Kof XIV is here! With 3d models.

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Still has that crazy combo damage, they seem really easy in this game too, more so than XIII.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

Massive damage MAX mode combos, three Kim supers in one combo and more - check out this King of Fighters 14 combo compilation

SNK showed off a new playable build of King of Fighters 14 earlier this week, both at E3 and the weekly Wednesday Night Fights event.

Gato Ray has put together a highlight reel of some of the best combos that players pulled off at both events, including the likes of AS|Reynald, Romance, and more. Several of the game's newcomers are featured within, giving us a glimpse at what they'll be capable of down the line.

The MAX mode system present in the game allows players to stack up damage in some creative ways; you'll notice that many characters only need one or two meters to take nearly half a life bar away from their opponents.

www.eventhubs.com/images/2016/jun/18/king-max-mode-combo/

Source: eventhubs

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

I'm not a fan of TOD mechanics in a more "serious" fighter, but it seems like they're still going this way.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

Laban Shares Some Notes from King of Fighters XIV’s Wednesday Night Fights Appearance

Atlus and SNK recently brought the latest public build of the King of Fighters XIV to Wednesday Night Fights. This allowed players from the region to try this latest build out for the first time.

One of those players was Laban, who previously shared an extensive breakdown of the game’s early PSX build late last year. In the same vein as that, he’s now shared some extensive notes on the build of the game that came to WNF.

As with his previous breakdown, this one is focused more on characters. That said, he does note certain things, such as how there seems to be no alternate guard. Originally a bug in older games, alternate guard became a feature in KoF XIII that allowed players to extend their blockstun, protecting them from tick throw setups.

Laban's King of Fighters XIV Wednesday Night Fights Character Notes

General gameplay notes

•Okay I confirmed myself there wasn’t any alternate guard when tested with the characters I played. I wasn’t able to test all 36 characters just in case. In KOFXIII Arcade (Pre-console/Climax), no character could alternate guard except for Maxima and he had to wiggle super faster just to maintain it. So I don’t know if there is some random discrepancy like that for KOFXIV, be it for this build or for when the game comes out in August.
•Athena’s Psychoballs could be hopped like in KOFXIII, but her anti-air game seems stronger. I remember being able to hop her projectile at the right range and not get tagged by anti-airs in XIII, but now I do. Then again, I had no sleep last week so by the time I was playing people in XIV whom were playing it like XIII, the nuances kinda killed me. At the least, everyone didn’t mix up Athena block strings, so calling them out on normal xx Psychoball with a guard roll was free and got free punishes.
•Another thing about Athena in XIV is that her run is much slower in comparison to both old KOF games and KOFXIII. I was thinking her cl.D anti-air would be GDLK in XIV on top of her new-ish projectile game, but her run is too slow to sling underneath to anti-air in a fashion that Iori could do. She’s not the only one with a slower run though.
•So with characters like Kyo and Iori, their run speeds feel relatively normal in comparison to old games and KOFXIII, but characters like the aforementioned Athena and Daimon have super slow run speeds in comparison to their older iterations. I didn’t feel this for most of the cast, but those few characters got the hit. Tizoc’s run in KOFXI wasn’t that fast of a run, but in comparison to KOFXIV KOD’s run is also much slower than his already kinda slow run of KOFXI. I don’t know if this was to balance characters with strong command throw options since alternate guard is out of the picture, but I could see this adjustment to run speeds as a cooperating factor.

Shun’ei

•Shun’ei I feel deserves the new “Protagonist” spot in at least his move set. The only thing I’d really like adjusted is to make his sweep make contact with the opponent after a cr.B cr.A block string. It doesn’t reach and just whiffs so I feel silly trying to sweep check “anti-hop checks.”
•Another thing about Shun’ei is that in this build, he wasn’t able to cancel his f.B into air dash much unlike the trailer. He could still cancel into air hand swipe, but not the air dashes. I forgot to test out jump-in normals canceled into air dashes or double air dash.
•Shun’ei’s burn knuckle is pretty safe on block, and it’s funny having it blocked. People want to press buttons since they think he’s negative (which he feels like ever so slightly), then I whiff punish people with another burn knuckle because it’s hard knockdown. It’s weakness is that if you try to tip with it, if you’re barely out of range his demon knuckle won’t come out and he’s stuck in a significant recovery animation. So his move is like XIII Claw Iori’s qcb+K move where it does dash forward and only comes out if in proximity within the opponent. The difference between the two is that at least Claw Iori didn’t have a big recovery window so he could use that skill for cross under mix ups. Shun’ei’s whiffed knuckle feels designed to have a weakness so he couldn’t just be Terry all day and scumbag safe burn knuckles in neutral and get safe jump wake up.
•Shun’ei’s qcf+P “Aqua Spear” is a really good poke which nullifies projectiles. The player has to treat it like a Shoto fireball in the sense that the opponent can read it and full jump it to get over it. At the least, the Aqua Spear is pretty damn fat and catches hops and can be spaced to anti-air full jumps that come from a further distance.
•As far as I know, Shun’ei doesn’t really have a meterless reversal.
•Although level 1 isn’t invincible, Shun’ei’s “Shine” Knuckle super is relatively safe on block. It’s only really unsafe if Shun’ei does it on a cornered opponent so he’s left recovering point blank in the corner instead of gaining distance to recovery outside of punishing range. So I was just trying to abuse normal demon knuckles and his knuckle super to get out of situations during neutral.
•His f.B feels a lot like Kensou’s old f.B from previous games. It whiffed on most characters I played against, but I noticed it did hit Daimon on crouch at the least. I couldn’t cancel it when I did it raw, but I could always test it again at EVO to reconfirm.
•Shun’ei’s DP is good as an anti-air and setting up people to jump into that range is relatively easy thanks to his Aqua Spear and demon knuckle. Otherwise his j.A, Far A, and cr.C are good anti-airs. I forgot to see what cl.D looked like but cl.C wasn’t an anti-air normal unlike stuff like Kyo cl.C
•I did cool things like try to get hard knockdown, air dash low to the ground and right past the opponent’s head to do air qcf+C to stop my momentum and cross up with the hand swipe. I think he’ll have cooler things in the future.
•I couldn’t back dash cancel into air dash, this made me sad but I respect that they didn’t give it to him since that’ll be super bust. It would have been better than KOFXI Gato stomp into air dash thing.

