The King of Fighters

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The King of Fighters
Cover artwork of the Neo Geo CD version of The King of Fighters '94, the first game in the series.
Genre(s)	Fighting
Developer(s)	SNK Playmore
Publisher(s)	SNK Playmore

The King of Fighters (ザ・キング・オブ・ファイターズ, Za Kingu obu Faitāzu), officially abbreviated KOF, is a series of fighting games by SNK Playmore, formerly SNK. The series was originally developed for SNK's Neo-Geo MVS arcade hardware, which served as the main platform for the series until 2004, when SNK retired the MVS in favor of the Atomiswave arcade board and will move the series to the Taito Type X² with the release of The King of Fighters XII. Ports of the arcade games and original The King of Fighters games have been released for the Neo Geo CD, Neo Geo Pocket, Game Boy and Game Boy Advance, N-Gage, Sega Saturn and Sega Dreamcast, PlayStation and PlayStation 2, PC, and Xbox. One of the most recent games in the series are KOF: Maximum Impact series.

[edit] Plot

See also: List of characters in The King of Fighters series

The initial storyline follows Kyo Kusanagi, a young Japanese who enters The King of Fighters tournaments. Being the heir of the ancient Kusanagi clan, who wield pyrokinetic powers, Kyo manages to use its powerful techniques to become champion of the tournament along with his friends. Kyo and his friends find themsleves meeting the host of the events: a powerful criminal named Rugal Bernstein, who wants to find worthy opponents to kill so that he can turn them into statues in order to remember his ruthless victories but is defeated. In the 1995 KOF tournament, it is revealed the entity of Orochi: an ancient eight-headed demon who was sealed by the three ancient artifacts of Japan. Rugal tries to use it but dies in the process. In this game, a fighter named Iori Yagami appears aiming to kill Kyo and destroy the Kusanagi clan, as revenge for the Yagami clan. In 1996, a new tournament is organized by the heir of the Yata clan, Chizuru Kagura, who wants to gather Kyo and Iori in her team to seal the Orochi demon, as their clans had done in the past. During the '97 tournament, a group known as the New Faces team learn of their past as being three of Orochi's Four Heralds and decide to awake Orochi. Kyo and Iori decide to join Chizuru to stop them and although they succeed in defeating them, Orochi is able to revive through the use of his Heralds' sacrifices. Joining their forces, Kyo, Iori, and Chizuru defeat and seal Orochi once again, however Kyo and Iori disappear during the aftermath of the battle.

The story would later continue in The King of Fighters '99, which would introduce a new story arc known as the NESTS Chronicles. A syndicate called the NESTS cartel organizes a new tournament so that they can obtain energy from the fighters to use for their data and weapons. The syndicate also kidnaps Kyo right after his battle against Orochi so that they could use his DNA to create a large number of clones to use as agents, though Kyo manages to escape during the process. One of the agents, K', betrays the NESTS cartel so that he can seek his own stolen past. Other notable characters introduced in the story arc includes Maxima, a half-man, half-cyborg who helps K' out and Whip, a military mercenary who helps the Ikari Warriors investigate the syndicate. Throughout the NESTS Chronicles story arc, K' and the rest of the fighters battle against many enemies, which includes a clone of K' named Krizalid, NESTS' second-in-command named Zero, and the leader of NESTS named Igniz, who sought to gain the power of the fighters so that he could become a new god to the people of Earth. After several fights, NESTS is destroyed, allowing K' to continue with his real life.

The most recent story arc in the series is the Tales of Ash story arc, which focuses on a strange and mysterious fighter named Ash Crimson. Though he's supposed to be the 'hero' of this story arc, Ash's true agenda is unknown and that his actions are often put in both question and suspicion by those who either fight or work with him. He searches to get the powers from the three ancient artifacts, causing him to take the powers from Chizuru and Iori, leaving Kyo as his next victim. In parallel to this, a mysterious group known as "Those from the Past" start breaking the Orochi seal, to get his powers.

