The King of Fighters XII - What Happened?
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Edited By: / guarascia
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Intro By: / 2manysnacks and / littlevmills
Music List:
The King of Fighters '94 - Esaka (Arranged)
The King of Fighters '98 - Intro
Metal Slug 2 - Judgement
The King of Fighters '96 - Arashi no Saxophone 2 (Arranged)
The King of Fighters 2003 - Joyrider (Arranged)
The King of Fighters XIII - Esaka Continues (Theme of Japan Team)
The King of Fighters '94 - Slum no. 5 (Arranged)
The King of Fighters '97 - Kuri to Itsu Made mo (Arranged)
The King of Fighters '99 - Psycho Sonic Trip (Arranged)
The King of Fighters '96 - Arashi no Saxophone (Arranged)
The King of Fighters '99 - Tears (Arranged)
The King of Fighters '98 - In Spite of One's Age (Arranged)
The King of Fighters XV - Character Select
The King of Fighters XV - Now or Never (Main Theme)
#mattmcmuscles #kingoffightersXV #whathappened? - เกม
Want more SNK goodness? Crack shoot over to my Fatal Fury Retrospective - th-cam.com/video/yIvoEgnEJJo/w-d-xo.html
Here's a question for you, Matt.
Did you really spend seven years as a QA tester? If so, what was it like?
Is there a chance you'll do a "Wha Happen?" on KOF 2001? That one is honestly deserving of an entry, considering that there huge plans SNK had for the game before it went into bankruptcy (and Eolith's screwing up of a few things SNK had planned for the game) , as well as the gameplay being more glitchy & gimmicky than the rest of the series and the OST sounding like amateurishly done EDM for some reason, as well as the whole controversy over K'9999 (and why when he came back as Krohnen, they gave him a design that looked like him before, but not really now).
KOF 94 Rebout should also get a video.
Been a hot minute since we've had a, "Yeah, That Makes Sense" moment. Glad to see that running gag still got some life in it.
Ooo that's back? I just turned it on. I love that from the og episodes. That makes sense!
16:00
XD
I love "it was the style at the time" 🤣
Sometimes shit just makes sense.
It's unfortunate that XII had to be the beta test for the much better XIII. Imagine if they actually went through the plans of actually having XII be the finale of Tales of Ash and then XIII be the Dream Match. How different would that be?
Also, Oda-san, produccer of KOF XV said that he'd love to do a Garou 2 before he retires. So the chance is there!
I think that with KOFXV having rollback and the FGC being pretty prominent nowadays, Garou 2 will be SNK's next big project.
Pretty sure the next fighting game after KOF will be Garou 2, they simple dont have any excuses after the success of XV
That would have been cool. If it was worked on more, it could have been a end of story, like the traditional KOF story arcs.
(E.g. Kof 94-97, 98 dream). But them making 13 the end of story retified the tradition although a little reversed
You know how kof maximum impact 3 was cancelled after the failure of samurai showdown? Garou 2 must be a good looking high quality fighting game
XIII is so damn polished that XII sucking ass has always been alright with me. It just feels like it should have been a free game or something, not a full retail release.
As a hardcore SNK fan, I bought the KOF 12 on 360 on day 1, then sold it the next day, a true story.
Hahaah yeah me too!! 😆👍
Yeah, it definitely wasn't the best. But hoooo boy! The game that came after was incredible!!!
@@rymat Was there any way to get a disc out without taking apart the system and the BD-ROM drive? I remember when I got the YLOD on my 80 GB 4 USB port model PlayStation 3. I had Super Street Fighter IV inside the system. I sent my system in to Sony to get repaired and they returned the game disc along with the new system.
"Deleted Ash Crimson from Reality"
Verse: *Uno Reverse Card*
[Matt McSkullman:I thought you were dead.]
[Ash Crimson:My death was greatly exaggerated.]
14:54 the perfect transition to this is the meme of Kiryu punching a desk then walking off.
I'm so glad KOF XV is off to such a good start and that KOF XIII has gotten the appreciation and playerbase that it deserves even if it took a few years!
