Fatal Fury: King of Fighters

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
"Garou Densetsu" redirects here. For the video game series, see Fatal Fury. For the novels, see Garōden.
Fatal Fury: King of Fighters
Developer(s)
Publisher(s)
SNK
  • Takara (Super NES)
    Mega Drive/Genesis
    Magical Company (X68000)
    D4 Enterprise
    (Virtual Console)
    SNK Playmore
    (PlayStation Network)
    HAMSTER Corporation (PS4/Switch/Xbox One)
Composer(s)
Hiroshi Matsumoto
Kazuhiro Nishida
Toshikazu Tanaka
SeriesFatal Fury
Platform(s)
Release
25 November 1991
  • Arcade
    • WW: 25 November 1991
    Neo Geo AES
    • WW: 20 December 1991
    Super NES
    • October 1996
Neo Geo MVS

Fatal Fury: King of Fighters, known as Garō Densetsu: Shukumei no Tatakai (餓狼伝説 ～宿命の闘い～, Hungry Wolf Legend: The Battle of Destiny) in Japan, is a 1991 head-to-head fighting game released by SNK for the Neo Geo arcade and home platforms.[1] Fatal Fury was SNK's first fighting game for the Neo Geo system and served as the inaugural game in their Fatal Fury series, as well as the first game to depict the fictional "King of Fighters" tournament, which became the basis for the later The King of Fighters games.

The game was designed by former

Joe Higashi, and their nemesis Geese Howard
, made their debut in this game.

Gameplay

Richard Myer
.

The gameplay follows the typical formula of most fighting games: the player competes against their opponent in best two-out-of-three matches. The play controls consist of an eight directional joystick and three attack buttons: punch, kick and throw. Each of the playable characters has special techniques that are performed by inputting specific commands in combination with the joystick and buttons. The input methods for special moves are shown to the player during the course of the game (after every bonus round), as opposed to being given in an instruction card in the game's cabinet.

The most novel aspect of Fatal Fury was the addition of two-lane battles. Many stages featured two rows, a background row, and a foreground row. Players can change between rows at any time other than in the Single Player Mode, where they have to wait for the CPU opponent to change rows before they can in almost every stage. The player is not required, however, to do so. When a second player joins during the middle of a one-player fight, instead of postponing the current battle for a match between the two players, the game will make both players team up against the current CPU opponent in a two-on-one match before their battle takes place. After every other match in the single-player tournament, the player will participate in a bonus round mini-game involving an arm wrestling match against a machine. The player must tap the A button rapidly to win these mini-games.[2]

Development

The game was designed by

combos, Fatal Fury placed more emphasis on the timing of special moves as well as storytelling, which are two features that he failed on during the original Street Fighter.[4]

Plot

Terry and his younger brother Andy were orphans who raised themselves on the streets of South Town. They were soon adopted by Jeff Bogard, a master martial artist. A few years after being adopted by Jeff, both Terry and Andy witnessed the brutal murder of their adoptive father at the hands of Geese Howard: a ruthless businessman and expert martial artist who rules South Town's criminal underworld as a merciless crime boss. Geese, who was once Jeff's rival, had murdered Jeff when the latter had tried to expose Geese's criminal activities to the public. Knowing that they weren't strong enough and needed more training to confront Geese, the brothers made an oath to spend a decade to fine tune their martial arts before trying to avenge their adoptive father. Terry chose to wander in his home country, combining his self-taught street fighting techniques with the Hakkyokuseiken fighting skills he learned from both his adoptive father and his mentor, Tung Fu Rue who is the shih-fu of both the art of Hakkyokuseiken and the art of Bajiquan. Andy decided to perfect his own martial arts style in Japan to differentiate himself from his older brother by being taught the Shiranui-ryū Ninjutsu (Shiranui Style Ninja Technique) and a form of empty-handed combat called Koppōken.

A decade later in 1992, Geese Howard has organized a fighting tournament, dubbed "The King of Fighters". Terry reunites with Andy after the latter returns to South Town from Japan. After the Bogard brothers pay respects to Jeff's grave, they encounter and befriend a Japanese Muay Thai champion named Joe Higashi from Thailand and learn about the KOF tournament hosted by Geese. Determined to avenge their adoptive father's death, Terry and Andy enter KOF alongside Joe and fought against many competitors, including Tung Fu Rue who had wanted to test the brothers out in making sure they were ready for their potential battle against Geese. Despite their best effort, both Andy and Joe were badly injured after defeating two of Geese's fighters, Raiden and Hwa Jai respectively, leaving Terry to continue on alone and facing off against Geese's right-hand man Billy Kane within the final match of the tournament. Although Terry succeeds in defeating Billy and winning the tournament, he is suddenly captured by two of Geese's henchmen and sent to Geese's personal tower by force, leading to a one-on-one showdown against the crime boss himself. Geese was a formidable opponent for Terry, but the latter gained the upper hand during their battle and defeated the former with a powerful jump kick, causing Geese to fall from his tower and plummet to his death. As Terry, who had finally avenged his adoptive father's death left the tournament victorious, Andy felt a mixed sense of closure and returned to Japan to continue his martial arts training while Joe, who had said his goodbye to the brothers after the tournament's conclusion, traveled back to Thailand in order to continue his Muay Thai training.