Daimon

•df.C is good again kinda like 02um or 98umFE.
•As said, run is pretty slow. Stuff that I can certainly punish in 98 and 02 by running up and cl.C xx cmd throw or just run into cmd throw wasn’t really feasible in XIV.
•Only thing I could consistently get the OTG command throw was off of dp+K against a cornered opponent. I couldn’t get it to connect after a hcb,f+P command throw even against cornered opponents. Needs more testing. I think this super is used in a way that you can either get dp+K and keep people in the corner and bopping them with tick throws and oki, or you sacrifice position for the extra damage by using this super. It’ll be a cool way to end a round in my opinion.
•Personally, I feel like Far C is the new 98 Far D. It’s fast and snappy and it tags certain full jumps and all hops really well. It didn’t seem to whiff on crouchers, so it was a great poke and check overall. Although Muimui’s Far C is the god, I was able to whiff punish it with Daimon on reaction as if I’m playing SF. Cr.C is kinda like Far C except just lower, so his wall of normals are still good within the context of the game
•Far D didn’t feel as fast as 98 or 02 so I didn’t use it as much as a hop check or poke. It whiffs on crouchers, so I mainly used this for full jumps that are outside of df.C’s range. I’d use df.C more, but the slower run doesn’t help so it makes me use his other buttons.

Athena

•Athena is good, she’s still much like XIII with her move set. As said, just a slower run.
•Her cl.D is good, but it feels like the activation range is much smaller than KOFXIII. Needs more testing.
•I got bopped by a bunch of her gimmicks (lol like in my KOFXIII days because lack of physical/practical match up experience of her XIII version) but certainly her zoning is strong even without a faster run speed.

Muimui

•I didn’t really play her but I got to play against Romance’s quite a bit. This character was the one giving me the most trouble
•Her MAX combos hella hurt and her ability to confirm into it from Far C is really damn strong.
•Muimui’s Far C is the new 02og Athena Far C or Third Strike Chun standing heavy punch. I thought she would be negative after I block it and I read a second one about to come so I tried to jump. I couldn’t and got hit, not even made it to the air. Far C into Far C is hella legit.
•Her j.CD beat out plenty of my anti-air normal uppercuts like Kyo cr.C. It’s pretty active and really strong in general based on what I played against it.
•I don’t know much else about her other than the combos you’ve all seen from the WNF footage. Her ground game is good, but at least she doesn’t seem to have the fast run in the game to match it to make it truly nightmarish.

Maxima

•I don’t know if I was messing up, but I tried to use his C Vapor Cannon like in XIII trying to get the guard point, but I was beaten out clean by projectiles on my start up or buttons. Dunno if this was changed or if I was just too tired to use it correctly (no sleep.)
•Normals still all feel really good, we’ll see how he plays out in the long run.

Terry

•Burn Knuckle is really really safe. It’s kinda like 98 or 02 kind of safeness on block, but the C version you could be lazy in spacing the last third or so of the distance and it seems to have the same recovery each time. Terry seems to be negative after his knuckle is blocked, but when “spaced safely” like mentioned before, he is safe from cl.C punishes like from Kyo and Iori. Burn Knuckle is also hard knock down so that’s nuts.
•Terry’s buttons feel good in general like Far B, Far D, Far C, and etc. Good neutral game in my opinion.
•Terry’s df.C is like XIII or even CVS2 status. On the characters I played against. cl.C point blank and 2 hits canceled into df.C, df.C would always whiff. cr.B, cr.A, df.C works on hit, but if spaced out from the start of the combo, df.C whiffs.
•f.A is kinda like XIII’s, it doesn’t special cancel like in 98 though which makes me sad. I used it to preempt hop check people and use it as a poke and it’s pretty good. It doesn’t feel as fast as XIII but it’s not as slow as 98’s, but I really wished it was special cancelable so I can use it in neutral but still continue pressure into Power Wave or something like in 98.
•I don’t know what to do with Terry’s non-EX Power Charges. They’re both kinda slow on start up, but the B Version combos from df.C but doesn’t knock down. I didn’t test if I can get special cancels from it like trying to do power charge xx burn knuckle. The C version does launch and juggle which is really cool, but I couldn’t combo it from normals.