Still can't get over how good Kof12 and 13 looks
Agreed KOF XIII did get its appreciation by the player base, it's still too bad KOF 13 didn't stand around long enough at EVO. KOF games like 95,97,98 and 02 were the most advanced gameplay mechanics. They even made 2 remixes of KOF 98 and 02. I really do believe that kof 13 did stick around long enough at EVO, for top players, champions, and fans to realize the full potential of the whole cast, instead of winning with popular well known characters. KOF 13 players, champions or fans started to realize you don't have to play KOF 13 a specific or certain way only. It's has a gameplay of 98 and 02 feel to it.
@@valletas Guilty Gear is the only and that is why I moved from KOF XIII to Guilty Gear when they released XIV
@@kingsdream7876 XIII is one of my personal favourite KOF titles that I still have the Steam version installed. I had so much fun with the XIII roster that I really missed not having Elisabeth, Shen Woo, Ash, Hwa Jai, and Raiden in IV. XIII is IMO one of SNK's finest titles after Garou: MOTW, KOF 98 (UM) and Samurai Spirit 2.
@@tcchip Respeat to you, am just trying to shine a light on 12, it offered a lot, in-game mechanics. Like counter Attacks or Crumple attacks in 12. Guess where the Crumple Attack comes from, now in 15?
I cant be the only thinking that the painstaking 3d to pixel process probably led to Mai being left out.
Yeah until 13 anyway
I honestly don't know why they even opted to doing it in pixels afterwards. But it is what it is.
With all the flaws that KOFXII has, I hated how people chose to criticize the 2D visuals calling them "outdated" and "low-res" compared to SFIV.
I think SFIV's 3D models have aged poorly compared to the beautiful 2D sprites of XII and XIII.
Strongly agreed, i still love how Kof XIII looks its really unique
@@ironmaster6496 KoF 18? This man lives in the future!
Also, I agree that the 2D visuals aged far better the the 3D ones of SF.
The fact that SFIV was once considered a good-looking game baffles me.
You have to be on drugs to believe that SFIV looks better than KOFXII. I guess 3D mania was a thing so if you had 3D game people was going to automatically say it looks better than the 2D game. XII and XIII has to be if not the best looking 2D fighting game and I'd never big into SNK's fighter like that.
I hate those people
Would love to see a What Happened for Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective. Not because it was a bad game, in fact it was a critical success, being created by many of the same genius creative minds behind the original ace attorney trilogy. However, because the marketing for it was so nonexistent, it commercially flopped.
I really didnt liked it that much.
But the Animation work was awesome
Ghost Trick was great. It’s still available on iphones.
The game is so damn awesome that you'll play it just once, got my "copy" on my DS' and still need to finish it.
Too bad the game is stupidly expensive now for the DS.
I remember seeing and playing the demo on the Nintendo Channel on the Wii back in the day, then forgot about it for years after rhat
XIII was like a phoenix rising from the ashes of XII but it took a lot of time for us to notice it's mark. I'm really happy SNK continues to make awesome games.
Yes
From the "Ashes" heh
Another great video. The more tragic irony for me regarding KOFXII is that it and KOFXIII still have some of the most lavish and beatiful sprite art I have seen in a 2D fighting game in the HD era... while in the process demonstrating why creating a fighting game with sprite art of that caliber is just not really feasible and why so many classic fighting game franchises have opted for polygonal models instead.
On a tangential note, nice joke there with the "algorithh synergy" considering the recent KOFXV launch.
What's the joke with the KOFXV launch?
@@Maloolz It's almost at the beginning of the video (around 0:30). It's poking some fun at the idea that Matt uploaded the video around the launch of KOFXV to take advantage of the TH-cam recommendations algorithm. Just some self-deprecating humor.
@@leogmg Not sure I'd call it a joke; it's just Matt saying straight out that he jiggered his release schedule so that he gets more views by taking advantage of the hype train a new _KOF_ release produces.
really sad indeed, kof 13 looks amazing, and i hated a lot the looks of kof 14. the roster on the other hand, was very good and i'm already missing some characters in 15.
@@boobah5643 I mean, that's why I call it a self-deprecating joke: He indeed took advantage of the algorithm and KOFXV to get more views, but he acknowledges it in a facetious manner, which makes it funny.
I remember buying KOF XII and thinking "wow, this is a cool demo, can't wait to see how the full game turns out!"
