| For a game series that's been around since '94, and that has survived the liquidation (and revival!) of the company that created it, you can't help but give some credit. King of Fighters can be referred to as the "Dragon Quest" of fighting games; ugly, lesser known, and outdated at first glace, but with an amazing amount of personality and depth that becomes apparent after some time spent with it...Not to mention an incredible resiliance as a series and a completely rabid fan base. When SNK "broke up" at the turn of the century, their beloved Fighting series was handed off to Korean developer Eolith. KoF 2001, which most people assumed would never happen, is the result. The game makes some pretty radical departures from it's roots with this installment, and as a result is almost universally disliked (some would say hated) by the KoF hardcore. On the other hand, it's probably the most accessible game to new players out of the entire series. Interestingly, Eolith would take the opposite approach for KoF 2002 and make a KoF nut's dream (probably to win back some of the fan clout it lost with this version - It worked, too). To be fair, if one jumps from KoF 2000 to 2001, the shock is noticable. Eolith doesn't quite have their sea legs where the Neo Geo hardware is concerned, and it shows glaringly when compared to the veteran SNK design team's preceeding, carefully polished game. Some backgrounds here are interesting and well made, others (like The Race Track) are ugly to the point of discomfort. Likewise, the fighting system got an overhaul of sorts, aping the Capcom "Vs." style of tag-team assisting attacks to a minor degree, which is something that most fans took as either refreshing or insulting (or both). First, though, something completely superficial that anyone will notice immediately: The art style is *awful.* Very few characters make it out unscathed when it comes to the artistic rendering of them. Yuri's KoF 2001 victory portrait will probably go down in the annals of fighter history as the ugliest rendition of a supposedly cute character since Hibiki from The Last Blade 2, who I'm pretty sure was supposed to be kinda homely to begin with. Likewise with the music. It tries to be a peppy techno soundtrack, and while it's functional, it's also amazingly bland and forgetable. If you can get past all this, however, you find that the game itself is actually very well done. The musty KoF fighting system gets a serious fire lit under it this time around. Eolith takes the baby steps SNK made with KoF 2000's system tweaks and cranks everything to 11, giving it a floatier, more combo-friendly feel. Don't expect this to be Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 or anything, but the fighters still spring around with a new litheness that belies the game's SNK roots (which, to the unitiated, makes it feel more "normal.") Thankfully, it works exceedingly well witht the game's creative move set, which was always a KoF staple. Eolith wasn't afraid to take risks, either, and so we get some new charactes up to bat. Foxy is now playable, promoted from her striker-only status from last year. New to the series are Angel, a clever (and powerful!) tech grappler, along with K9999 (say it "Kay-Four-Nine") who is, for all intents and purposes, Tetsuo from the Akria comics/movie. He's even got the red cape and white hair as a victory pose, plus a mutated metal arm that goes nuts evey once in a while. Good stuff, and remarkably fun to use since he's very powerful, but only has two special moves. Like I said, risky, but it works beautifully once you get your head around it. Which is exactly my feelings on this game. |