King of Dinosaurs

•Yeah he’s pretty slow, in run and in normals.
•Far C is kinda like Zangief st.MP chop but not that fast. It was good in XI with more range and better speed, but he feels like he needs more range on it.
•Far D is was pretty dang slow, but then again it was kinda slow in XI and Garou. On the flip side too, Far D in XIV is slower than either XI and Garou making it not as viable during neutral. This needs range and faster start up speed.
•I feel the strength of this character will come in how good his Far A and cr.A are in pokes. His Far A felt good almost like XI, but I didn’t get to try cr.A since I forgot.
•His sweep is actually pretty good for the speed it his, the range it covers, and it being double hit.
•EX Command throw super actually has him run a bit forward before he throws, but will instantly connect if he’s already point blank or within the throw range. That’s how I interpreted it at least.
•I think the character needs a bit more work, but I don’t feel like he’s that far behind the pack as everyone else seems to think. All I feel he really needs is faster heavy normals.

Tung Fu Rue

•I couldn’t back dash cancel or tiger knee is air spin attack. It’s a decent air to air and air to ground for a cross up, but you can’t Brian Battler it up.
•df.A is a pretty strong anti-air, but he does have a bit of a blank spot right above his head.
•Typical bnb is cl.C df.A xx C Lunge Punch and cr.B cr.A df.A xx C Lunge Punch.
•He seems to space will with df.A and projectile, I think he’ll be a decent to good zoning character with annoyance properties.
•All I truly want with him is a faster run

Sylvie

•I didn’t try her too much but I feel like I don’t really know what to accomplish with her.
•Her normals overall didn’t seem fast for neutral game but anti-air game is quite good with cr.C, f.A, and DP. The thing is that I didn’t really have tools to really coax anyone into hopping or jumping at me. The qcf+P biribiri electricity just covers only that range so people can just hang back and let it whiff instead of having it pressure them to want to jump. Maybe I have to go inside space with her more, because her mid range and far range game don’t seem that hot

Nelson

•I really wanted to play Nelson but trying to learn him then and there wasn’t really feasible to me.
•His normals seem very Heavy D like, outside of the command normals of course
•Nelson can do command dash and super cancel the recovery like how Dudley in SF3 could do Ducking into SA3. I was able to react to an Athena fireball and dash under into super; I think dash into super into level 2/climax could be strong and force people to respect his neutral game. In other notes, command dash does seem to have a bit of recovery, so I only really liked doing it into super cancels.
•A basic BnB to do with him is cr.B, cr.A b.A b.B it was hard trying to learn things on the fly when people want to beat your character up or the CPU punishes everything perfectly.

Ralf

•Ralf seems to be a fun mix of 98 Ralf and XIII Ralf with maybe a sprinkle of 02 and XI Ralf in there.
•His normals are all really good. Even cr.C feels as fast as 98 cr.C as opposed to XIII cr.C, doesn’t seem as disjointed in hit box as 98 though but the speed makes me happy enough.
•j.D is still an instant overhead like in KOFXIII, it’s fun to abuse while hopping back against someone’s wake up then still bully them with far ranged normals after getting out.
•EX Galactica Phantom does have big guard point windows, a legit enough reversal or something to whiff punish with or plow through attacks with during neutral.
•cl.C 1 hit into df.A doesn’t work anymore, but at least cr.B into df.A does. I’ve seen in the footage that he can do cl.D into df.A, so I think cl.D might be the preferred party starter.

Clark

•He still has his hcf+B delayed command throw but I didn’t get to see if it still guard pointed people.
•His cl.D seems more viable as a vertical anti-air since it has speed it didn’t have in either 98 or 02. I didn’t test if it whiffed on crouchers like in 98 or 02 though.
•Normals feel good, has a bunch of old ones return like Far D, st.CD, j.C, and etc.

Hein

•I should have tested him more, but I was more addicted to Shun’ei
•f.B does cancel into Dive Kick/Bishop if f.B was canceled into. I forgot if here was a normal that did combo into f.B but cl.C wasn’t one of them.
•Main BnBs are like cl.C f.A xx qcf+C and cr.B, cr.A f.A xx qcf+C
•I couldn’t really find out how to use Rook or Castling. It just felt awkward and not that good, but I had limited time to actually try to lab him so I’m not going to say they’re wack.

Nakoruru

•Her bird stance is pretty good, seems to last a long time but doesn’t seem to get quite the height like it did in Samsho 2. Her d.D option from it has her do a flip kick that seems to hard knockdown on contact.
•qcf+P didn’t go underneath airborne projectiles unlike CVS2, made me sad.
•qcb+P ender to qcf+C seemed safe on block. I didn’t get to extensively test this
•Bird Super is really good at sniping people doing projectiles.
•j.B crosses up but feels like it needs more finesse to land as a cross up than her j.LK in Cvs2.
•df.A did not combo from cr.A; her bnb is like cr.B, cr.A xx qcf+A.

Billy

•Billy felt good overall and even his far C felt good as a poke for once.
•Main issue (or blessing for the opponent) is that f.A is not as abuse-able as it was before. It seems like it can lock down like in XIII or even 98/02 ish, but I had more normals and specials stuff it out on start up. So doing cr.C f.A into f.A string in against a cornered opponent doesn’t seem as good of a strat as it used to be.

Kukri

•Flip kick thing reminds me of O. Shermie in 98/02. It is an overhead. B version falls completely down while the D version goes a certain horizontal distance. Can’t remember if I can cancel back dash into it like O. Shermie’s can.
•Far D wasn’t as abuse-able as I thought it was; I legit want it to be as fast and as far reaching as M. Bison’s sweep in SF/CVS2, but having it already cancelable into teleport or other specials is strong in its own right.