I used to work at a game store about a decade ago, and this game would always be playing on one of the monitors we had set up around the store. Didn't know squat about KOF back then, but this good friend of mine that worked with me was the one to tell me how much XII sucked. He hated it so much lol. He had KOF XI set up on another screen, and we used to play that like crazy whenever we had any down time since he said that was a WAY better game. That's what really got me into KOF. So in a way, I guess this crummy game helped bring me and my love of KOF together in a way.
XI is my favourite of the series.
I know what you mean. Sometimes we get into a franchise through the worst gateway possible. But it only makes the good stuff in it even better.
KOF XI (and 2002) are all time greats. Love them and to me... they ARE the quintessential KOF game
I played KOF XI so much in the arcades back in the day. Even when XII came out I almost never played it and stuck with XI until I could get a PS2 and get the game for myself
I remember reading an article that covered the process of creating the sprite asset’s (characters, stages, etc.) for XII & XIII, and while it was awesome to see the results, it would’ve made any level-headed producer turn pale with the time it would take to create a single fighter.
I’m happy that KOF XV has made the successful jump to 3D and the series will be in a good state going forward, but I’m bummed that the gorgeous XIII never had the chance to be a success story with how XII turned out.
@@billyj.causeyvideoguy7361 Aint’t that the truth.
I sometimes wonder if SNK kept those 3D assets for KOFXII/XIII and reused them in other productions.
I wish they tried the ArcSys route
@@edsonsengo2684 if not arcsystem route they can find their own artstyle snk clearly can do better graphic with 3D like kof 15 is improvement of their 3D going forward their game will.become.better
@@edsonsengo2684 Yeah, let's make every fighting game looks identical and have no sense of identity. ArcSys games all look same-y no matter how "pretty" the visuals are.
I always thought it was weird how KOF 12 was a 'dream match' when we had clues of something going on. Iori was missing his flame attacks after the events of KOF 11 and Mature somehow returned to life missing an eye. There were hints of a story but I guess time ran out.
I’m hoping there’s a Skullgirls episode somewhere in the pipe, though I can understand holding off until we’re absolutely sure when it’s done or stable.
Never lmao
@@notimeforcreativenamesjust3034 damn fr?
I dont think What Happened is a good fit for it, as the story is more it never ended and goes on and on (which is good).
@@Redblaze27 There's a ton of aspects of the story that have cropped up in other What Happened episodes: financial setbacks, layoffs, dissolution and reformation of companies, Kickstarter, severing ties with a publisher that would demand the game be delisted from stores, controversy surrounding a lead developer, and yet the game STILL continues. Lesser games have fallen with only one or two of these things, but Skullgirls still keeps going; it's the little game (engine) that could! The game definitely deserves praise and exposure, and I think What Happened would be a good fit for it.
They deserve an entire mini-series. Theyve gone through every kind of controversy you can imagine and still pulled through.
Would love to see an episode about No One Lives Forever 1 & 2, and, more specifically, the issues with them getting re-released
17:10 has certainly aged well
Damn, that 98 intro rap still slaps till today!
No way. That was unexpected, you should also talked about kof 2001, they had a lot of problems.
I'm happy this is covered. Cant wait for 2001 to be touched.
Another fantastic episode!
Hope one day you'll tackle the Resident Evil : Welcome To Raccoon City movie!
Thanks for all your awesome work, Matt.
I was trying to forget that movie
That Teams 'boop' scared the shit outta me. Immediately looked at my work laptop to see why I was needed on a Saturday. I thought Kansas was exploding. Don't do that to me, Mr. Musclebones
KOF 12 may have been a dud, but the merchandise it had was one of the few things It had going for it. To this day, I still use the KOF 12 black mousepad I got from eBay many years ago.
When they left out Mai Shiranui from the game, my pubescent heart shrunk like it was dipped in very cold water. She had such a great... personality.
She simply wasn't finished at the time, and the ONE time they delibrately left Mai out (and added B. Jenet to compensate) it backfired a bit.
@@MidlifeCrisisJoe plots you mean... Her large, interesting, overarching plots. 😂
Honestly I was more of a King enjoyer.
Mai is great
I really like Mai's big breasts.
“Burn Knuckled out of the company’s windows” made me laugh out loud
Literally was just checking to see if there was a new What Happened a minute ago, then this pops up. Nice!
