Galloping deities. I just realized that I’ve spent seven and a half hours doing nothing but staring at the screen, researching one random bit of stuff after another. The only constant strain was that it all tended to be centered around SNK in whatever manner — filtering out precisely what the intricacies of Eolith’s contract was with SNK when it was originally signed, what the Crystal System really was and why it’s never been used aside from that one soccer game out of Evoga (too complex to get into here, but I think I understand now). Rediscovering the names (which were mentioned to me dozens of times in the past, but my mind is a sieve for details like this) of all of SNK’s primary artists aside from Shinkirou (Tonko, I remembered at least). Sifting through the details of SNK’s bankruptsy and how it happened as it did. (Aruze is the scum of the earth, that’s how.)

And I am exhausted. If only I could put this kind of focus to work for the forces of good.

One slightly more entertaining-to-someone-other-than-me item, though, than other things I’ve learned today; the art to KoF2002 is apparently being done by the team of Hiroaki and Nona.

Okay, so that means nothing to you? It didn’t do a lot for me at first, either. I knew that Nona was the artist from KoF2001, and I mostly dug what he did for that game even if it rubbed a lot of other people the wrong way. So, fine. But who’s this Hiroaki? I learned he did the art for Bukiri One. That also didn’t mean much to me, although I knew one of the Another Strikers from KoF2000 had his origin there.

Finally I remembered the SNK art book that Shepard sent along with his other game stuff. I flipped to the end, and looked through the Buriri-One illustrations. It’s then that an earlier comment hit me. It hadn’t entirely registered, or maybe I wasn’t yet entirely sure whether to believe it.

This is the guy who did the art for KoF2000. And he’s fantastic. I mean, I thought that Tonko’s art for Last Blade and Mark of the Wolves was great. Heck, Tonko’s art was some of the first SNK artwork that really appealed to me. But Hiroaki is… I mean, jeez! (If my head weren’t throbbing right now, I’d look up a few examples again — but all of those windows are now closed. I might do so later, if I remember.) If you’ve seen KoF2000 (particularly some of the pictures in the art gallery), you’ll know what I mean.

So. Nona is still doing the character art, although he’s evidentially been instructed to tone down the weirdness quotient a bit. This is all fine by me, as his art has a certain grittiness and malease which I feel suits KoF perfectly and which the series has been lacking for a long while. His art is frankly just a little disturbing at times. I don’t think I want to know what else he draws in his free time. But aside from his style, he seems to understand, and do a great job at capturing, the personalities of the characters. His freehand art is kind of hit-and-miss, but at least it has personality and life to it. And again it’s certainly distinctive.

Meanwhile, everything else is apparently being handled by Hiroaki. Keep in mind the intro and ending sequences to KoF2000 when I say this. Yes? Yes.

This is the perfect team. I’m eternally grateful that Shinkirou decided to jump ship and move over to Capcom. We’ll never have to deal with his dated, grotesque mannequins again. And yet neither do we have the sharp anime look of ’99 and 2000 — which was nice, but perhaps not entirely appropriate for the intended tone of the series. I’m now really looking forward to seeing how the game turns out from a visual standpoint, as I don’t think there’s ever before been this much potential for the series.

I guess I can live without King. Gripe time is over; now let’s just see what the game does has to offer.