King

•King is King, really solid as always.
•Her ground normals feel much better than XIII to me. I didn’t mess with her Far B though. Sweep isn’t cancelable as far as I tested; so although it looks like it’s good and has the range of CVS2 sweep instead of the older KOF versions, you can’t keep up the fireball block string pressure to the extent slide can do. I guess they’re trying to make sweep relevant and balanced with slide instead of making the slide end all and be all.
•j.CD seems slower than XIII and KOF98/02um. I think her spacing game is still really strong but j.CD is less be all of air to air and air to ground like it usually is in other games. I think SNK is trying to make people play with her other normals and air to airs. Still, she’s really good.
•cl.D into df.D into activate doesn’t really connect to anything. I kept on getting Far D to hit. I think the ideal BC activation starter would be cl.D BC cl.D.
•I didn’t mess with Far B, so I don’t know if it really is that bad or whatever.

Benimaru

•EX projectile is a really strong zoning tool. It has quick start up and quick recovery, it was hard to counter zone it without a reflector or without meter.
•His normal qcb+P was kinda weird. I saw it go through Leona’s Baltic Launcher but Benimaru was recovering within the Baltic Launcher’s hit zone without getting hit by the other hits of the projectile. So maybe it nullifies projectiles? Needs more testing

Mai

•I don’t know if it was B or D Version, but Mai’s hcf+K on my crouching block would cross me up on the second hit. It was silly.
•Mai is good, and people were using her like an old school Athena by zoning with projectiles and getting anti-airs with Kagerou Super as if like an old school Shining Crystal bit. People were also tagging me with far C after I try to hop her projectile.
•cl.D looked like a really good run under anti-air, but I didn’t really get to test if that was really the case.
•I wasn’t able to combo cr.B cl.A xx hcf+B. So it’s kinda unlike 98/02/XIII in which you’d be able to do that. The hcf+B was too slow to combo from the cl.A. At least her qcb+C did combo and knock down. Needs more testing as usual for better confirmation.

That’s all I can remember off the top of my head, but I’ll post more later as I remember it. The characters I played the most were Shun’ei and Terry while trying to figure out Nelson and Ralf while sometimes putting on Kyo or Iori to try to keep myself on the station to play.

Source: shoryuken

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Nice breakdown. I would have liked to see what he thought about the systems.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

Previously unseen character Mian sheds her mask in latest King of Fighters 14 trailer - also gives more screentime to Sylvie and Kukri

The latest trailer for King of Fighters 14 is for Team Official Invitation, which contains previously shown newcomers Sylvie and Kukri alongside Mian who we haven't seen prior to this.

Source: eventhubs

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

I have a feeling we might see lots of Sylvie lol.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

Heres a picture that features schedules I found from eventhubs by user KensouADV:

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

I still can't wait to see who the boss will be this time around. Any takers?

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

The King of Fighters XIV to Appear on Japan’s E-Sports MAX TV Show

SNK has been pushing its upcoming fighter, the King of Fighters XIV, quite hard these past few months. As part of that effort, the game will be making its television debut this weekend.

The King of Fighters XIV is set to be featured on the July 2 episode of E-Sports MAX. The show, which focuses on competitive video games, will be showcasing the game with the help of KoF player Dune, who will be there to explain the fundamental gameplay and strategy behind the game as they go over some matches and replays.

This move represents possibly the first time that not just a KoF game, but an SNK fighting game has been on Japanese television since the late nineties, and seems to show SNK’s dedication to promoting their upcoming title.

E-Sports MAX airs on Saturdays on the Tokyo MX network.

Source: shoryuken

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

The developers behind KOFXIV have a lot to talk about, and they certainly did in a recent interview with Japanese news site 4Gamer.

Here's a synopsis of the interview with four of the core development staff: producer Yasukuyi Oda, artist Eisuke Ogura, battle designer Hayato Watanabe, and the legendary Neo_G who was still in Capcom until earlier this year..

Developer Profiles

- Producer Oda left SNK and moved to Dimps in the early stages of Garou:MOTW2's development.

- SNK artist Eisuke Ogura joined SNK in 1996 and worked on fighting games in the FF team. His first title was RBS and Oda was his senpai. He did pixel art starting from Dominated Mind, helped on RB2, LB2, then left SNK and came back to SNKP in 2001. During KOF12 and 13 he was in the PR department but he moved back to R&D for 14. He currently work on visuals for both character design and PR.

- KOF14's battle design was done by a guy named Hayato Watanabe who doesn't have a professional fighting game development history like Oda or Neo_G. He was an arcade gamer and joined the gaming industry around 2007 to port fighting games onto fliptop cell phones. He also worked on the launch of 13's smartphone port. He joined SNKP after hearing that they're making 14 and he's been involved from its planning stages.

- Neo_G joined SNKP recently and he's been helping Watanabe, giving advices on character concepts, game system, and also assisting in development and promotions.

- SNKP's Pachi division wasn't doing good and its income was domestic Japan only so they turned all their resources to consumer and smartphone games. Given that games are all online now and they can be sold worldwide, things are really looking good for SNK because they're strong in the Asian and Central / South American regions.

- SNK returning to its old logo and motto was for showing that they're going back to their videogames roots. It was actually decided from votes by all their employees.

- The 'O' in SNKPlaymore's logo was the shape of a pachislot medal and not an earth globe or basketball. Even Ogura didn't know this.

Development Decisions on KOFXIV

- They decided to go 3D on KOF14 after considering the current market and what things will be like 5-10 years into the future. Their staff all agreed that things would be best if they challenged in 3D right now and started building up experience, knowledge and libraries in their company.