We'll never get the beauty of Kim's pants animation again.
3:26
Me: (Sees Adelheid) “PLEASE BRING MY BOY BACK IN KOF XV SNK!”
“I WILL GIVE YOU MY MONEY!”
Shame it all turned out like it did, really. Every frame of this game is a work of art.
Fully agree
And this is why I always personally hate KoF 12 and 13 as the both of them bankrupted SNK and made them(YES MADE THEM) do a stint of selling gacha games and pachinko hust to survive for a while.
Reminder that not only did each character take more than a year, PER CHARACTER to make, but they spent upwards of 150,000 USD to finance each character. And the RoI didn't even cover the costs.
I'll agree that they both look "pretty" and the gameplay is "Awesome", I still hate them on a personal emotional level.
@@janematthews9087 SNK had made poor financial decisions, but XII and XIII was nowhere near the kind of excessive spending that bankrupted the original SNK. XII and XIII's mistakes were a result of underestimating the scope of the work involved.
I think XIII was a great redemption arc for SNK though. It's a genuinely fantastic game, and considering it's nearly 10 years since its arcade release, I'm still playing the Steam version to this day. SNK was really reaching for the stars with XII, and at least with XIII, they caught the moon. And we'll never see the likes of it ever again, simply because they can't take that kind of risk anymore. XIII was a true labour of love, and I respect the hell out of them for pushing forward with their vision.
SFV in comparison was really unambitious. While it had its moments of brilliance, now that it's at the end of its development cycle, I've always felt SFV never lived up to its full potential.
@@tcchip From what I understand, I don't think that the amount of work is what killed XII and XIII, but rather very poor sales regarding the effort in the development.
And thats a damn shame, that even KOF XIII did less than XII wich didn't do very well.
And I still don't get why KOF XIII didn't do better, because it had the gorgeous looks and great gameplay. Maybe today, if we count all downloads of the game, it ended up doing well...
I think if XIII came out today, with the revival of oldies and pixel art, it would have made a much stronger impact...
Love this art style and how both games looks visually. Would have loved to see SNK do more games in this style. I didn't know it was that much of a pain in the ass to accomplish. I'm a fan of XII and XIII. Excellent video Sir!
Solid gameplay
Nice Animations and artwork
What y need more in a fighting game?
For me its enough and i think is a good game
Thanks for finally taking a look at this. The whole story story of the rise and downfall of SNK in the early 2000s is definitely worth an episode of its own.
There's a cherry on top when talking about KOF XII's Online, and as someone who really tried to like this game, it's worth pointing out. Ever since launch, SNK knew the playerbase was small, so in order for people to get the online Achivements, they had official bots un ranked matchmaking that only threw 5Ls and were there for you to defeat them easily. You could tell because they were all named like SNKBot_001A or something like this.
This COULD'VE been a nice solution, but the main problem was that the bots weren't placed in an emergency queue or an auto trigget if you had waited for 10+ mins. These bots were in the actual player pool. So EVEN if you wanted to play with people, 4/5 times you matched with someone, it was a bot. Sometimes not even 30s had passed and you were already being matched with a bot again. We ran some tests with a friend, searching for ranked matches at the same time, same rank, and out of 10 matches, we only found eachother like 3 times. All the rest were bots.
One of the most keening disappointments I've ever experienced.
I've always had a tendency to want a root for SNK, I guess because I always root for the underdog, and while I understand the circumstances for this, it really landed with a thud
Well, The King of Fighters XV seems to have been a success for them and Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves looks very promising
It seems SNK also wants to diversify its output by making different types of games and not just fighters (and Metal Slug)
I enjoyed XII but then again, I’m a huge SNK fanboy. In retrospect, it was pretty obvious this installment was patched together with whatever they had ready in order to recoup some development costs; since the process of rotoscoping 3D sprites was so time intensive. I’m glad SNK is finally finding their footing in the 3D space; while XIV was visually lacking, their work on Samurai Showdown gave them the experience to deliver a much more visually appealing XV. Can’t wait to see what the future holds for KoF and SNK!
Now we're reaching some gaps on my knowledge. I know who Terry and Mai are, and that's enough for me, so when Mai isn't even in a title, then what's the point?!
