The King of Fighters 2000/2001

"Rising like the mighty phoenix, SNK has returned to toast your @ss!"

They're back, and what better way to welcome their return than with the King of Fighters! Featuring both KOF 2000 and 2001, this combo pack promises hours of 2d fighting bliss at the low cost of $40 bucks. Is it worth it? Decide for yourself!

Graphics: designed for the neo-geo hardware (a 10+ year old, sprite based system) the graphics look like they would be more at home on a sega saturn or a psx than a PS2. Hell, half the players have appeared on these systems in earlier forms of KOF. However, the quality of the character design and the backgrounds more than makes up for any deficiency in the graphics. Each character is beautifully animated, comparable to capcom vs snk 2, and colored in a much more detailed way than recent capcom fighters. The backgrounds are beautiful as well. In 2000, backgrounds sport multiple animations and in some instances change between rounds. For instance, a chain link fence might stand in round 1, yet in round 3 a bulldozer busts through it and proceeds to knock brick around while billowing smoke. Its a nice touch. In 2001, the backgrounds have been redesigned from their arcade counterparts with more color and animation. Plus, each stage has two versions which are randomly selected as you play. As an example, The original CHINA stage is set at dusk with an orange hued color scheme and people cheering you on, while the remixed stage takes place at night and instead of people cheering, fog rolls through the stage. Very nice, and much better than the arcade or DC versions. All of this has been touched up at a higher resolution for the PS2, making things much more crisp and pronounced.

Sound: The sound in this game is crystal clear, but there are a few gripes. The soundtrack to 2000 is beautiful and a compliment to the game, while the 2001 soundtrack is a little drab and uninspired. Not terrible, but nothing great. As for sound effects, they ring crystal clear and stay in sync with the actions on screen, but I've noticed that a few minor effects are gone. For instance, in a certain win pose, a dog will come out and bark.....or is supposed to. The bark animation is there, but the sound effect is gone, unlike the arcade or DC versions. I've only noticed this on two instances, and its not much, but still kind of a letdown. I really liked that bark.....

Control: Get an arcade stick for this one. The ps2 controller is perfectly adequate for fighting games, but its stiff nature hampers a few of the moves, like Iori's maiden masher extension. After a little practice, its all good, but nothing beats a fighting game on an arcade stick.

Gameplay: Ah! this is where it shines! The King of Fighters lets you pick four characters to fight with, against teams of four. In 2000, you use three of your characters to fight with, while the fourth becomes a ''striker''. During play, if you so choose, you can call out this striker to assist your attack on your opponent. Its a fun system, leading to large, spectacular combo's. In 2001, its pretty much the same, but adds a ratio system. This way, you can use the three characters to fight with one striker, or two characters and two strikers, or one characters and three strikers. The damage received and dealt is adjusted accordingly to what you choose. Each character has a wide variety of special moves (twice as many as street fighter characters, for instance) and several supers which you can use depending on certain conditions. There are also several modes of play, both versus and single player, so that its fun with a friend or without.

Overall: In the end, Kof 2000/2001 is one of the best 2d fighting games on the market. It may not be as flashy as Guilty Gear X or the Capcom fighters, but its more in depth and has a longer lasting appeal. The only gripes I would have is the lack of blood and a few minor animations that have been removed from the Japanese version, but the rest of the upgrades and the translated story more than make up for it. Buy it! Your only going to get one chance

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 12/12/03