- The game engine was internally developed by SNK. They were considering Unreal Engine earlier in development but decided not to go with it because the version at the time didn't match well with SNK's situations including their knowledge, budget, and potential risks. As a result it was inevitable that they were going to be bad with lighting and shadings, but given that they need to build up their knowledge, they went with their decision.

- They didn't go with cell-shaded graphics because Oda and Kuroki's visual image of the KOF series is that of KOF94. (Note: The original KOF94 had an almost metallic gloss to its graphics because Irem's Mitsuo Kodama (R-Type, Last Resort) worked on it after moving to SNK. He's now the president of K2.) Neo_G agrees that Neo Geo games back then had a look that tried to imitate reality through pixels. According to Oda, the KOF series always had tall un-SD'ed characters up until 13, which was more anime-style. But because KOF13's been played for 6 years, there were people saying that the next KOF would be better if it looked anime.

- KOF14 originally had a more realistic look in its earlier stages but that ended up making things weird for characters like Kula or Athena that have blue or pink/purple hair. So they tweaked things and ended up with the current graphics.

- Hitboxes/hurtboxes are added manually in 2D.

- Tweening is used in the game but not for very visually important parts. It's been particularly helpful in animating some moves like Kim's bicycle kick since it automatically draws the motion of him crouching; if done by hand they would've needed to hand-draw multiple situations depending on Kim's situation before he squatted.

- Ogura has no remorse in leaving behind pixel art since it was a method to bring out the best in low-resolution graphics. Now that times have changed, even if doing 2D he'd rather take a different approach than pixel art.

- The Neo Geo's pixel graphics were fine tuned to look their best on the CRT in MVS cabs. So on other cabs, it didn't look as good. Another example given by Neo_G, Capcom's CPS was 384 x 224 so the pixels they drew were horizontally longer.

Character Stuff

- The game has 50 characters and 19 of them are new. The developers don't think that's too many considering it's only a third of the roster (in an average game a third of a roster is like 6 characters).

- Oda: "Nowadays 6 new characters might be considered huge, but in the old days we used to swap out the whole cast. Maybe we're old-school, but we wanted an impact and it (the game's roster) ended up like this"

- Oda says that the old developers in the Neo Geo era kept saying they had no plans to add Nakoruru in KOF because she doesn't match into the game too well, but they probably wanted to add her in... if they could.

- Oda on Nakoruru: "KOF94 was being developed simultaneously as Samurai Shodown and nobody imagined that Nakoruru would be such a hit character. So in the root of the KOF game engine, there was no way to place (player controllable) sprite objects other than the main character, like the weapons and the hawk. The core engine was inherited into the sequels even after 95 and beyond, so I think the truth is that they couldn't add Nakoruru even if they wanted to"

- Ogura insists that King Of Dinosaurs is not Tizoc. They originally had an empty roster spot for a new wrestler character, then Oda came by one day with a drawing of the Dino-wrestler and it was just too astounding not to use.

- No plans for DLC characters yet. No time to even think about that. They threw all their development resources into the 50 characters, so even if they make additional characters, it'll be after they see everyone's reactions when the game comes out.

- The Orochi clan characters are popular but they're also dead. If they decide to bring them back, they'll need to think about their storylines. It's certainly a possibility in the future as the developers know they're popular.

In-game Details

- The online lobby (Free Match) has 3 modes: Team VS, Single VS, Party VS. Up to 12 people can enter and also spectate

- The user can play games while waiting for opponents in Ranked match.

- Ranked Match has about 30 ranks and you can earn titles in the higher ranks. Also at the beginning, you can chose to jump to the higher ranks if you're an experienced player; the game will score you in your first 10 matches and jump you to an appropriate rank. That way you can skip time climbing up the ladder and avoid killing noobs.

- KOF14 is intended to be like a collection of the best parts of KOF98, 02, and 13. 98 was simple and easy to learn but its system is too outdated. 02 had an interesting Quick Max system but the game speed was too fast. 13 had an interesting balance where offense could chip guard meter but blocking gave meter, but its combos and command techniques were too high. So KOFXIV adopted 98's simplicity, 02's Quick Max, and 13's meter management.

- The jump speed is loose on purpose. Previous KOFs were designed for the arcades, but 14 will be mainly played online and the game was specifically designed to accommodate that. Speaking in detail, the game was designed so that with 2-4 frames of lag it'll feel very much like 02 or 13.

- It's also a design decision to make the game easier for new players. Which can also be seen from the fact that KOF14 has the one-button Rush Combo system.

- But actually the Rush Combo might be more of a system useful for old farts to get back into the series. The system was intended to make the game easier for new players, but then the developers realized that the elders like Oda and Neo_G were more prone to rely on it.

- Oda: "Huh me? No way! But Neo_G's been screaming 'I can't do the combos! I can't do the combos!' "

- Neo_G: "Well, we're the generation that's been playing fighters since the SF2 and FFSpecial days, so we can do space controls, neutral games and whatnot. But as you age your mind can't go as far as thinking about the combos, so in situations like that, the Rush Combo can be really useful"

- Oda: "... Truth is, it's seriously easier for me to just do Rush combos after a jump-in (laughs)"

- Oda: "Also, given that you need to use 3 characters in KOF, there's going to be players that can't get around to learning their second and third character. For them, the Rush combo will be helpful"

- However they didn't mess with the special commands like Ryuuko Ranbu because they've been a series tradition.