It like what mk3 did by not having scorpion in it.like u don't put a popular character of the game in the game it gonna get some backlash
No Mai, No Buy
@@Raver-1601 yeah had a team call team flare with terry,kyo and Mai so didn't like how she got cut out of the roster.
It's like putting out Street Fighter and not putting in Chun-Li, or a Mortal Kombat without Scorpion or Sub-Zero.
You'll notice, there is no day-one Kim team for probably the same reason. Them assets gotta be PRODUCED.
Curious. That “Rotoscoping” technique Matt talked about was one ArkSystemWorks also used for their BLAZE BLUE series! It’s why the Pixel Sprites on that series was so phenomenal, and it built the FOUNDATION for the incredible 3D art style from future Guilty Gear games and DragonBall Fighters Z!!!
The more you know……..
That was shocking when I learned about that back in 2010 with some behind BlazBlue articles on IGN.
Yessir. Nice call out!
Also used for Elena in SF3
Art of fighting 3 had rotoscoping too
Why is dbzf and the current guilty gears not the standard in terms of fighting game visuals?
Just wanna say I discovered your What Happened series last week and I've been BINGING. Really like the style of humour and information. Great work.
Yesterday, I bought KoF XIII for PS3 - it's a great game, a fighting game like it should be, easy to learn and hard to master. And all those spriteworks and animations are simply amazing!
Theme of XII I really like a lot. It is one of the few good things that KOFXII has left us.
That theme alone is worth unlocking the entire OST on the KOFXV Jukebox.
I get that KOFXII was bad for having a small roster and no story whatsoever, but the up close camera combat made all the hits look more impactful, especially with the counter mechanic. Kinda wish KOFXIII kept the same camera.
Gotta say after looking at the same sprite style for so long, it was very refreshing to see this game for the first time back in the day.
Shit with the bell and everything YT didn't let me know about this video coming out, shame on you YT. Thanks a lot again Mat for another cool documentary.
It's a shame that I just found your channel today. But hey, now there are many videos from you that I can binge watch the next days :D
I absolutely love your videos and content!
Greetings from Germany
I’m really loving the What Happun series. Gives more details on games/ companies we grew up with and loved and the events that led to wherever they are now. And I’m glad KOF broke the curse of ending on a bad note. XV is without a doubt a good game imo, and I hope it continues to be successful! Thanks for the upload! Looking forward to many more!
Mai's sprite's idle animation in kof13 is still mesmerizing to this day.
KOF 13 is one of the greatest fighting games of all time, crazy it came out of a what happened-level game. I like 14 and 15 a lot, especially since the execution barrier isn't as high, but 13 has some of the hypest tournament matches of any fighting game, even if they all have Mr. Karate
And it is an unbelievably good looking game. Honestly, in the past 20 years I don’t think we’ve anything close other than guilty gear
@@letsgitcrackin skullgirl. kof 13 and skullgirl have the best looking 2d sprite to this day, no other fg today not even guilty gear can compare to them. But still kof 13 looks is superior than any other fg.
KoF is one of those series I've been meaning to get into for years, but just can't find a good entry point
Try 2002
get into kof 15 while is still new so you can play with people who are new to the series too.
XV is great to get into right now if you want to play online and you can check out the previous plots on the KOF wiki if you're curious
XV is the new hotness.
98 or 02 has good rosters and good solid uses of the rules if you dont wanna start at the beginning. 15s roster really is fantastic though so if you dont mind starting on a later entry its great
As soon as you said "to coincide with KOF's 15th anniversary," I realised for the first time just how much of a death knell that is for any game... and then you confirmed that realisation literally the next sentence.
The knowledge on fighting games you have is incredible. i really loves these videos. thanks Mr. McMuscles i played the earlier titles as a kid but dropped off untill KOFXIII so i had no idea about any of this stuff.
As a *BIG* KOF fan i really appreciate that intro and tje video it shows how much you like or at least respect the franchise
Wow thanks Matt, I requested that episode for so long!!
17:09 It's back baby, it's back
I want a new, modern Fatal Fury.
Well congrats, Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves will arrive in early 2025
I'm not 100% sure this is the right place to put this but I downloaded The Takeover a few days ago and it is siiiiick! Haven't been able to put it down. Great tight gameplay and coming from a person who never skips cinematics, the work is absolutely top notch. Great Job on it!
