Hikaru Ichijyo
Thundercock,
- Joined
- Aug 5, 2002
- Posts
- 1,826
I got the latest issue of GMR in the mail today and I'm thumbing through hoping these knuckleheads would have ANY pics or blurbs of SvC: Chaos.
On the table of contents page I noticed they had a picture of Ryu and Ken from SFII':Champ Edition and when I looked at the actual table of contents I saw they had an article regarding fighting games.
I flipped to that article and from the look of it, it was basically a summarization of how fighting games have evolved and what their impact was on the North American market. The first page dealt with a bunch of filler and talked about Yie Ar Kung Fu among others and then the next page and a half was pretty much all about Street Fighter.
It wasn't until page four (of an 8 page article) that the first mention of SNK popped up and here's what they wrote:
"As Capcom's new cash-cow property branched out, a whole slew of new fighting games sprang from it's roots. Low-Profile innovator SNK dished out a few gems (Fatal Fury, Last Blade, King of Fighters and the sexy Samurai Showdown) during the '90s (see the SNK breakdown page for details)."
As a note...I scoured the magazine top to bottom and did not see any so-called "SNK breakdown page". I did however see pics of some SNK games in the sidebars within the article, one was called "Moonlighting" and it highlighted games that were not fighting but featured characters from fighting games. Here's the two SNK games they mentioned:
SAMURAI SHOWDOWN RPG
"A decent spin-off that follows the story lines of Samurai Shodown 1 and 2 through the eyes of one of six Sam Sho characters."
Rating: STRONG
and
SNK VS. CAPCOM: CARD FIGHTER'S CLASH
"A well-received competetive card-based title starring the best of both publisher's fighter stock. It arrived on the short-lived Neo Geo Pocket console in two versions."
Rating: FIERCE
The article then goes on about the likes of Mortal Kombat for about a page then segues into discussion regarding the emergence of the 3D polygon fighters such as Virtua Fighter, Fighting Vipers, Tekken, and Soul Blade/Calibur.
Before I get to the nitty gritty of the article there was one last little blurb regarding 2D fighters...
"Any fighting gamer would likely acknowledge the genius behind a work like Soul Calibur , but not all of them would want to play it. The gameplay dynamics inherent to 3D fighting games differ significantly from those of 2D fighters, and most hardcore fans much prefer one style to the other. As 3D fighters continue to vastly outperform 2D offerings in the marketplace(*poster's edit-this is sure to ensue much flaming
*), however, the old-school fighting games will inevitably drop off the development schedule. A handful of sprite-based titles with cult followings (Capcom vs. SNK, Guilty Gear X2) keep the 2D genre alive, but the profitability of polygons has carved out a crystal-clear path for future fighters.
AND NOW FOR THE FUN PART!!!
The last two pages of the article they list what they believe are the 5 most essential fighting games to own but as a disclaimer they put the following blurb at the top of the page:
SURE TO SPARK RIOTS ON THE INTERNET, GMR PUTS ITS MOUTHPIECE IN AND PICKS THE FIVE GAMES EVERY FIGHTING GAME FAN SHOULD OWN. ONLY THE CREAM RISES TO THE TOP. NOSTALGIA NEED NOT APPLY.
Even with that put there, they can't help themselves but take pot shots at the 2 (count em TWO) SNK/Neo Geo games to make the list. shame At least, that's how it came across to me, but don't take my word for it, read what they had to say...
NO.5 FATAL FURY: MARK OF THE WOLVES (NEO-GEO/DREAMCAST/2000)
"For years, SNK had been mining the same 16-bit hardware to churn out endless sequels to it's Fatal Fury, King of Fighters, Art of Fighting, and World Heroes games. Whereas Capcom eventually evolved beyond it's dated CPS-II hardware, SNK stuck to it's MVS system, presumably saving on R&D expenses (although not saving quite enough to avoid bankruptcy). But with Fatal Fury: Mark of the Wolves, the company finally proved it could hang with the competition, which by this point was the Street Fighter III series. For the first time in the history of Fatal Fury, SNK ditched the bitmap character art for the hand-drawn anime-cel style of the recent Street Fighter Alpha games. Despite only one returning character (Terry Bogard) from the original Fatal Fury cast, Mark of the Wolves is the fastest, most beautiful, and technically accomplished fighter in SNK's storied history. Since the cartridge is prohibitively expensive (upwards of $500), it's recommended that gamers seek out the near-perfect Dreamcast port."
and...
