anybody get Pokken?
This is the first I’ve heard of it.
Er, whee. Interesting…
Incidentally, for anyone interested in how I combine my views on Riven and The King of Fighters, I have rambling, poorly asserted patchwork blog posts for that.
http://www.aderack.com/journal/2016/02/on-inference-and-understanding/
http://www.aderack.com/journal/2016/02/corrosion-and-sparks/
Hi Aderack!!
What are your thoughts on PikaKyary?
Needs more bananas.
I haven’t watched these yet but GatoRay has been uploading footage from the Playstation Arena event in Korea this weekend. I imagine other people must be uploading footage too.
Andy’s select portrait for THE KOF XIV cover is no more
I remember when KoFXII was first shown in some blurry screens and videos that if you squinted your eyes the characters almost looked like real 3d models the way they moved. This time around I find the reverse true when looking at the off-screen cam footage. They’re just animated in such a particularly smooth 2d way that even GGXrd doesn’t look like.
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Tangentially, it’s pretty obvious that XII was an “oh fuuuuck” work-in-progress result, and that XIII is closer to what they actually meant to release. I hadn’t realized how much this was the case, though. In the MMCafe thread about XIV someone posted footage from the XII beta, which contains several final story sequences from XIII.
And even then, apparently a bunch of stuff was cut from XIII to make its eventual release. There was supposed to be a team of rivals for Elisabeth. There were supposed to be more original villains. Basically they just finished up the previously existing KOF characters and said “to hell with it” regarding the original cast they had planned.
Interesting…
Even as the models for this game improve (mostly…IDK about Kyo), I’m still not too sold on the animations. Main complaints I have about how the game looks in action:
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Jumps are floaty as hell. People don’t rise and fall nearly as sharply as they did in older games, even compared to XIII. I can see where some players are concerned about this. They could still be a decent spacing/offense tool from a competitive perspective – they just look like butt right now. Tell SNK to hit the fast forward button on 'em IMO.
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Some of the animations aren’t nearly sharp enough. Not a lot of snap between keys, just a lot of awkwardly excessive interpolation. The floaty jumps kinda exacerbate this effect. Getting into Heavy Metal Taarna territory in some cases. (She does not need that many frames to chop a dude’s head off. I’m sorry. I know rotoscoping was that fire shit in the '80s, but less is usually more when it comes to “real-time” attack animations.)
A specific example of 2) would be Iori’s 1st rekka, I guess. Long windup and you see way too much fine detail as his fist goes up. Doesn’t actually look like it hurts that much, and that’s a significant aesthetic problem for a move you’re gonna see 50,000x a match.
That all said I plan to play the game assuming I can pry myself off SF5 Bison. Until further notice, day 1 team is Kyo/Mai/ KING OF DINOSAURS (do NOT abbreviate his name). Here’s to the best fighting game of 2004!
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To be honest I think a sense of impact or damage on hits is something KOF has not excelled at generally. Heavies and some specials are good but on the other end you have the various ranbus, as an extreme example. I think moving into 3D the extra layer of realism makes that kind of thing stand out more since the extra animation leaves less to the imagination. Jump heights are a weird thing since on a fundamental they never look real and what looks right probably depends on what you are used to seeing. Like, SF2 and Virtua Fighter jumps are relatively silly compared to modern jumps but I don’t bat an eye at them since I’m used to them. I think KOF14 will probably end up the same way.
But from a gameplay standpoint it definitely feels like SNK is trying to make jumps and hops less free to emphasize grounded movement more. I think hops still look to be quick enough to be effective while also making it easier for the defending player to deal with, if they’re careful. Also of note is that some moves put the opponent into a juggle state in the air and you can follow-up with jumping attacks if you’re not close enough (King does this in one of the videos).
Leona has that follow-up kick to grand saber (the running slash) and Iori has that lunging overhead again. Iori’s new super also looks like it’s going to be real annoying to deal with when the clock is down. It comes out fast in the video below (should start at 2m39s) but in the second video here it comes out much slower- I’m not sure if it can be delayed or if this is just the difference between DM and SDM versions.
I wouldn’t mind sailing down to Cape KoD since his design is wacky and his climax DM is so good (it made me smile the moment I saw the glass on the screen crack- it’s it’s not just another slam into the ground that grapplers usually get), but Tizoc has been too strong too many times and I don’t want to see him anymore. The South American team looks and sounds cool from the leaks. SNK has some great boxers (Vanessa in KOF and Rick Stroud from RB2, who I only recently started messed around with and absolutely fell in love) so I’m looking forward to seeing what’s up with this “handi-capped boxer”.
And I am going to make a confession here: the KOF14 theme song is so cheesy that it has grown on me the same way Indestructible and that Tekken 5 theme did. I was legitimately hyped when the chorus kicked in in the latest trailer (the syncing with Andy’s climax DM and following up with Terry turning his hat around really helped the mood). Any time someone turns the tables in a match you can bet I am going to be yelling “BURNING ON THE INSIDE! WHOA OH OH OH OH!” I don’t understand any of the other lyrics but those two lines are all I really need.
This is the fate of all bad fighting game trailer songs.
Except the Street Fighter x Tekken one.
are they putting this game on PC I don’t remember
if they are I will play it (badly). KING OF DINOSAURS is an auto-include on all of my teams now that the Vanessa dream is dead. I don’t know who would fit with him thematically. maybe Maxima, but I don’t like Maxima. I feel like Geese could work. I like Geese.
At first it’s PS4 only, because Sony helped to fund it. I’d be surprised if it didn’t show up on Steam, though, as apparently it was Steam sales of XIII that convinced them to get back into making videogames.
About the jumping: Oda said that, although they were basically attempting to recreate the XIII mechanics in the new engine, they were looking at every element individually and questioning how necessary it was to retaining the KoF “feel”. Anything that wasn’t needed was to come out, in effort to make XIV easy for newcomers to get into. One of the mechanisms he mentioned was the jumping – did they really need all of those levels or not? Did it make the game more complicated than it had to be, or was it fairly intuitive?
I’m easy to please. They got King? Great. Of course she’s there. If she’s not, it’s not The King of Fighters.
The two games that she’s not in? The worst two. Coincidence? Possibly.
King is a core member of Team Probable Lesbian, so of course I will play her. I even played her in CvS2. who played King in CvS2? no one.
Ah, she’s got a thing with Ryo. Unless he’s just her merkin.
yeah but let’s be real here
projecting video game characters’ sexuality makes me uncomfortable.
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I guess, but any character you don’t “project” a sexuality onto is someone you are going to assume is straight anyway, which isn’t much better.
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