As a newcomer to the KoF franchise, I’m a bit surprised the mixed reception Ash has as a character. He is currently the only charge character I made the effort to learn since he is so fun to play. Also the green flames are kickass
I guess the reasons why Ash had a mixed (at best) reception years ago was for a few reasons: His effeminate appearance might have rubbed people the wrong way (while I don't think SNK said anything about Ash's orientation, some people might have got the wrong idea, and people back then had some not-so-nice things to say about effeminate men (and to an extent, masculine women) in general), and people trying to figure out if he's heroic or villainous also puzzled people, and stealing Chizuru & Iori's powers (in '03 & XI, respectively) also wound up not helping matters. Ironically, Ash temporarily wiping himself from existence at the end of KOF XIII to prevent his ancestor from ressurecting Orochi (if I can recall) caused many KOF fans to feel sad that he's gone (mostly because he turned out to be heroic, just not what fans expected). I myself back when I was getting into KOF (mostly thanks to M.U.G.E.N.) even remembered the vitriol Ash used to have from fans and even back then, I was kinda surprised at it (and to add another fandom of characters I used to despise but now like, I guess the Watatsuki Sisters from Touhou Project fit in a similar manner (I blamed the poor writing of the manga they appeared in and a Touhou fan animated series I despised for why I disliked them)).
I apologize for the massive wall of text, but that should explain why Ash used to be a not-popular character.
wack design held ash back.
As a big SNK fan, thank so much for your coverage on KOF 12 (and 13). These two games are the ones that are usually wrongly praised by people who just only see the pretty graphics, one or two pro matches from eons ago and absurdly hard combo trails and blindly go "BEST KOF GAME EVER" while at the same breath have no clue about the real woes that went on with said games, nor where there to actually experience them firsthand. In reality they sold poorly, had tons of cut content, gutted movesets across the board, terribly dysfunctional online netcode, nearly caused a second SNK bankruptcy and forced them away from the genre for over half a decade. With how they've been outfitting their games since KOF 14, saying how they don't regret letting go of that rotoscope spriting method and toning down the top end execution needed for the games, I'm glad they're back on the up and up and providing fun games within their knowledge and cost limits.
I always thought the art style and animation lent itself to some beautiful sprite work, but good lord do the character models NOT mesh with it.
Yeah. People take the context wrong about XII and XIII visually when it had the most lackluster package of any recent KOF game in the series. I give XIV a pass because it was SNKs first attempt at a comeback so there was going to be growing pains overall. But XV looks to be lessons learned and a way to keep moving forward while hopefully, helping evolve and trust of the IP moving forward.
KOF XIII is the best game in the series gameplay-wise, and its graphics are among the best of any 2D fighter ever made. Those are just facts; bad online and poor sales numbers don't diminish those accomplishments, and don't make the game any less praiseworthy.
@@blackcat19 Gameplay wise is subjective. China probably outnumbers much of the KOF global community by sheer numbers alone but 97 to them is king. Also not everyone liked some chars movesets getting gutted. Y'know people who actually play the game. I won't dispute the animation quality of the sprites nor the backgrounds which not many FGs in the last decade has touched in terms of ambiance and quality. The negatives about XIII are what they are and do/should affect the perception of the game overall which is what the subject is all about. The overall package for XII and XIII aren't great at all. The lackluster online means not many people really committed themselves to the game outside of offline play (which people just play on PS3/X360 anyway) with bigger communities. So I'm not surprised the people coming out talking about the strength of the visuals and nothing else are folks who have never really played the game like that.
I asked about this game a while back! Thanks for covering it, Matt. :)
I appreciate you trying the KoF rap. And this is the one KoF I skipped but got on board with the apologetic sequel
Great video man! Love it.
I really adore this channel, I can't express you much I love your videos.
Matt your wha happun series has been the most coherently enjoyable series i have seen in years i would love to see an episode centering around the xbox one it would demonstrate how a disastrous revel and launch couldnt tarnish the hard core xbox fans and how xbox mostly resurrected their brand with a cheaper model and alot of effort in creating more exclusive games.
I cant wait for your upcoming episodes from Evan Boosel.
