The impression is that this year some mega-corporations announced an underground tournament fighting game developers. No wonder that several distinguished veterans have decided to revive old.
Did The King of Fighters XII fulfill its destiny? With the move to this question does not even answer. In some ways, of course, progress is obvious. Just one glance at the screen to see how the picture had changed a little. SNK Playmore from scratch redrawn characters and arenas, updated animation fighters - even those beautiful flash, which can be obtained when you beat the opponent's jaw with his foot to turn, now look brighter and richer. This is certainly not spectacular scenes of Tekken 6, and the spectacular camera angles, as in Street Fighter IV (where the camera every now and then darts off to a favorable angle to show ordinary superspace) is not here. But still nice.  | |  | Most of the new possibilities for some reason it was sent to protect. For example, Guard Attack, which allows almost any enemy counter attack. Very similar to Focus Attack of the Street Fighter IV | | On the number of all possible lights, glitter, explosions and Scorchlings The King of Fighters XII may well argue even with BlazBlue, though with the same Street Fighter IV |
The very process of mutilation, too, has changed. SNK Playmore in droves to scrap the elements that appeared in past episodes (eg, Tactical Shift System, allows you to change the team members directly during the round), but, as usual, instead introduced a couple of new ones. Hit of the season - Critical Counter, when properly parried the enemy attack you for some time stuns the enemy, thereby obtaining the opportunity to hold a series of attacks, ending its florid special moves. With due diligence can be a one-stop deprive the enemy half of the line of life! The trick, of course, interesting, but when your every attack threatens to turn into big trouble for yourself, all the fighting spirit all at once somewhere disappears. As a result, instead of the hurricane fights often observed, as opponents keep everyone in his corner and do not wish to attack, fearing a counterattack.
Scale Power Meter has been reduced to a single division - respectively, and the number superpriemov now equals one. In general, this is the austerity regime and became the most unpleasant surprise KoF XII. Arenas only six, two of them - only the "nighttime" options already available. Soundtrack limited subsistence minimum of tunes that devoted fans the game would have already learned by rote. List of men dropped to 22 names (KoF XI, we recall, there were twice as much) ... I waited for fans of "new hope for the show."
 | The drawn game |
In fact, that in the KoF XII «just a little," explained not by laziness of developers from SNK Playmore. The fact that the game does not use technology, in which all the animation frames are drawn, essentially by hand. This has robbed the studio a lot of forces: if you believe the official information on each character worked ten designers for sixteen months! That's why had to reduce the number of participants in the new tournament, to abandon the spectacular superpriemov second and third levels and so on.
 | |  | Yori Yagami - one of those who outwardly has changed markedly since The King of Fighters XI | | Not all will be satisfied with the character selection screen: little girls, May Sirani out of business ... But in terms of gameplay roster very nice |
It is fair to note that for Tekken or Street Fighter is a number of heroes has always been sufficient. And yet, the best annotation KoF XII is the phrase "total could be even bigger." Even in the list of available modes seem to be mandatory for any self-respecting fighting game line. Not only that, this time completely missing the plot and, accordingly, no Story mode. This happened with the series before (and low loss, let's be honest: the story of The King of Fighters has never played a major role). But Where are the customary Challenge mode and Survivor mode? Arcade mode is, but it is just something out of five matches against randomly assembled teams. Plus the opportunity to give second joystick to another player, plus training, plus a "Gallery" with bonus pictures - everything. Very sparsely, especially when compared with the abundance that offers Street Fighter IV or ... almost any of the previous editions of The King of Fighters.
In addition to all the troubles, the online mode was virtually unplayable. To get to the arena and fight, you must first cut through a huge number of menu options and settings ... and eventually found himself overseeing the fight, two other players. And it can not go, if you please watch till the end. When it is possible to join the battle itself, the game throws new caper: the lag not just noticeable, it is terrible. How to play the two-dimensional and not too richly animated fighting game, when the image on the screen then stops, then speeds up - you think, imagine. It remains only to download and install a giant, unseen patch size of 700 megabytes, which eliminates problems with the network game. What else am I to do? Before us is still long-awaited The King of Fighters in high definition. Yes, it was conceived SNK Playmore only half: a big step to do turned out, but only a step this - do not forward, and to the side. And if you come to terms with multiple disabilities, it is quite possible to enjoy the updated graphics, and to meet with familiar characters.After all, even if Street Fighter IV caused no unequivocal delight both the veterans and the beginners (although as a whole by more than heat), the KoF XII is hardly interested in someone, but loyal fans of the series, finished with a heavy heart, to forgive pet any omissions creators. That's just not diminished if their up to the next release?
| What's New? |
New to KoF XII is only one - the character Raiden, who came into the game straight from the Fatal Fury (another fighting game-series from SNK). Other characters have migrated from previous episodes of The King of Fighters (preference releases, released before 1999), many participants returned to their old way of mid-90's. Rollback affected not only the appearance of men: a list of available methods was also redesigned, and most characters have lost their abilities, received fresh episodes. This reform, however, is to be expected: SNK Playmore previously warned that with KoF XII intends to "restart" series, giving up a number of developments for the opportunity to go in a new direction. Next issue should put an end to all the storylines and to lay the basis for new stories. However, now a few characters have new characters and reworked the arsenal of techniques (in particular, the two characters, exclusive to the console versions).
 | |  | The developers emphasize that one of their goals was to "create the most entertaining two-dimensional fighting game in history" |
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