- That said, they changed Geese's Raging Storm command to a motion. They understand that old fans will cry about it, but they wanted to make it accessible to pad users considering there's quite a number of them.

- On a side note, the old moves from FFSpecial were so complicated because they were originally too easy and everyone discovered them during the loketests. So they changed them right before the game was done. Back then, supers were supposed to be like top-secret moves. Oda recalls riding on the Bullet train to get to a Game Show where he appeared on stage as a Fatal Fury master, and he was told to memorize Laurence's Bloody Splash motion written on the edge of a notebook by the time they got there. He couldn't do it.

- So aside from and , Iori's would be about the hardest command in KOF14. Also like in other KOFs, you can hold on the button to extend the move's buffer, making it easier for reversals and whatnot.

- The Just Defense system (which the developers don't want to give any official system name to in KOF14) is a low-risk, low-return system. The only thing it does is give the player a small bonus: reduced guard meter chip and additional power meter gain. It doesn't do other things like reduce blockstun, slow down time, etc.

Future things that the Developers want to do

- Oda keeps getting told by fans everywhere for a MOTW sequel so he feels obligated to make it one day. (Note: 4gamer has a photo of characters that were designed for the original Neo Geo). In addition, he also wants to make a new AOF since the series never got far enough to find its answer as a fighting game. He also wants to make an Athena and Metal Slug.

www.4gamer.net/games/317/G031749/20160613002/screenshot.html?num=001

- The first company that Neo_G want for after graduating from school was SNK. He failed after applying for planner position because the test told him to draw Nakoruru, and he could only do stick figures. He played Samurai Shodown all the time and wants to make a seriously bloody Samurai Shodown for grown-ups, almost like an MK but with a traditional Japanese samurai drama taste. He also wouldn't mind making another Wind Jammers but it has licensing issues, so he'll settle with Paddle Mania.

- Ogura wants to make a new World Heroes because noone will complain no matter how crazy he goes on it.

- Watanabe wants to make a new Buriki-One, now that consoles come with two analog sticks. He thinks the game can be refined for more fun. But what he truely wants to do is a new fighter or a new action game series.

Last Words

- Ogura on KOF14: "All of us staff gave it everything we have, so it should be a volume that's quite satisfying. Especially the story mode. If you want to check everything from the opening to the endings, that alone will be plenty of playing time. And this is just the starting chapter of the new saga, so we hope that even fans of the characters will look forward to the new storyline. We can't say that we'll release a sequel every year, but the storyline will keep going. please look forward."

- Neo_G on KOF14: "We made KOF14 with everything we've got without giving a second thought into the future, but... personally, I couldn't be happier that I can make games in that sort of enviornment. If fighting game fans touch it, there should be some points that are clearly like 'oh, this was by Neo_G', and I'll be delighted if people can enjoy that sort of stuff too. We're planning to bring back SNK with this game, and we hope fans will support us!"

Source: mmcafe

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

They dumbed down Raging Storm? It was only a matter of time...

[WarMachineRhodey]

Jun 28, 2016 4:43:36 GMT -5 The Big Daddy C-Master said:

They dumbed down Raging Storm? It was only a matter of time...

I always thought the decision to use the pretzel motion was because of balance since the raging storm has instant startup, can counter jump ins or cross ups, and have a good amount of invincibility if not fully invincible and surrounds geese from both sides and i want to say it recovers pretty fast but i could wrong on that.  

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Jun 29, 2016 18:00:18 GMT -5 WarMachineRhodey said:

Jun 28, 2016 4:43:36 GMT -5 The Big Daddy C-Master said:

They dumbed down Raging Storm? It was only a matter of time...

I always thought the decision to use the pretzel motion was because of balance since the raging storm has instant startup, can counter jump ins or cross ups, and have a good amount of invincibility if not fully invincible and surrounds geese from both sides and i want to say it recovers pretty fast but i could wrong on that.  

Yea basically they give you better moves for more execution. On that note look at how special moves have gradually gotten weaker in fighters as well. Now you need meter to do what you used to do for free. On the other hand you get easier inputs too.

I could do it either way, but I figured they would do it sooner or later. I wonder how much power it will have now because it was powerful, fast, and covered his whole body. Guess we'll have to see.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

New King of Fighters 14 trailer gives our first proper look at Zarina - Also features Nelson and Bandeiras from Team South America

The latest King of Fighters 14 team trailer has been released, and this time it's focusing on the South American team.

We've already seen Nelson and Banderas in previous trailers, though they show off some new stuff here as well, but this is our first official look at the team's sole female member, Zarina.

Source: eventhubs

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Those are some of the better looking character models IMO.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

First Print Editions of King of Fighters XIV Include a Premium Art Book In Japan

As previously reported, King of Fighters fans in North America can pick up an premium art book for the King of Fighters XIV as part of its Premium Edition. Now, it seems that fans in Japan will also be able to get their hands on something similar.

SNK have announced that first print editions of the King of Fighters XIV in Japan will come with a 120 page “Premium Art Book.” This art book will include art for all 50 characters including various alternate costumes, and color variations. In addition to this, it will also include art for the game’s stages as well as commentary from the developers.

Source: shoryuken

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Nice print layout. Who's ready to play this game?

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

Neo-G explains his leave from Capcom to SNK

Capcom's Neo-G may have moved to SNK, but it's certainly not for making a new game to compete in the e-Sports market.

