each of his moves, but he's a combo beast or something, really.
-Ryo and Robert are respectively Kyokugen96 and Kyokugen95 style, so their playability is drastically different.
-Goro is, once again, super strong.
-Raiden is 100% a mix of original Raiden and Big Bear.
-New-old Kensou is great to see in motion.
-Flameless Iori is way faster than the old one. Reminds me a bit of MotW Freeman.
-Ralf reminds me a bit of MotW Kevin

And that's enough for now!

Yawn.
http://www.neo-geo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=194748&referrerid=9516

Dope shito. Is there a boss yet?

There is no boss.

i'd like to try the new Iori

BBH said:

There is no boss.

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woah, unfinished or what.

BBH said:

There is no boss.

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Can anyone confirm this from Japan?

Shito said:

Finally found one in Osaka. You won't believe it, but that's true: I found just ONE KOFXII cab in the whole Osaka as for now. Not a single one in Nanba, neither in DenDenTown... just one in poor old Montecarlo Arcade (Umeda), once a temple of 2D gaming, and now mostly reduced to a pachislot, card-medal game shit. Toooo bad.

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Thanks for going out of your way to let us know. I'm sure KOFXII will show up at more arcades eventually. You might want to also try the arcade near SNKP in Esaka or some arcades in Nishinakajima Minamigata. Is MonteCarlo in a shotengai in Umeda?

This game needs KOF '94 Rugal as the boss.

From what i've heard, the reason why the arcade version doesn't contain a boss is KoFXII was built as another Dream Match like 98 and 02. Which those games had Rugal as a boss. Would be nice to see a new hi-res sprite for Rugal in this one.

Most likely they'll add a boss in the home versions.

dakingofzumunda said:

From what i've heard, the reason why the arcade version doesn't contain a boss is KoFXII was built as another Dream Match like 98 and 02. Which those games had Rugal as a boss. Would be nice to see a new hi-res sprite for Rugal in this one.

Most likely they'll add a boss in the home versions.

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Yes its likely that they reserve that feature to the home versions which will be released on the PS3 and Xbox 360 this year..

Sounds awesome... the new Iori sounds like it will be interesting

k'_127 said:

Can anyone confirm this from Japan?

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I know people didn't want to believe that our random arcade in Portland got a final version of the game before the Japan release, but...

kernow said:

woah, unfinished or what.

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Well, consider this. They said that it took a long long time to animate each character, which is why the game has the lowest number of characters in any KOF. With a small character roster, would you rather see them expend that effort into producing another character (seeing how a lot of people's favorites are absent, just one extra could make at least some people happy depending on who it is), or instead draw a boss who'd probably be stupid broken as usual, not playable in the arcade and banned from competitive play on the console versions? It would feel like a waste of a character slot to me.

The game itself tells you it's a time trial and you're only fighting against 5 teams when you start a game against the CPU. It's possible there could be something entirely different in the console versions, but we won't know until July.

I guess, I mostly play 1P KOF though _ I imagine the port will have some kind of boss. Seems silly to not just have Rugal really but I understand your point.

Fighting in 1P sure would be boring though.

How is the music in this one?

G-sample said:

How is the music in this one?

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I received my "machine" 48 hours ago.

What I can say, is the game in general is sick. iori, terry and kyo play like a sex induced fantasy.

However I find myself feeling disappointed in the lack of rock or genjuro. Eternally.

MeTaLCzAr said:

However I find myself feeling disappointed in the lack of rock or genjuro. Eternally.

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Why would you expect Genjuro when Samurai Shodown characters have never been in KOF...

ahahah

BBH said:

Why would you expect Genjuro when Samurai Shodown characters have never been in KOF...

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... he's just thinking wishfully...probably.

I've been playing the game for three days now.
Guys, seriously, this game kicks ass big time.

Reasons are: A) it's 100% KOF style and feel and B) it's 100% fresh and new.

Apart from the system change abnd tweaks we all are used since any new yearlyrealase for the classic main series, here you got to learn new timing and new priorities and new hitboxes for EACH character, attack, whatever. And it's fun, dambn fun. Gosh, I didn't felt THAT excited since the last 100%-brand-new SNK major release... when was that? Garou maybe...

I confirm Kyo, Kim and Terry as top ties as for now.

Can't confirm about the boss absence, as the one machine I found is always on versus mode. The game seems to run as a "time attack" in 1p mode though, dunno if this is the effect of some dip switch or whatever.

And yes, I think I can quote everything from BBH in this thread.

BBH said:

With a small character roster, would you rather see them expend that effort into producing another character (seeing how a lot of people's favorites are absent, just one extra could make at least some people happy depending on who it is), or instead draw a boss who'd probably be stupid broken as usual, not playable in the arcade and banned from competitive play on the console versions?

