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The King of Fighters '97
The King of Fighters '97[a] (KOF '97) is a fighting game produced by SNK for the Neo Geo arcade and home console in 1997. It is the fourth game in The King of Fighters series. It was ported to the Neo Geo CD, as well as the PlayStation and the Sega Saturn in Japan only. It is the last game in the "Orochi Saga" storyline, that began in The King of Fighters '95.[1] Gameplay KOF '97 follows the same format as the previous KOF games, but introduces two distinct playing styles which the player can select before choosing their team: Advanced and Extra. Advanced mode is based on the previous game in the series, KOF '96, but features a revamped Power Gauge.[2] Instead of charging the Power Gauge, the Power Gauge is now filled whenever the player strikes the opponent or by performing Special Moves. The player can stock up to three Power Gauges. The player can use one stock of the Power Gauge to perform a Super Special Move or enter a "MAX" mode, in which the player's defensive and offensive strength are increased. Performing a Super Special Move while in MAX mode will make the player perform a more powerful Super Special Move.[3] Extra mode is based on the first two games in the series, KOF '94 and KOF '95. Like in those games, the player fills the Power Gauge by charging it or defending against the opponent's attacks. After the gauge is filled, the player enters MAX mode and like in Advanced, their character's offense and defense will increase. The player can only perform Super Special Moves in MAX mode or when the life gauge is near empty and flashing red. When the player performs a Super move in MAX mode while the life gauge is flashing red, then the Super move will be even more powerful. The Emergency Roll maneuver from KOF '96 used in Advanced mode is replaced by the side-step from KOF '94 and KOF '95. Plot and charactersDespite the events at the end of the previous game, the KOF tournament was a huge commercial success and sparked a worldwide fighting craze. Within a few months of the tournament ending, various large corporations had held smaller KOF tournament qualifiers and constructed special KOF stadiums around the world, building the excitement up for the next tournament. News of the tournament spread through every form of media and fans and new fighters from across the globe come to watch the preliminary matches. All of the characters from the previous game return, with the exception of the Boss Team which was disbanded after its first appearance, Kasumi Todoh who went off to search for her father, and Mature and Vice who were killed by Iori Yagami after he was possessed by the Riot of Blood at the conclusion of the previous game. Chizuru Kagura, the sub-boss in the previous game, takes Kasumi's place in the Women Fighters Team, while Geese Howard's underling Billy Kane, who previously participated in The King of Fighters '95 tournament, returns to join forces with female agent Blue Mary and wanted felon Ryuji Yamazaki (both from Fatal Fury 3: Road to the Final Victory) to form the unlikely "'97 Special Team". Iori returns as a Team Edit character along with Shingo Yabuki, a high school student who patterns his fighting style after his idol and reluctant mentor Kyo Kusanagi. An alternative version of Kyo with his pre-KOF '96 moveset also appears as a hidden character. Iori and Leona appeer fight as mid-boss characters in the Riot of the Blood curse depending on which characters the player is using. A team of all new characters also appears in the form of the "New Faces Team", consisting of bandmates Yashiro Nanakase, Shermie, and Chris. The New Faces Team will be revealed to be the last three servants from Orochi during the Arcade Mode. Additionally, they fight as sub-boss characters having more powerful abilities than their common forms. Once they are beaten, Orochi will possess Chris' body to fight as the final boss character. Depending on team chosen Orochi will be sealed to hide the next match with the New Faces Team offering their lives to their lord. If the Hero Team wins the final battle, Kyo is challenged by Iori in a one-on-one fight. The plot is further altered if the player uses the Sacred Treasures Team, it is revealed Kyo's girlfriend Yuki is a descendant of the Yukinada meant to be offered to revive Orochi. The defeated Orochi tries to use Iori due to sharing the curse of his lineage but he turns against him. Kyo joins in order to definitely defeat the enemy after hearing a conversation with Yasakani, Iori's predecesor. New characters to the series are marked below in bold:
DevelopmentThe King of Fighters '96 was the last game directed by Masanori Kuwasashi as he expressed pressure with the annual release leading to his eventual replacement with battle designer Toyohisa Tanabe as the next director who would end the Orochi arc with The King of Fighters '97. Tanabe kept in charge of balancing characters. The main objective with the game was ending the Orochi story arc by revealing the title villain who would take human form and face the Sacred Treasures Team. With The King of Fighters '96 experimenting new systems, The King of Fighters '97 was meant to improve on them.[4] Among other subplots, Leona was revealed to be related with the Orochi with missing character Heidern acting as her father figure.[5] Key arts of snakes were heavily featured in promotion of the game to symbolize the stronger presence of Orochi.[6] In order to decide who would become the members of the '97 Special Team, three polls were conducted by the video game journals Weekly Famitsu, Gamest and Neo Geo Freak, in which readers voted who was the character they wanted to see in the team. The Neo Geo Freak's winner was Billy Kane and Famitsu's winner was Ryuji Yamazaki. Blue Mary was first in the Gamest poll, barely beating Duck King from the Fatal Fury series who was second in the poll via a few mere votes. Additionally, the three journals created a team, which players can view an image of them after beating the game in the Japanese version. The special team created by the Neo Geo Freak's staff was a team of fire wielders: Billy, Kyo Kusanagi, and Mai Shiranui. The Gamest's team created was composed of Terry Bogard, Blue Mary and Joe Higashi, while Famitsu created a team composed of Chang Koehan, Choi Bounge and Ryuji Yamazaki.[7] Although Blue Mary already had two designs in the Fatal Fury series at this point (her original Fatal Fury 3 design and her Real Bout Special design), her designer wanted to use her Fatal Fury 3 design as he liked it more.[8] In order to have all of the eight servants from Orochi confirmed by this game, Yamazaki was chosen to be the new member as the staff noted him to be a good villain and liked that he was similar to a snake (as the ancient Orochi was a giant snake). In order to adapt him to KOF, the game planner had to provide new moves to Yamazaki. The new moves were initially noted to be failures, but designers later thought of them as successful.[9] In particular, Yamazaki was to different from his Fatal Fury persona after Tanabe got the producer's permission.[10] The gameplay was created to appeal to The King of Fighters '95 and The King of Fighters '95 as well as The King of Fighters '96 gamers as the original two games had their own fighting system. Moreover, Kyo's original projectile version was added as an alternative playable versionsince he was popular within gamers. There was an objective to give players a large amount of combos with the two systems the game uses.[11] There were two weeks of balances for the game.[12] The New Faces Team was created to offset the remaining top three characters. Their members were developed to be the Hero Team's counterparts; Chris manipulates fire like Kyo, Shermie uses lightning like Benimaru Nikaido and Yashiro Nanakase is a giant man like Goro Daimon.[13] The plot element of Chris acting as Orochi's new body was developed since initial stages of production, but the staff had already thought of using other ideas.[14] At the inception of production, the plan was for Chris to use the "Flame of Darkness (Black Flame)," but due to difficulties of seeing the black flame in the screen it was changed to the purple ones.[15] The final boss character, Orochi, was first meant to be "a buck-naked Chris" fighting with a shining energy ball. However, it was opted to his current design after developers made a survey in which there were only two votes in favor of the first design. His design codename was "Chief", but several people were against giving him the name of "Orochi".[16] Iori Yagami in his Orochi form was originally meant to be the final boss of the game after the player beats the New Faces Team in their Orochi forms. However, it was later decided to make Orochi Iori the mid-boss with Orochi becoming the final boss and the New Faces Team as the sub-bosses.[17] Series flagship director, Toyohisa Tanabe, states that the staff was initially reluctant to add this version of Iori to the series' roster — worried about fans' reactions — but did so to add more impact to the Orochi Saga's climax. He was particularly pleased to see surprised reactions from female fans to this form during KOF '97's location testing.[18] After deciding Iori as the mid-boss character, developers also were focused in adding Leona as an alternative mid-boss character if players were already using Iori in the game. As such, several advertisements were added such as televisions broadcasts, sent to be given as a message to the player about a "fork in the game" to give hints about Orochi Leona.[19] In The King of Fighters '96, several moves from Kyo were changed in order to adapt him to the new game system. However, the original moveset was still popular between gamers and as such, an alternative version from Kyo was added to KOF '97.[20] The introduction of this version was noted to be "a hit" with gamers. The staff kept adding new alternative versions of other characters to the sequels. This later led to the creation of the Kyo clones (Kyo-1 and Kyo-2) from The King of Fighters '99.