The developers at SNK had a lengthy interview with Japanese site 4Gamer, which starts off with Neo-G explaining the reasons behind his departure from his old company, The interview later goes on talk about e-Sports, and it seems that SNK will certainly be moving into a different direction from some other companies in terms of servicing their fans in fighting games. Read below for their views on competitive gaming and e-Sports.

Neo_G: "First of all I want to say that I left my company in good terms (laughs). At my previous workplace (Capcom), I was in management position since I've been around for a long time. But people were making making fighting games and whatnot right on my side, and my urge to make games again gradually started to rise. While I was thinking about taking on a challenge, I had the opportunity to drink with Oda-san, and we really got heated up. (laughs)

Oda: "That was around the end of 2015, like 2AM midnight. All we did was talk about fighting games (laughs)"

Neo_G: "At that time I wasn't committed enough to think about going so far as leaving my company to make games. But then I asked myself, in the 15 years or so before my retirement, how many more games can I make? Nowadays the development span for making a single game is pretty long. I was thinking that maybe it's better if I made games elsewhere or if I decided to go freelance as a planner. A bit later I talked with SNKP again, and I guess I got excited, because we were just talking about recent stuff but one thing lead to another and..."

4Gamer: "You wanted to get back to the development scene, even if it meant leaving your company?"

Neo_G: "Well that too, but there was another reason why I chose SNKPlaymore. KOF14 will be a new start for the company as 'SNK', and I thought that being part of it was going to be a huge opportunity to experience that. I was hoping that I can get back into experiencing the good old days when companies made games with a grinding approach, where each and every development staff created whatever they were doing through tons of trials and errors. I just couldn't miss out on that opportunity.

Oda: "Nowadays you really need a justifiable reason to make a console game. But because of that, there's a lot of members in KOF14's development team that came because they "wanted to keep going hands-on in making games". There's member's like Neo_G who joined from other places as well as seasoned staff from the old Fatal Fury / Art Of Fighting era, but both young and experienced staffs are really pumped up about it.

~~

4Gamer: "One question that's been on our minds is the competitive side of KOF14. In other words, how much thought was given to its game balance during the development process. Especially since the e-sports scene is getting larger and there's a lot of times when the competitive aspect is getting considered to be important."

Oda: "First of all, I don't think there's a single fighting game that was created with its game balance purposely broken. We've seen a lot of unbalanced fighting games that were given birth, but that's due to lack of tweaking or lack of knowledge.

4Gamer: "Certainly. For players, it's definitely better if a game has good balance. But the KOF series kind of started off as an all-stars game without much thought put into game balance."

Oda: "Well although it's not about ignoring balance, my first impression when the original 94' launched was 'This game is [an all-stars] festival! And it's summer vacation time!" And my image of KOF is still like that."

Oda: "We've certainly balanced KOF14 to make its competitive aspect fun as a fighting game. But we need to keep in mind that over 90 percent of the players don't attend tournaments; they're all enjoying their games by having fun mashing at home. The first and foremost important thing is that we make it fun for them to play. The competitive aspect comes after that."

Watanabe: "I agree that we shouldn't tweak things with the competitive scene given the first priority, but do so to make our games easily playable by anyone. If it gets popular in the e-sports scene as a result, that's awesome.

4Gamer: "I think we're starting to see KOF14's development stance here."

Neo_G: "But that's not just with KOF, it's the same with all the fighting games I've been involved with too. Like for example I've received many compliments like "3rdStrike's character balance was a tad off but the system was awesome", or "CVS2 had the RC bug issue but it has a lot of freedom and great balance", but in all honesty, we didn't put too much consideration into the competitive side when making those games.

Oda: "Rather than to think about game balance from the get-go, it's more important to throw in a bunch of new characters and new fun ideas to make the gaming experience refreshing. Especially in the early stages of development."

Neo_G: "Yeah. Of course at the end we take our time balancing the game until we're confident about it, but the most important things are the game system and character concept. And to keep in mind, 'Game Balance' and 'Competitive aspect' are two different things. 'Game Balance' is a broad term that has to do with the overall enjoyment of the videogame, whereas the 'Competitive aspect' is about the fun that two players can have by building strategies around it. In that sense, developing a game for the sake of its competitive aspect is probably not a happy thing for us, the developers.

It has a bit to do with what I mentioned before, but when you think about how many games you can make during your lifetime, personally when I'm done with a game I'd want to immediately move on to making the next game and try new ideas. But if you need to keep tweaking the balance, you need to keep sticking to just that one game."

4Gamer: "That's true. In that sense, the long-term commitment for tweaking balance in fighting games is more like running a management or operation rather than game development."

Neo_G: "Of course it'd certainly be ideal to have a game that runs like that and pursues its way to its final form. If you have the resources to do that it's quite something, and it's something to be envious about. Well, maybe I'm being egotistic (laughs)

Oda: "Neo_G really wants to make all sorts of games."

Neo_G: "Yeah. As Oda-san was just saying, the KOF series used to come out every year, and each year it always had various new systems. It was like enjoying a festival that lasted for just one year, that's my impression of the series. And of course the heatup of its competitive scene was a part of that festival.

Oda; "Certainly so. We love fighting games that get heated up as e-Sports. We think that it's one of the great ways of enjoying fighting games too."

Neo_G: "No matter what path it takes, fighting games are a 'game'. People that enjoy watching fighting games as they get streamed as e-Sports will hopefully rediscover that, and play for their own enjoyment.

