I Can See Your Moves
I’ve just replayed ’96, and I’ve got to say that it’s the most intriguing in the series aside from 2001. It’s where everything came together right, for the first time. And SNK had to revise just about everything they’d established in ’94 and ’95 in order to make the game.
It makes me wish all the more that 2002 had been a concluding plot chapter for the NESTS era, as it rightfully should have been. The pattern would be complete, then.
’99 established the new gameplay system, with the strikers and all. It was nice and original, and a good idea. 2000 was almost the exact same game (as ’95 was to ’94), only with the rough spots polished away. Just as ’96 revolutionized the early series, 2001 revolutionized the later series. ’97 took what was established in ’96 and didn’t add much to it in terms of gameplay — but rather expanded it and used it as the backing mechanics for an orgy of plot exposition and drama.
Then ’98 — the first dream match — was almost the same game as ’97 (just compare the selection screens of the two!), only with an extra nine characters (every left-over non-boss character from ’94-’96 aside from Eiji), “classic” versions of most of the main characters (with their pre-’96 move lists), and a bunch of extra animations and interactions and energy added in.
That makes ’98 more or less “’97 DX”, in its structure. And at the same time, it’s a kind of a compilation of everything KoF up until that time. Not unlike the upcoming Street Fighter II compilation for the PS2. Aside from all of the characters and character versions above, it also has both major game systems up to that point (“Advanced” and “Extra” — which correspond to the pre-’96 and post-’95 engines). Basically, however you like your (pre-NESTS) KoF, ’98 has it. All it lacks is plot. But it’s got extra heaps of charm to make up for the loss (if you’re familiar with the characters).
That could have been the case with 2003, for the series’ tenth anniversary. 2002 would have put to use the refined system introduced in 2001, and cleanly finished off that plot arc. 2003 would have been the ultimate KoF dream match, covering the whole history of KoF — or at least everything that’s happened since ’98. Every major non-boss character. Every major game system. At least two distinct move lists for most of the major characters.
Then 2004 — the first Atomiswave game — could be the start of the next plotline. A nice clean beginning, on new hardware.
But, no.
Anyway. To illustrate, the pattern goes more or less like this:
[1a] [1b] [2a] [2b] [x] [1a] [1b] [2a] … [x]’94 ’95 ’96 ’97 ’98 ’99 ’00 ’01 n/a ’02
[1a] defines a new game system. It’s a rough draft. A little awkward. A few obvious problems to work out. Still, by virtue of its new ideas it’s got some energy and life to it.
[1b] is the refinement of that system. It’s the edited version, more or less. Most of the overt kinks have been knocked out. Problem is, it’s almost the same as the previous game. The game is nice, but one is left waiting for the point.
[2a] is the second draft. This is a total overhaul of the system introduced two games earlier. While the previous game was merely a revision, the goal of which was to fix the obvious problems in the first incarnation of the game system, this game scraps the earlier system altogether and rephrases the original ideas in a far more elegant form. This is more or less what they tried to do two games earlier, but hadn’t quite figured out how to express yet.
[2b] is to [2a] as [1b] is to [1a]. More or less. Now that they’ve finally got the system down, they don’t really have to think about it anymore and can just use it to tell an interesting story.
[x] is where we clear out the closet. Tally what’s been accomplished so far, while we figure out what to do next.
The NESTS saga never really got either a [2b] or an [x]. And it needed both, in order to work satisfactorily. Instead, it got abbreviated by a train wreck.
As you can both gather and imagine anyway, it’s the “a” chapters which do more for me. Especially the revised ones, where SNK (or Eolith/Brezza) figured out what they wanted to say. The “b” ones tend to bore me a little (particularly the “a” ones), since they’re creative resting periods. It’s all just futzing. And honestly, polish tends to annoy me. I like things rough; it leaves the character in. EDIT: (Of course, some things manage to combine both roughness and polish at the same time! HOW CAN YOU LOSE!)
Hell. I might as well post this, while I’m here.