[21] ReleaseThe King of Fighters '97 was first released in Japanese arcades on July 28, 1997. It was ported to the Neo Geo AES and Neo-Geo CD on September 25, 1997 and October 30, 1997, respectively. A PlayStation version was also released on May 28, 1998. The Sega Saturn version was published on March 26, 1998 and it requires the same 1MB RAM cartridge utilized by the previous game.[22] A "Saturn Best Collection" was released on October 1, 1998, adding a new cover and a lower price.[23] An emulated version of the game was released as part of The King of Fighters Collection: The Orochi Saga in 2008 for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable and Wii.[24] The Neo Geo AES version was added via emulation to the Wii Virtual Console in Japan on September 6, 2011, in North America on March 8, 2012 and in the PAL region on February 9, 2012. Another emulated version was released for iOS and Android in 2013. The iOS version supports the iCade accessory.[25] The arcade version was emulated and released as part of the ACA Neo Geo series for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on November 2, 2017 with releases for Windows, Nintendo Switch, and iOS following afterwards.[26] Another emulated release of the arcade version titled The King of Fighters '97 Global Match featuring online multiplayer was released in 2018 for the PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, and Microsoft Windows via Steam. ReceptionCritical receptionReception
AllGame wrote said the presentation was the best in the series, becoming of one of the best in the 2D fighting genre.[27] Hardcore Gaming 101 appreciated the new characters and their playstyle. They also commended the seamless integration of the story into the game. While the gameplay changes were lauded as "great", the game was criticized for being unbalanced. The controls were described as more responsive than in any previous entry in the series. The game's soundtrack received praise, although it was noted that players don't hear much of it during the game.[22] Reviewing the Virtual Console release, Nintendo Life compared the game to The King of Fighters '95, saying the difference is huge: '97 has more characters, improved animation and backgrounds, and more balanced artificial intelligence.[3] In 2021, Sportskeeda noted '97 as "the most well-loved and well-known" game by The King of Fighters fan community.[38] Video Games and MAN!AC gave positive reviews for the Neo Geo CD and PlayStation ports respectively but criticized the excessively lengthy load times.[37][32] In conclusion, Video Games deemed '97 slightly worse than '96.[37] Comparing the Neo Geo CD and PlayStation ports, the magazine said the PlayStation version has marginally shorter load times.[39] Consoles News said the PlayStation version's load times were optimized and noted is as the best PlayStation port of an SNK game. Although, it was said to be inferior to the Sega Saturn port.[30] Sega Saturn Magazine said that '97 was a return to form for the series after the disappointment of '96. Overall, it was noted as a "great game" and a "fantastic update".[35] Fun Generation didn't like the visual presentation, the long load times, and called the music some of the worst on the PlayStation. The game was praised for its solid playability and was recommended only to experienced fighting game fans.[31] Mega Fun complained about the small sprites compared to the arcade version and called the gameplay tired.[34] 148Apps said the "iOS port holds up incredibly well". They praised the wealth of control options.[25] Slide to Play said the virtual controls work well but the button layout is too cluttered.[36] Pocket Gamer reviewer called '97 the best of the Orochi Saga games but said it just doesn't work well with touchscreen controls.[28] TouchArcade reviewed the 2023 version: "I think it’s only a better set of multiplayer options away from being the best possible mobile port it could be."[29] Global Match received a poor grade by Gaming Age for not providing modern games several modes to learn how to play charaters and instead force them to play directly while also acknowledging there is an input lag as well as difficulty.[40] Bonus Stage UK was more positive to the presentation and input lag, making the game more appealing to players if they ignore such issues.[41] SalesIn Japan, Game Machine listed The King of Fighters '97 on their September 1, 1997 issue as being the second most-successful arcade game of the month.[42] By August 1998, The King of Fighters '97 had shipped 50,000 arcade sets in Japan and an additional 100,000 overseas, the highest number among Neo Geo games.[43] According to Famitsu, the AES version sold over 19,900 copies in its first week on the market.[44] During its release week, the Sega Saturn port of the game sold 94,327 copies in Japan. As of 2004, the sales went to 156,717.[45] The PlayStation port sold 160,124 units.[46][47] NotesReferences
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