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For an SNK game, the lack of boss might be an improvement.

BBH said:

The game itself tells you it's a time trial and you're only fighting against 5 teams when you start a game against the CPU. It's possible there could be something entirely different in the console versions, but we won't know until July.

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There could be multiple modes in the operator settings. Time trial mode and standard mode.

Neo Alec said:

For an SNK game, the lack of boss might be an improvement.

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True. At least for the sake of the machines.

"Dear SNK,

Please stop including boss characters. They're making my customers break my machines.

Sincerely,
Joe Arcadeowner"

Deuce said:

True. At least for the sake of the machines.

"Dear SNK,

Please stop including boss characters. They're making my customers break my machines.

Sincerely,
Joe Arcadeowner"

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Off-topic, but this does remind me of the time back in June 1995 when I beat some guy in KOF '94 using only Athena (Chin and Kensou were already defeated). He nearly punched a hold through the monitor! (Fortunately, nothing broke, and I'm still alive to tell the tale.)

This wouldn't be the first time an SNK fighting game didn't have a boss. Aggressors of Dark Kombat (or GanGan) had no boss (but it did have individual endings).

I know I'm jumping to conclusions since I have yet to play the game (and I'll most likely take back my comments once I do), but I must say that KOF XII is looking like the best work-in-progress fighting game I've ever seen.

insaneben said:

This wouldn't be the first time an SNK fighting game didn't have a boss. Aggressors of Dark Kombat (or GanGan) had no boss (but it did have individual endings).

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That's from ADK though...

insaneben said:

I know I'm jumping to conclusions since I have yet to play the game (and I'll most likely take back my comments once I do), but I must say that KOF XII is looking like the best work-in-progress fighting game I've ever seen.

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I think I already wrote this in some other thread, but my impression is KOFXII development started as a full game, with teams, storyline, boss character and all, and then got half axed when they realized it took soooo long to create hi-res hi-quality pixel art spites.

Hints:

1) No story, but flameless iori is just following KOFXI ending facts (Ash has stealed powers from Iori).

2) Elizabeth had been officially announced (original art for KOFXII shown), and yet she did not show up. Elizabeth is a key character in the Ash story arc.

3) No teams, though some complete teams are anyway present, and some missing starrings has been dropped in favour of some not-so-relevant teammates...

4) the intro demo for the game, plus the various ad movies, clearly show an invitation letter...

5) Demo cut scenes are in there, complete with the whole Satella News Network thing, even if there's no story...

My guessing is the complete roster for this game would have been:

1) Starring team: Ash, DuoLon, Shen Woo
2) Japan team: Kyo, Benimaru, Goro
3) Ikari team: Leona, Ralf, Clark
4) Psycho Soldier team: Athena, Kensou, Chin
5) Garou Den team: Andy, Terry, Joe
6) Ryuuko team: Ryo, Robert, [Takuma]
7) Rival team: Kim, Raiden, [??????]
8) K' team: K'(*), [Maxima], [Whip/Kula]
9) Women team: Mai (*), [King], [Yuri]
10) Iori team: Iori, Elizabeth (*), [???????]

Shito said:

I confirm Kyo, Kim and Terry as top ties as for now.

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What are people doing with Kim that makes him seem so good? Nobody here is playing him and when I tried him he didn't seem all that great.

BBH said:

What are people doing with Kim that makes him seem so good? Nobody here is playing him and when I tried him he didn't seem all that great.

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Basically, combos. I think this game has been made fast to encourage aggressive fighting, and Kim can be used very effectively if rushing/pressing on the opponent.

Also, it seems to me the game system has been designed to encourage "predictive" fighting style than a "punishing" fighting style. I like that: can't stand those game were no one do actually nothing but light kicking until one of the two misses somthing, and then the other one punish him with an almost pre-calculated combo draining 70% of the life bar of the opponent...

Also, some more details, as I7m basically playing the game every day!

-CD counter is very interesting. It's, again, coinceived towards a predictive style of fighting, for the actual counter fist/hit will be anyway performed by your character even if you're not actually being attacked duribing the guard step of the counter move.Basically, it's an auto guard-and-returnhit with top priority.

-Throws: Nobody seems to uise those, and neither I am. Not only they've been switched to a two-buttons imput (A+C), but they do bot seem to have greatpriority... but may be a matter of getting the timing as well...

-I'm not trying much characters now, and everyone seems to focus on some characters they already know from previous titles, as everything has to be more or less re-leart in a away or another and, well, 100y are 100y... I managed to kick a couple of butts yesterday night, not bad. This game is a winner on versus, that's for sure.