[edit] Games

[edit] Main series

A battle in The King of Fighters '95

Further information: List of King of Fighters video games

The first game in the series, The King of Fighters '94 was released by SNK in August 25, 1994.^[1] The game was originally designed to be a dream match of characters from the company's various arcade titles, particularly Fatal Fury, Art of Fighting, Ikari Warriors and Psycho Soldier. The game was remade and released in 2004 for the PlayStation 2 as The King of Fighters '94 Re-Bout in Japan. This version has several new features like hi-res graphics, online play, team edit, a playable Rugal Bernstein, and the addition of Saisyu Kusanagi.^[2] On January 7, 2008, the game was made available for download on the Wii's Virtual Console download service, for a price of 900 Wii Points.^[3] The success of the game lead to SNK to release yearly installments of the series and numbered the games for the year they were released. The King of Fighters '95, was released on July 25, 1995, with several ports being released the next year. This game allowed the players to create their own team of three members.^[4] The King of Fighters '96 was released on July 30, 1996. The game establishes a new story arc regarding about the main antagonists of the series. Depending of the playable characters in a team, an exclusive ending will be played.^[5] The King of Fighters '97 was released on July 28, 1997 and ended the Orochi arc.^[6] The King of Fighters '98 was released on July 23, 1998 and unlike previous games it did not feature a story; instead, the game allows players to play with most of characters available on previous ones, including ones that were supposedly dead. SNK refitted the Sega Dreamcast version renaming it The King of Fighters: Dream Match 1999 with an extended cel animated introduction and 3D backgrounds.^[7] A remake titled Ultimate Match was released in Japanese arcades on March 18, 2008 and later on some video game consoles expanding the character roster and improving the graphics.^[8]

In July 22, 1999, The King of Fighters '99 was released, which introduced a new story arc. The game includes several new characters with some ones of the previous ones being secret ones and the addition of a new member to each team, being the fourth an assistant named "Striker". The Sega Dreamcast version was titled The King of Fighters: Evolution, there are several improvements such as new strikers and better animation,^[9] The King of Fighters 2000 was released on July 26, 2000, with the addition of several new character that would only work as Strikers.^[10] The King of Fighters 2001 was released on November 15, 2001 and ends the new plot started in 99. Due to some economical problems of the company SNK, the Korean company Eolith helped in the development of the game.^[11] Like 98, The King of Fighters 2002, released on October 10, 2002, was created to reunite old characters from the games, and featured no story. A new story arc is started on The King of Fighters 2003, released on December 12, 2003 and allowed the players to change characters while playing but the number of team member was reduced to three.^[12] By 2004, SNK abandoned yearly releases of the series and numbered future games in a more traditional manner;^[13] the first main series game released as such was The King of Fighters XI, released on October 26, 2005.^[14] The King of Fighters XII, the latest game is expected to be released in April 2009. KOF XII will use newly-drawn 2D sprites on detailed 2D backgrounds. Producers informed that the game is one hundred percent hand drawn.^[15]

[edit] Other games

In 2004, SNK produced the first 3D installment of the series, KOF: Maximum Impact. The game and its two sequels revises much of the backstory for characters and settings from previous games. The producer of the Maximum Impact series, Falcoon, stated that the Maximum Impact games are in a different continuity from the original series of games.^[16] Another spin-off video game, The King of Fighters Neowave, was released for the X-Box, Play Station 2 and Arcade during 2005 and 2006. Like KOF '98 and KOF 2002, Neowave has no storyline and is considered a "dream match" game. The game is a gathering of numerous characters from previous installments, including dead characters like Mature and Vice from KOF '96 and the New Face Team from KOF '97. The character artwork was done by Tomokazu Nakano.^[17]

Two video games were released for the Game Boy Advance titled The King of Fighters EX: Neo Blood, featuring characters from KOF '99 and 2000.^[18][19] A role-playing game was also created exclusively for the Sony Play Station under the name of The King of Fighters: Kyo, adaptating a manga with the same name.^[20]

Several characters from the series appear also in cross-over video games. Neo Geo Battle Coliseum is a 2 on 2 tag team fighting game for the Atomiswave arcade board. Along with the KOF, chararacters from other SNK video games also star there.^[21] Capcom also produced a series of similar crossover fighting games with SNK. The SNK-produced fighting games of this crossover includes the Dimps-developed portable fighting game SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium for the Neo-Geo Pocket Color in 1999 and SNK vs. Capcom: SVC Chaos for the Neo-Geo in 2003 The games produced by Capcom includes Capcom vs. SNK in 2000. It was followed by a minor upgrade, Capcom vs. SNK Pro ; and a sequel titled Capcom vs. SNK 2, both released in 2001. All three games were produced for the NAOMI hardware as well.