NO.2 SAMURAI SHOWDOWN II (NEO-GEO/1994)
"Unless your local bowling alley still has an SNK MVS system (the kind with three or four games in one cabinet) installed, chances are you haven't been playing much Samurai Shodown II recently. Which is a damn shame, because this game is not only the epitome of the series, it's one of the most focused, hard-hitting, fighting games around that has stood the test of time. For a game that came out in 1994, it's amazing how well it holds up. Guilty Gear X2, as fun as it is, wishes it were Samurai Shodown II. Boasting sharp graphics, smooth animation, and a roster of 14 characters strong (Gen-An and Cham Cham reprazent!), the true star of SS2 is the razor-sharp gameplay. Sadly, SS2 was never ported to a console capable of doing it justice (a PlayStation port was crapped out, but never a *sob!* Saturn version), except for the Neo-Geo CD, which all of 14 people own. Two sequels, Samurai Shodown III and Samurai Shodown IV: Amakusa's Revenge, were released for both Saturn and Playstation in Japan."
Oh..for any non-GMR reading people out there, these were the top 5 fighting games that they said every fan should own...
NO.5 FATAL FURY: MARK OF THE WOLVES (NEO-GEO/DREAMCAST/2000)
NO.4 SOUL CALIBUR II (PS2/GC/XBOX/2003)
NO.3 SAMURAI SHODOWN II (NEO-GEO/1994)
NO.2 VIRTUA FIGHTER 4: EVOLUTION (PS2/2003)
NO.1 STREET FIGHTER III: THIRD STRIKE (DREAMCAST/2000)
If you're interested in reading the article in it's entirety, it's in the Sep 2003 issue of GMR (Issue 08).
On the table of contents page I noticed they had a picture of Ryu and Ken from SFII':Champ Edition and when I looked at the actual table of contents I saw they had an article regarding fighting games.
I flipped to that article and from the look of it, it was basically a summarization of how fighting games have evolved and what their impact was on the North American market. The first page dealt with a bunch of filler and talked about Yie Ar Kung Fu among others and then the next page and a half was pretty much all about Street Fighter.
It wasn't until page four (of an 8 page article) that the first mention of SNK popped up and here's what they wrote:
"As Capcom's new cash-cow property branched out, a whole slew of new fighting games sprang from it's roots. Low-Profile innovator SNK dished out a few gems (Fatal Fury, Last Blade, King of Fighters and the sexy Samurai Showdown) during the '90s (see the SNK breakdown page for details)."
As a note...I scoured the magazine top to bottom and did not see any so-called "SNK breakdown page". I did however see pics of some SNK games in the sidebars within the article, one was called "Moonlighting" and it highlighted games that were not fighting but featured characters from fighting games. Here's the two SNK games they mentioned:
SAMURAI SHOWDOWN RPG
"A decent spin-off that follows the story lines of Samurai Shodown 1 and 2 through the eyes of one of six Sam Sho characters."
Rating: STRONG
and
SNK VS. CAPCOM: CARD FIGHTER'S CLASH
"A well-received competetive card-based title starring the best of both publisher's fighter stock. It arrived on the short-lived Neo Geo Pocket console in two versions."
Rating: FIERCE
The article then goes on about the likes of Mortal Kombat for about a page then segues into discussion regarding the emergence of the 3D polygon fighters such as Virtua Fighter, Fighting Vipers, Tekken, and Soul Blade/Calibur.
Before I get to the nitty gritty of the article there was one last little blurb regarding 2D fighters...
