When do you think SNK's Fighters started to become really good?

[cyriades]

Have to echo previous posts in that for me it started with FF2 and SamSho1. I'm personally very fond of FF1 even if it is a stiff playing game because you can see the amount of effort that went into the rest of it and how it influenced the rest of the series. FF2 though I thought was a better game than SF2 because of its presentation, characters, and movement options. The balance wasn't perfect but it seemed to be much better than SF2 as well. SamSho2 is still a game I have heated matches on in gamerooms at anime conventions. The atmosphere, precise controls, original characters, balance and such keep us coming back!

 

[Shakepants]

1994.

 

[Tyranix95]

Imho, Fatal Fury and Sam Sho 1 pretty much put SNK on the fighting game scene. Never saw AOF and WH get any real drops in the arcades.

Fatal Fury Special and Sam Sho 2 just continued the trend. A lotta fight guys liked these games, and still do, including me. AOF2, WH2, and WHJ always seem overshadowed next to these games.

But, SNK really took off on the fight scene when the KOF titles hit, as these became the fighting game staples right next to Street Fighter.

 

[Yagyu Jubei]

Imho, Fatal Fury and Sam Sho 1 pretty much put SNK on the fighting game scene. Never saw AOF and WH get any real drops in the arcades.

I disagree on FF. Back in college everyone was playing Street Fighter 2. There was a Big Red right next to the machine with Fatal Fury and people only played it to kill the boredom while waiting for their turn to feed Capcom. To SNK's respect, the play mechanics of FF were ahead of its time but the innovations were done by necessity to even compete with the 600-lb Street Fighter gorilla. I do agree that SS1 was the first game by SNK to give players an exciting, unique fighting alternative to SF. Then SNK damn-near created the perfect 2D fighter when II came out.

 

[Azathoth]

Imho, Fatal Fury and Sam Sho 1 pretty much put SNK on the fighting game scene. Never saw AOF and WH get any real drops in the arcades.

Sounds lame but my biggest introduction to Fatal Fury when it was first released was operators still ran MVS cabs at 25 cents but had jacked SFII cabs to 50 cents. My brother and I would throw a credit on each side, let 1P play against the computer until they were about to die then quickly hit start on 2P, which resulted in a co-op match, then a VS match, then the winner continued on. FF seems to always be remembered for line switching yet people forget the whole reason it was there to start with: co-op VS a CPU opponent.

 

[Tyranix95]

Yea, 'cause everywhere you went, SF had like $5 in quarters lined up on the cab.

And it took like 20 minutes for your turn to come up.

... people only played it to kill the boredom while waiting for their turn to feed [Street Fighter]. ....

But Fury wasn't a flop. The two player co-op was pretty fun.

Capcom didn't do something like that until Alpha.

 

[oliverclaude]

But Fury wasn't a flop. The two player co-op was pretty fun.

Not to mention what a blast it was at home in '91! I was intimidated by the sound f/x, those graphics were just awesome. It wasn't so easy to find an SFII cab where I lived, let alone playing one regularly, and the SNES ports just didn't have that impact on me... needless to say, I developed a burn-in right on my retina from playing Garou back then .

 

[Electric Grave]

There's a delusion here with FF1, the game is fun and ok but that didn't place SNK in the fighting scene, that game wasn't meant for competition, neither was AOF. They were more of a single p[layer fighting game and I say fighting game loosely 'cause at times they felt more like an evolutionary step of brawlers into fighting games, think of it, rigid and rudimentary commands, limited movement, limited control, to me this wasn't it. FF2 and Samsho 1 were made with VS competition in mind, a complete different mindset came to play when those games were designed along with everything that came after.

Those who say KOF was it are either too young or started too late.

As for World Heroes, well it did play better than FF1 and AOF so at least it had that going for them but it was also a bit limited, sorta like power instinct 1, rather odd sprite movement, not the animation but the actual movement of sprites in the screen, some moves were either too fast, too slow or all over the place, nonetheless I do love the Gouketsuji series, love it dearly.

FF2 first game to step it up and compete with SFII maybe even top it but at the same time shortly after the updates started coming along which leaves us with the best fighting games ever; Super Turbo and Fatal Fury Special, everything else even to this day lives beneath them. ST being the pinnacle though, I don't think SNK ever manage to beat Capcom on that aspect, it pains me to say it but I'm doing it with total clarity and fanboy bias aside.