[edit] Compilations

In addition to the remakes of individual games such as Re-bout, Ultimate Match, and Unlimited Match, SNK Playmore has released compilations of their KOF games. Two KOF compilations were released in Japan for the PlayStation 2 as part of the Neo Geo Online Collection. The first compilation, The King of Fighters Orochi Hen (ザ・キング・オブ・ファイターズ -オロチ編-, The King of Fighters Orochi Hen^? "The Orochi Compilation") features KOF '95, KOF '96, and KOF '97, the three games comprising the Orochi story arc. The compilation features a Color Edit mode that allows the player to create a custom color palette for every character in each game, the choice to play each game with original and arranged soundtracks, and an online versus mode which supporting the MMBB service.^[22] The second compilation, The King of Fighters NESTS Hen (ザ・キング・オブ・ファイターズ -ネスツ編- , The King of Fighters NESTS Hen^? "The NESTS Compilation"), features the original Neo Geo versions of KOF '99, KOF 2000, and KOF 2001, as well as the corresponding Dreamcast versions of each game. It has the same features as the previous compilation, but with online support available only for the Dreamcast games in the compilation.^[23]

A separately produced compilation titled The King of Fighters Collection: The Orochi Saga was released for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable and Wii in North America, the PAL region, and Southeast Asia. This compilation has the same lineup of games as the Japanese Orochi Hen, along with KOF '94 and KOF '98, although the extra features are different, with an added Challenge Mode where the player must win certain matches against the CPU in KOF '98 under specific conditions and a Media gallery featuring listenable tracks from each game and a collection of official illustrations.^[22]

[edit] Other media

A manhua adaptation of KOF titled The King of Fighters: Zillion was created by Andy Seto. Hong Kong artists, Wing Yang and King Tung produced further manhua for the games, starting in The King of Fighters 2001 through 2003 along with the Maximum Impact series.^[24] There is also a spin-off manga story based on the adventures of the characters in The King of Fighters '96 entitled, The King of Fighters: Kyo.^[25]

During August 2005, a short anime series based upon KOF entitled The King of Fighters: Another Day was announced. It debuted at the year's Tokyo Game Show about a month later. Production I.G produced the title as an original net animation. There are a total of four episodes, each about 10 minutes in length. It has since been released as a bonus DVD, packaged with KOF: Maximum Impact 2 (The King of Fighters 2006 in the US). A live-action movie of The King of Fighters will begin shooting in the first quarter of 2008.^[26][27] In December 2006, Sabertooth Games released a King of Fighters 2006 collectable card game set along with Samurai Shodown V for it's Universal Fighting System (UFS) game. Other games like Street Fighter and Soulcalibur III are also included into the series. Character starter packs were released for Terry Bogard and Mai Shiranui.

[edit] Development

In an interview with veteran developers of the series they claim that their prototype version for KOF was going to be a side-scrolling beat 'em up titled, Survivor. In this version, it would only use core characters from the Art of Fighting and Fatal Fury series, specifically allowing players to play Robert Garcia and Terry Bogard for location testing. However, the idea was quickly abandoned after the debut of Capcom's game with similar gameplay, Final Fight. Since they were attached to the idea of the two series cross-over, they eventually agreed to make their idea into a fighting game. Characters from Ikari Warriors and Psycho Soldier games were also added in spirit of other gaming genres considered for their final product. The concept of a three-man team was one of the ideas kept from the side-scrolling version.^[28]

The first games of the series were only available in Japan with the exception of KoF 95 which saw a US release on the Sony Playstation in 1996. However, in 1999 when SNK was expanded to North America, the games were released also there.^[29]

[edit] See also

• List of characters in The King of Fighters series
• KOF: Maximum Impact and its sequel
• SNK vs. Capcom series
• Days of Memories

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• The King of Fighters 10th Anniversary Official Website
• SNK Wikia
• The King of Fighters Wikia
• The King of Fighters Series (Planet-SNK)