The King of Fighters '95

The electronic music is engaging and helps emphasize the uptempo pace of the battles. Eight skill levels are available, and you can "rank in" to the high score screen with a mere 20K, making it easy to record your high scores. It's not a huge step forward, but King of Fighters 95' does a brilliant job of tweaking an already winning formula.

Muchos os preguntaréis porqué he hablado de la versión Saturn en vez de la original. Pues porque en la original me tenía que dejar pelas en unos recreativos y jugar en un emulador (no dispondo de NeoGeo ni NeoGeo CD) no es lo mismo, ni mucho menos. Éste producto fue la razón que me acabó de atraer hacia los juegos de lucha en 2D, el que me hizo de la MLL, el que ha hecho que ahora yo esté por estos lares y el que hizo que durante 2 años yo fuera Kyo “el del sol irregular”. Tal vez las versiones postreras fueran más intuitivas, pero la magia de "The King of Fighters '95" no ha sido igualada todavía, y sinceramente dudo que lo sea jamás. Un clásico con todas las de la ley.

KOF '95 is one of the best brawlers out there, especially with the Edit feature that creates endless possibilities. Let's hope for a real all-star lineup in 1996.

KOF '95 is my favorite Neo Geo fighter. The wealth of characters creates a deep, diverse, fighting experience and the art is a testament to hand-drawn games, with some of the best backgrounds and character art I've ever seen. The Saturn version is the first game to utilize the cartridge slot and comes with a cool little memory cart. The end result: totally do-able loading time and a pixel-for-pixel perfect translation. SOA needs to bring this game out here. It's a fighter worthy of their label.

Este juego presenta interesantes virtudes, como los combates en grupos de tres y la inclusión de luichadores míticos y es una buena opción dentro de este estilo de lucha, pero la competencia en este género en Saturn no es que sea dura, es que es realmente encarnizada.

The faithful and well-done port of the Neo Geo arcade game is a better offering, both graphically and control-wise, than it's cousin. Samurai Shodown III. Although it doesn't add anything to the genre, it brings back memories of old 2-D fighting games. It plays well, looks good and sounds the same as the arcade version. You could do worse.

SNK has done it again. I didn't think they could do it, but they improved upon KOF '94. In KOF '95, they replaced one of their old fighting teams and added a new one. My favorite new option was the added Team Edit Option in which the player can choose any three of the 24 fighters to make their own personal team. The gameplay and animation is top-notch. With these changes and the new backgrounds, SNK has produced perhaps their best fighter yet.

King of Fighters '95 is everything that fans of the KOF series could have wanted in a straight sequel. It combines the already well-polished gameplay from KOF94 with some graphical improvements and the ability to make custom teams to create a very enjoyable gaming experience.

That leaves this edition one of the least renovated. The company was obviously working the formula, inserting some inspired backdrops, and tweaking this just slightly for the next year. It's a small step (though not a bad game by any means), enough to write this one off completely, and ignore it to head straight into '96.

Where King of Fighters excels is the massive amount of playable, diverse characters. Even before Capcom started teaming their fighters up to see who was the better (my bet will always be on Strider), SNK was teaming the Art of Fighting combatants and the Fatal Fury kids with the Ikari Troupe ... all representing a different game SNK developed. I must say, this was always intriguing, and I wished more companies would do things like this. However, as much as I like this game, it seems like they have missed a wonderful oppurtunity to cross some of the Samurai Shodown, or Last Blade characters into the King of Fighters universe. This series has just improved over time, however subtly. And while it's not Street Fighter II, it isn't Time Killers, either. I wish there was more to it, but each of the games is fun to play.

The character balance and AI could benefit from some tightening up. Certain fighters like the huge ball-and-chain toting Chan Koehan seem to easily overpower the rest. I also noticed some minor collision detection problems, which is rare for an SNK game. The background scenery is uneven in quality. Some stages (like the pier) are breathtaking, while others (like the bar) look noticeably pixilated. The music is also a mixed bag, with high-energy rock jams mixed in with some easy-listening garbage. And while the three-man team mode is a nice idea, it doesn't work well with the CD version, since each player needs to be loaded individually (that could mean six loads screens per match!). Of course, if you're lucky enough to have the cartridge, then you're in good shape.

King of Fighters '95 is the first Neo-Geo fighting game to make its way over to the Playstation. And sure enough, it throws in fighters from the many other SNK fighting games - such as Art of Fighting and the Fatal Fury series. In addition to the normal one-on-one fighting mode, KOF adds a team mode, which pits two of three teams against each other.