Characters

At the beginning of the game, the player is given the option to select one fighter which is either Terry, Andy, or Joe. The player is then given the next option to select from one of four fighters as their first opponent:

Billy Kane
.

Competitors
Challengers
Bosses
Final boss
  • Geese Howard - the final boss of the game. An underworld crime boss and the sponsor of the "King of Fighters" tournament. After defeating Billy, the player's character is kidnapped by Geese's men and taken to his building, Geese Tower, for the game's final battle. His fighting style is aikido and has a projectile attack similar to Terry's Power Wave called the Reppuken (烈風拳 / れっぷうけん; lit. "Gale Fist"). He can also slam his opponent after blocking a close-range attack, this technique is called the Atemi Nage (当身投 / あて身なげ; lit. "Hit Throw"). When the player loses to Geese, instead of the standard continue screen, they witness their character falling off from Geese Tower. However, if the player wins, their character will knock off Geese from his building, seemingly killing him.

Console versions

Reception

Commercial

In Japan, Game Machine listed Fatal Fury: King of Fighters on their January 1, 1992 issue as being the third most-successful table arcade unit of the month.[11] It went on to be Japan's fourth highest-grossing arcade game of 1992, below Street Fighter II (two versions) and Captain Commando.[12] In North America, RePlay reported Fatal Fury to be the second most-popular arcade game in February 1992.[13]

Critical

Paul Rand of Computer and Video Games called Fatal Fury one of the best Neo Geo games available in 1992 and compared it favorably with Street Fighter II, stating Fatal Fury was a "brilliant feast of fighting" with "huge and excellently drawn" character sprites, great animation, and unique special attacks "giving the game more variety."[5]

In a retrospective review, Maximum commented in 1996 that the game failed to offer any real competition for Street Fighter II in either playability or character selection. They concluded, "The only main point in this game's favor is that two of the characters may team together to take on a computer opponent in a three-player frenzy, and the game also tries to offer something else new with a two-tier playing arena, but the slow action and the disgracefully difficult fireball motions make special moves something of a rare occurrence."[9] In 2018, Complex rated the game 74th on their "The Best Super Nintendo Games of All Time". They praised the combat and the ability to jump in and out of the backgrounds concluding: "One of the best fighters on the SNES, by far."[14]

References

  1. ^ "Oh! Neo Geo Vol. 6 - 餓狼伝説". Beep! Mega Drive (in Japanese). No. 41. SoftBank Creative. February 1993. p. 134.
  2. ^ Fatal Fury user's manual (Neo Geo AES, US)
  3. ISBN 978-4862333810
    . 西山 SNKで仕事するようになっても、 「ストリートファイター(1)」で実現できなかっ た、より感情移入しやすいストーリー性とキャラクター作りに挑戦したかったんですよ。 そうして作ったのが 『餓狼伝説』 なんですが、 リリースしたときにはすでに『ストリート ファイターII」が大人気でしてね。両者の発売タイミングは5ヵ月しか間が空いておら ず、リリースされてから開発しても時間が足りないし、そもそも僕らが 「ストリートファイ ター(I)」 を作ったのに、 パクリとかずいぶん言われました(笑)。 [Nishiyama: Even when I started working at SNK, I wanted to challenge myself to create a storyline and characters that were easier to empathize with, something I couldn't achieve with "Street Fighter (1)". That's how I made "Fatal Fury", but when it was released, "Street Fighter II" was already very popular. There was only a 5-month gap between the release timings for both games, and there would not be enough time to develop it after it was released. Even though we made “Street Fighter (I)” in the first place, it was often called a ripoff (laughs).]
  4. 1UP.com. Archived from the original
    on January 22, 2012. Retrieved 19 December 2011.
  5. ^ a b Rand, Paul (15 February 1992). "Neo Geo: Fatal Fury". Computer and Video Games. No. 124 (March 1992). p. 64.
  6. ^ Computer and Video Games, issue 138, pages 62-63
  7. ^ GameFan, volume 1, issue 5 (April 1993), pages 14 & 24-25
  8. ^ GamePro, issue 34 (August 1992), page 66
  9. ^
    Emap International Limited
    . March 1996. p. 42.
  10. ^ Myers, Paul (21 May 1993). "Fists of Fury". Mega Guide. pp. 2–3.
  11. ^ "Game Machine's Best Hit Games 25 - テーブル型TVゲーム機 (Table Videos)". Game Machine (in Japanese). No. 418. Amusement Press, Inc. 1 January 1992. p. 37.
  12. ^ "第６回ゲーメスト大賞 〜 インカム部門" [6th Gamest Awards – Income Category]. Gamest (in Japanese). Vol. 84 (February 1993). December 28, 1992. pp. 8–28 (27). alternate url
  13. ^ "The Player's Choice - Top Games Now in Operation, Based on Earnings-Opinion Poll of Operators: Best Video Software". RePlay. Vol. 17, no. 5. RePlay Publishing, Inc. February 1992. p. 4.
  14. ^ Knight, Rich (April 30, 2018). "The Best Super Nintendo Games of All Time". Complex. Retrieved 2022-01-27.

External links

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