It’s prom time. At the last minute, you get the gumption up to ask the prettiest girl in school–and she said yes. This chick is smokin’ hot, and you figure its time to step it up a level, and go for the trophy.

On prom night however, you realize that the grass isn’t always greener. This hot babe is as dumb as a lugnut, has bad breath, and is only going to the prom with YOU to make her ‘roid raging football star linebacker boyfriend jealous–and he’s seconds from clasping his hands around your throat. All of a sudden, all that cash you spent for the limo, tickets, and corsage doesn’t show much of a return on your investment–and you didn’t even get lucky. This little story is kind of a parable with my time with SNK Playmore/Ignition’s King of Fighters XII.

For those who are unfamiliar, the King of Fighters is a series that has a long legacy, and is well respected among 2D fight fans. Since 1994, SNK has been bringing out a new game roughly every year. The concept is that two teams of three members square off in 1 on 1 fights, until all the members of the opposing team are KO’ed. Basically, its been the same gameplay since 1994 with character roster and moveset updates for each year. The character rosters have consisted of folks from other successful SNK properties. Fatal Fury, Psycho Soldier, Art of Fighting, and even Ikari Warriors have joined the KOF specific characters since the introduction of the series. Believe it or not, there are “stories” involved with most of the games. Run a Wiki search for more info.

The latest in the series is KOF XII marks a complete reboot of the series. On the positive side of the ledger, the first thing you’ll notice are the gorgeous graphics. So called professional reviewers from big money sites and mags have refered to these graphics as being runny, or blurry (particularly when compared to BlazBlue). That is rediculous. It’s the art style. What SNK has done with this game is render the sprites using a soft edged pastel pallette. Seeing the game in motion in contrast to the busy backgrounds, and bright impact animations make the game look like a moving pastel painting. These moving paintings–so to speak–are the result of a 4 year long process SNK Playmore did on every character on the roster. As I understand it, each character was designed as a 3D model, and converted back to 2D. Then, every clothing ripple, muscle flex, and impact grimmace for every motion for all 21 characters was re-drawn and animated by hand. Combine this with lushly animated backgrounds (one even has shading) and you’ve got one good looking game.

The actual gameplay hasn’t changed much at all. KoFXII introduces the “Critical Counter”, which is kind of SNK’s version of the X-Ism specials from Street Fighter Alpha 3. Critical Counter takes place when you counter attack with strong punch or strong kick at close range. This allows you to string any punches, kicks, and special moves together in a combo. Being in this mode also allows you to execute your character’s Super Special attack for flashy pyrotechnics and heavy damage.

Now that I’ve covered the good, its time to go negative on this “hot babe” of a game. Lets begin with the single player modes. You have a choice of the 3-on-3 team, or 1-on-1 fights. Since there is no story, there is no history between the characters in the game like in previous KoFs. Part of KoF’s charm was seeing those opening match interactions between certain characters. Even in versions such as KoF 98 and KoF 2001 where there was no actual “story”, the characters still had interaction from being enemies or allies based on elements from the series’ storylines. Not so with KoF XII, and that takes away considerably from the series’ charm. Also, the single player is nothing but a time trial that only lasts 5 fights. Not fun.

There are only three backgrounds, and the character roster is limited to 22. While that sounds like a lot of characters by other fighting game standards, you have to keep in mind that more recent KoF entries usually have upwards of 30 characters. KoF 2002 Unlimited Match has 52 characters on the roster. Speaking of the roster, some of the re-imagining of the characters in KoF XII are a little weird. Ralf and Clark are so beefed up with muscles, they look like they could go toe to toe with the Hulk and maybe win. J-Pop fighter Athena looks kind of goofy now–looking like she borrowed Chun-Li’s Theigh Master to get her oversized legs.

The unforgivable however is the online. Its absolutely horrible. Matches are so laggy, they are for the most part unplayable–even after the patch that was supposed to “fix” the problem. Fights animate like they’re being viewed through a View Master flip book. Though I’m playing on the Playstation3, the problems with lag don’t fall on PSN’s shoulders. Its the same story on LIVE from what I’ve read on other sites. Online options are pretty varied. Arcade mode gives you ranked matches, and custom matches allow you to set voice and time options (among others). You and two other online buds can set up your own clan, and duke it out with others. I haven’t tried the clan and ranked online options because–frankly, with the lag being as bad as it is, playing this game online is pointless.

So, the bottom line is that KoFXII’s flaws outweigh it’s positives. This game was one of my most anticipated of games this year, and I thought it would continue the re-birth of fighters as the releases of Street Fighter IV and BlazBlue did earlier this year. Unfortunately, this game turns out to be barely worth renting, and not at all worth buying. Yet, I am excited for what this title represents. This game’s engine represents a boatload of effort, and is going to be used by SNK Playmore for a long time. The prossiblilty of another Mark of the Wolves, Art of Fighting, Samurai Showdown, Fatal Fury or a new IP entry using this game’s engine assets is very exciting. Its also fair to say that the inevitable KoFXIII should be superior. Hopefully it will have a larger roster, a story, and a more varied moveset–in line with previous KoF entries, since all the hard foundation work was done in KoF XII. They MUST get the net code right in future projects.

Just like the hot prom date in this review’s parable, this game has a lot of show, but not so much go. Rent if you must, but skip this one. Like a raincloud with a silver lining, the crop of fighters that will hopefully use this game’s assets makes me hopeful for SNK Playmore’s future titles.

Tags: Reviews