Neo_G: "We made KOF14 with everything we've got without giving a second thought into the future, but... personally, I couldn't be happier that I can make games in this sort of environment. If fighting game fans touch it, there should be some points that are clearly like 'oh, this was by Neo_G', and I'll be delighted if people can enjoy that sort of stuff too. We're planning to bring back SNK with this game, and we hope fans will support us!"

Source: mmcafe via eventhubs

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

I'll be looking forward to try this game out at EVO16.

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Who do you pick? Do you play this a lot? Can't remember if you said you played XIII.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

Ramon shows off his stuff alongside King of Dinosaurs and Angel in Team Mexico trailer for King of Fighters 14

We've already seen a great deal of both King of Dinosaurs and Angel in the upcoming King of Fighters 14, and while we knew that their team's third member was classic Lucha-fighter Ramon, we haven't seen him proper in the game yet. Until now.

Even if you're not interested in this particular team, I guarantee that by the end of the trailer, you'll be chanting "Viva Mexico!" alongside Ramon.

Source: eventhubs

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

GDH has a very interesting Angel pic he showed me. I'll have to get him to post it here.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

Jul 7, 2016 2:02:58 GMT -5 The Big Daddy C-Master said:

Who do you pick? Do you play this a lot? Can't remember if you said you played XIII.

From bits of memory especially playing online (which I don't play much) I would choose from Yuri, Kim, EX Iroi, Mr. Karate, and King. I use to play it a lot when it was new maybe before SFXT was coming out, sometimes I usually like to do some coloring from color edit mainly to look like from past games (even one based off the Art of Fighting Movie).

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Those are good characters to start out with.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

SNK’s Yasuyuki Oda on King of Fighters XIV at Japan Expo

SNK and Deep Silver brought the King of Fighters XIV to the Japan Expo in Paris, France this past weekend. As part of this, producer Yasuyuki Oda took the stage to participate in an open Q&A session.

While the Q&A session was in French, BzChoy from the Shoryuken forums has translated and posted notes on some important bits from it.

The session itself covered a plethora of topics concerning SNK’s upcoming fighter. This includes things related to the game’s cast, including whether or not there will be unlockables (only the 2 boss characters need to be unlocked by finishing Arcade Mode), as well as future DLC and whether there will be more characters from Garou: Mark of the Wolves.

On the former, Oda stated that they have no plans for DLC as of yet. Meanwhile, regarding the latter, he stated that he thought that there were enough characters from the Fatal Fury franchise, which is why they didn’t add any MOTW characters. He did, however, made some joking hints about the King of Dinosaurs, who SNK continues to deny is Tizoc, despite the in-game dialogue saying otherwise.

As for guest characters, he stated that he would like to see Street Fighter’s Akuma in KoF.

In addition to this, he was asked questions about some of the features of the game, as well as the game’s online mode. While he didn’t specifically state anything about the game’s netcode, he did confirm that there will be both regular and ranked battles online for both 1-on-1 and 3-on-3 team formats. In addition to this, the online party battle that allows 3 players to form a team will also have the ability to shuffle the player and character orders.

He also dropped a bit of bad news for European players, as he confirmed that there will be no Collector’s Edition for the region. Anyone who wants one will have to import it from the US.

Oda was quite coy about any future projects, stating that anything after KoF XIV is currently being kept secret. As for bringing more of their past games on to PlayStation 4, he stated that there are no plans for releasing any physical remastered classics.

Of course, this is just part of what Oda talked about. For those interested in watching the whole thing, shinblaze was able to record footage from the event, which he’s split into three videos you can see below.

Take note that the session is in french. Additionally, the third video also has some gameplay footage featuring Team Mexico.

Source: shoryuken

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

Nightmare Geese Howard DLC costume revealed in new King of Fighters 14 trailer

Fatal Fury's big baddie has a brand new look in King of Fighters 14.

Nightmare Geese makes the already terrifying fighter even more horrific, as now he inspires fear with both his hard hitting attacks and his appearance.

This ghoulish alternate costume will be available via DLC after the game's release. As you'll see below, it's received its own trailer for the sake of highlight, so you'll be able watch Nightmare Geese in actual gameplay action.

Source: eventhubs

[The Big Daddy C-Master]

Looks more monstrous. Not my style but it's cool they get costumes.

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

The King of Fighters XIV Demo Coming to PlayStation Network in Hong Kong Next Week

Those following SNK’s official Twitter account may have recently been witness to a bit of a brouhaha when they mistakenly Tweeted that the demo of the game was out. While they quickly corrected the Tweet, the reaction of fans showed how hungry many of them were for a chance to try the game out before release.

Well, take heart, as it seems that a demo for the game will be forthcoming after all. According to Chinese gaming news site A9VG, Sony Interactive Entertainment has confirmed that a demo for the King of Fighters XIV is set to be released on PlayStation Network in Hong Kong next Wednesday, July 20.

No word has been given on who will be playable in the demo or what modes will be available.

Additionally, whether or not other regions will also receive a demo version of the game is unknown. That said, with SNK holding a panel at Evo, there might be a chance of an announcement then.

Source: shoryuken

[Nyu Nozomi Hyuga]

King of Fighters 14 South Town Team trailer gives our first proper look at Hein, also shows classics Geese and Billy Kane in action

If you're a fan of Fatal Fury, this is a team you won't want to miss. Fatal Fury's big baddie Geese is back on the scene, and flashier than ever. In tow, he has Billy Kane as well as his own butler, Hein.
















Source: eventhubs