Had this for a week after release, and returned it. No Mai Shiranui, No K', No Dice. 😠
This video made me decide to get KOF XV this week. I was undecided between getting KoF XV asap or waiting a bit for its price to drop (considering I will "have to" pay more for DLC characters)... but after watching your video, I remembered that time when Mai and King were not even in the game. Having them at launch, plus Mary, Whip, Angel, deserves me recognizing SNK by paying full price. Thanks a lot.
It's crazy to think how far the series has come, especially for the last 4 titles. XII will always hold a soft spot for me, being the game that introduced me to the series (and my favorite character Ash), but I cannot deny what was said - it did feel like a rushed game that offered little compared to other titles at the time, not just in the series. For all its flaws, I do still like XII but I'm glad it lead to better titles like XIII and XV.
"Now, bring back Fatal Fury!!!" I second that. Both in form of a new FF title and/or a new Garou MotW, or even a combination of both. At least we have Gato and Jenet back to KOF for now!
Well, Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves will release in early 2025 and it seems all of the characters from the original Mark of the Wolves are coming back, alongside some new characters and probably ones from earlier Fatal Fury games
KOF XII walked so KOF XIII could run. Or whatever. At least we have XV now.
When KOF 94, which looks rough (understandable since it was the first one), looks better than KOF XII, a later game, you know something's wrong.
Great episode!! Always wondered what was up with XII, I had no idea the characters took so long to make... 0_0
I recently got KOF '98 for the Switch, and need to get around to playing it. Heard a lot of good things. Still, very nice video as usual
First really would like to thank you Matt for doing this. There's always some folks who think that this game or XIII bankrupted SNK. So hopefully this one helps corrects some of those misconceptions.
So on the arcade side of things, KOF XII was also a failure, actually. It ran on the Taito Type X2 board, which was basically the newest arcade board out there then (so it costs quite a lot). What really didn't help XII was that KOF 2002 UM was also released at the same year, and not too far apart (I recall it was like a few months apart, but Wikipedia says XII was April, and 2002 UM was October).
2002 UM also ran on a much cheaper arcade board that is not the Taito Type X series, it's actually called the Y2 System (wiki.arcadeotaku.com/w/System_Board_Y2 ). So with a much cheaper game, and given how they remade 2002 UM into something that's actually really good and fun, XII's arcade version was essentially ousted from the arcade scene in Asia. IIRC SNK Playmore then did claim that XII and 2002 UM were "targeting different markets" but that definitely wasn't the case, in my experience over in Asia, you can find like 2-3 2002 UM machines that's getting constantly played and one XII cabinet that's basically ignored.
Old MMCafe forum posts that I recall, but couldn't find anymore then also did mention that SNK Playmore's reputation took a hit in the Japanese arcade scene because to arcade operators, it felt like a bait and switch - they bought the expensive XII arcade boards but it was overtaken by the much cheaper and more popular 2002 UM. I wish I could find that again, but alas.
Isn't the Taito Type X2 board just a PC running windows?
I remember that back in the day XII and XIII got cracked and pirated very quickly, like by early 2011, and it just needed a PC that matched or had better specs than the X2.
@@axelprino Yes, what you said is true (Taito X2 is basically a Windows PC with DRM)
But it has little relevance to the topic the commenter originally said, in which KOF2002UM stole any hype KOFXII had. Due to more characters, leading to more varianced gameplay. And more players.
Also for some arcade owners, KOFXII is much more expensive. So why bother keeping a more expensive game when a cheaper one is actually earning more?
@@StriderVM well, all I really know about the Type X2 is that it's a PC, it came out so late in the arcade's decline than by that point the arcade business was completely dead where I live. So I assumed that making it a PC was meant to cut costs and make them more affordable, since it wouldn't be custom hardware, or at least most of it would be off the shelf components that are easier to upgrade.
@@axelprino Yes that is also true, it doesn't mean they will pass it on to the arcade operators though. For example, the Taito Type X (v1) uses a Pentium 4 but they sell those to arcade operators as much as $1000 with only a single game .
@@StriderVM that's just, wow. No wonder arcades went extinct.
I mean we're talking just about the board itself, right? No screen, cabinet, or buttons.
I've been watching this show almost 2 years now, and only just this week figured out the intro music's the map screen from sims superstars
This is such a great video. I implore everyone to try out KOF if you haven't already!