"Any fighting gamer would likely acknowledge the genius behind a work like Soul Calibur , but not all of them would want to play it. The gameplay dynamics inherent to 3D fighting games differ significantly from those of 2D fighters, and most hardcore fans much prefer one style to the other. As 3D fighters continue to vastly outperform 2D offerings in the marketplace(*poster's edit-this is sure to ensue much flaming
*), however, the old-school fighting games will inevitably drop off the development schedule. A handful of sprite-based titles with cult followings (Capcom vs. SNK, Guilty Gear X2) keep the 2D genre alive, but the profitability of polygons has carved out a crystal-clear path for future fighters.AND NOW FOR THE FUN PART!!!
The last two pages of the article they list what they believe are the 5 most essential fighting games to own but as a disclaimer they put the following blurb at the top of the page:
SURE TO SPARK RIOTS ON THE INTERNET, GMR PUTS ITS MOUTHPIECE IN AND PICKS THE FIVE GAMES EVERY FIGHTING GAME FAN SHOULD OWN. ONLY THE CREAM RISES TO THE TOP. NOSTALGIA NEED NOT APPLY.
Even with that put there, they can't help themselves but take pot shots at the 2 (count em TWO) SNK/Neo Geo games to make the list. shame At least, that's how it came across to me, but don't take my word for it, read what they had to say...
NO.5 FATAL FURY: MARK OF THE WOLVES (NEO-GEO/DREAMCAST/2000)
"For years, SNK had been mining the same 16-bit hardware to churn out endless sequels to it's Fatal Fury, King of Fighters, Art of Fighting, and World Heroes games. Whereas Capcom eventually evolved beyond it's dated CPS-II hardware, SNK stuck to it's MVS system, presumably saving on R&D expenses (although not saving quite enough to avoid bankruptcy). But with Fatal Fury: Mark of the Wolves, the company finally proved it could hang with the competition, which by this point was the Street Fighter III series. For the first time in the history of Fatal Fury, SNK ditched the bitmap character art for the hand-drawn anime-cel style of the recent Street Fighter Alpha games. Despite only one returning character (Terry Bogard) from the original Fatal Fury cast, Mark of the Wolves is the fastest, most beautiful, and technically accomplished fighter in SNK's storied history. Since the cartridge is prohibitively expensive (upwards of $500), it's recommended that gamers seek out the near-perfect Dreamcast port."
and...
NO.2 SAMURAI SHOWDOWN II (NEO-GEO/1994)
"Unless your local bowling alley still has an SNK MVS system (the kind with three or four games in one cabinet) installed, chances are you haven't been playing much Samurai Shodown II recently. Which is a damn shame, because this game is not only the epitome of the series, it's one of the most focused, hard-hitting, fighting games around that has stood the test of time. For a game that came out in 1994, it's amazing how well it holds up. Guilty Gear X2, as fun as it is, wishes it were Samurai Shodown II. Boasting sharp graphics, smooth animation, and a roster of 14 characters strong (Gen-An and Cham Cham reprazent!), the true star of SS2 is the razor-sharp gameplay. Sadly, SS2 was never ported to a console capable of doing it justice (a PlayStation port was crapped out, but never a *sob!* Saturn version), except for the Neo-Geo CD, which all of 14 people own. Two sequels, Samurai Shodown III and Samurai Shodown IV: Amakusa's Revenge, were released for both Saturn and Playstation in Japan."
Oh..for any non-GMR reading people out there, these were the top 5 fighting games that they said every fan should own...
NO.5 FATAL FURY: MARK OF THE WOLVES (NEO-GEO/DREAMCAST/2000)
NO.4 SOUL CALIBUR II (PS2/GC/XBOX/2003)
NO.3 SAMURAI SHODOWN II (NEO-GEO/1994)
NO.2 VIRTUA FIGHTER 4: EVOLUTION (PS2/2003)
NO.1 STREET FIGHTER III: THIRD STRIKE (DREAMCAST/2000)
If you're interested in reading the article in it's entirety, it's in the Sep 2003 issue of GMR (Issue 08).