I like how they follow WWE's example and started giving their newer entry sequel number instead of year cause they knew they couldn't keep up annually anymore. After KOF2003, they went straight to KOFXI, then KOFXII, and so on.
Thanks for this video again, and the last segment also clarify WHY they dropped the gorgeous sprites. I wished everyone watches that so they can stop crying about the loss of pixels.
They could not keep making games like that, as 12 and 13 were bludgeoning the company t death.
XV looks fine and they will keep sharpening their 3D skills.
15 looks extremely janky, and the unnatural jerky looking attacks of otama raga is the best example of this. Nothing looks fluid at all or like it's supposed to link into each other. In the current era, creating rotoscopped sprites from 3d models would take a fraction of the time it did back then with the technology we have now. I just seen a guy make KOFXIII style Angel in couple days.
I was watching this while working at home and the Teams notification sound scared the crap outta me
Oh hell yeah Poppy! Been wondering about this game for quite a while, perfect timing!
Sixteen months for one character man game designing is something
XII was an incomplete mess, to say in the least. I'd rather play 2001 over that hot mess.
The one time SNK dropped Mai from the roster *DELIBRATELY* they backpedaled on that in the console release. But then again, XI wasn't meant for good boys & girls even in the arcades.
I watched this at work and the teams notification noise in the video freaked me the hell out lol
17:10
The monkey paw curls its finger.
I'm so excited for Metal Slug Tactics and I'm loving KOF XV
Would've never expected an episode on KOF XII. Today is a good day.
One thing KoFXII had going for it was my all-time favourite trailer music. I edited it to make an extended version and still have it on my playlist!
I really love Athena’s design in this and 13. It’s really cute and a neat call back to the art style of psycho soldier
Love your stuff. Especially when you do anything by SNK. Unpopular opinion...I like the art and HD update of KOF 94 Re-Bout.
You're not alone
6:00 mark
Rotoscope is how DISNEY did their old animation. I mean Walt Disney did his animation. Snow White was rotoscoped in 1937.
Bless you matt. My dad is in hospice (a plurality of cancers) and videos like yours are how I turn my brain off and try and get right.
My condolences to you and your family.
11:24 Almost gave me a heart attack because I work at home with Teams lmao you caught me slacking
Sorry I got hooked on the Stage 01 Music from Metal Slug 2/X. Nice touch, friend.
3:44 that’s the artist?
Of AWESOME Jojo fanart I have seen?!
The one thing I remember KoF by is a random video where Athena salutes at the start of the game then gets drop kicked the next second as her opponent rushes her. The comedic timing was great.
Everyone always attributes this style and everything 12 did to 13, but I can't really blame them lmao.
Can you please do a What Happen about X-Men Destiny, Alpha Protocol or even early Fortnite about how it started out as a game about zombie storms and fort bases lol. Seems like some decent topics to talk about.
You forgot to mention all the missing special moves for the characters. Especially Ralph and Clark. They felt incomplete and forgotten about.
This roster. What a pittance.
Thanks for the ptsd with that Teams chime Matt!!!
17:09 This. Right Here. THIS PLZ SNK!
I felt this in my heart.
I never did get the chance to touch 12, but I bought XIII the moment it was released on Steam. An avid KOF fan for some time, I was stoked to finally be able to purchase and play a KOF game on my own.
...I don't even go online with it.
And yes, since so many others have become available, I've gone and purchased the KOF games that I emulated extensively back in the 90s because I'm no longer a poor kid.
Really loving the music picks
Tears💜💜💜
Me: man KOF is back with XV!
Also me: let's not talk about KOF XII
Ash Shall never Die. Viva ma team Red! Ash, Mai and Terry for the fucking win!!!!
Thank you for this Episode.
SNK nearly crawled its way out of the pit of insignificance in the last few years. The end of the 2000s were rough years for them.
I dont play fighting games anymore but i really feel very very happy for SNK. Played their games for hours in my teenagehood.
I remember very well on Kof XII.
Was in DOA Team ninja Forum during that time. There was one user mocking me constantly over the KOF series.
The critics upon release of XII didnt make it better and i forced myself to like it.
But this one never reached the class of KOF XI and the other entries before including both Maximum impact games.