Fatal Fury: King of Fighters, known as Garō Densetsu: Shukumei no Tatakai (餓狼伝説 ~宿命の闘い~, Hungry Wolf Legend: The Battle of Destiny) in Japan, is a 1991 head-to-head fighting game released by SNK for the Neo Geo arcade and home platforms.[1] Fatal Fury was SNK's first fighting game for the Neo Geo system and served as the inaugural game in their Fatal Fury series, as well as the first game to depict the fictional "King of Fighters" tournament, which became the basis for the later The King of Fighters games.
Fatal Fury: King of Fighters | |
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Developer(s) | SNK
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Publisher(s) | SNK
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Director(s) | Takashi Nishiyama |
Producer(s) | Eikichi Kawasaki |
Designer(s) | Seigo Ito Takashi Tsukamoto |
Composer(s) | Hiroshi Matsumoto Kazuhiro Nishida Toshikazu Tanaka |
Series | Fatal Fury |
Platform(s) | Arcade
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Release | 25 November 1991
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Genre(s) | Fighting |
Mode(s) | Single-player, co-op, multiplayer (up to two players) |
Arcade system | Neo Geo MVS |
The game was designed by former Capcom employee Takashi Nishiyama, the creator of the original Street Fighter (1987). Many of SNK's mainstay characters, including the Bogard brothers Terry and Andy, friend Joe Higashi, and their nemesis Geese Howard, made their debut in this game.
The gameplay follows the typical formula of most fighting games: the player competes against their opponent in best two-out-of-three matches. The play controls consist of an eight directional joystick and three attack buttons: punch, kick and throw. Each of the playable characters has special techniques that are performed by inputting specific commands in combination with the joystick and buttons. The input methods for special moves are shown to the player during the course of the game (after every bonus round), as opposed to being given in an instruction card in the game's cabinet.
The most novel aspect of Fatal Fury was the addition of two-lane battles. Many stages featured two rows, a background row, and a foreground row. Players can change between rows at any time other than in the Single Player Mode, where they have to wait for the CPU opponent to change rows before they can in almost every stage. The player is not required, however, to do so. When a second player joins during the middle of a one-player fight, instead of postponing the current battle for a match between the two players, the game will make both players team up against the current CPU opponent in a two-on-one match before their battle takes place. After every other match in the single-player tournament, the player will participate in a bonus round mini-game involving an arm wrestling match against a machine. The player must tap the A button rapidly to win these mini-games.[2]
The game was designed by Takashi Nishiyama, the creator of the original Street Fighter (1987) at Capcom. After leaving Capcom for SNK, Nishiyama wanted to create a fighting game with a storyline and characters that were easier to empathize with, something he wasn’t able to achieve with Street Fighter.[3] Fatal Fury, which Nishiyama envisioned as a spiritual successor to Street Fighter, was developed around the same time as Street Fighter II (1991). While Street Fighter II placed more emphasis on combos, Fatal Fury placed more emphasis on the timing of special moves as well as storytelling.[4]
In 1981, Terry and his younger brother Andy were orphans who raised themselves on the streets. They were soon adopted by Jeff Bogard, a master martial artist, eventually living in Southtown. When Terry was 10, they both witnessed the brutal murder of their adoptive father at the hands of Geese Howard. Knowing that they needed more training to confront Geese, the brothers made an oath to spend a decade to fine tune their martial arts before trying to avenge their father. Andy decided to perfect his own martial art over at Japan to differentiate himself from his older brother by being taught the Shiranui-ryū Ninjutsu (Shiranui Style Ninja Technique) and a form of empty-handed combat called Koppōken. Terry faithfully chose to wander in his home country, combining the Hakkyokuseiken fighting skills learned from his father, his father's mentor Tung Fu Rue who is the shih-fu of both the art of Hakkyokuseiken and the art of Bajiquan, and Terry also studied other martial arts abilities gained from the street fighters of South Town.
A decade later into the present, the crime lord Geese Howard organized a tournament, dubbed "The King of Fighters". Andy returns to South Town to reunite with Terry. After the Bogard brothers pay respects to Jeff's grave, they encounter and befriend the Japanese Muay Thai champion, Joe Higashi, from Thailand and learn about the K.O.F. tournament hosted by Geese. Andy enters with the two in an attempt to avenge their father, but lost the tournament to Geese's right-hand man Billy Kane before he could reach Geese, Joe Higashi also lost to Geese's muscle-bound henchman Raiden after getting passed by his bitter rival Hwa Jai. Terry then defeated all 7 fighters including his former mentor, Tung Fu Rue, and celebrated his victory, when suddenly Terry gets captured by two henchmen and sent to Geese's Tower by force, to have a one-on-one showdown with the crime boss himself. Geese was a formidable opponent for Terry, but he gained the upper hand by defeating him with a jump kick out of his tower, causing Geese to plummet to his death. As Terry left the tournament victorious, Andy felt a mixed sense of closure and returned to Japan to continue his training.
At the beginning of the game, the player is given the option to select one fighter which is either Terry, Andy, or Joe. The player is then given the next option to select from one of four fighters as their first opponent: Duck King, Richard Meyer, Michael Max, and Tung Fu Rue. After defeating their first opponent, the player faces the other three opponents in the following order: Richard, Michael, Duck, Tung. The cycle begins at whichever opponent the player has selected. The three bosses before the final boss Geese Howard are fought in the following order: Hwa Jai, Raiden and Billy Kane.
Publication | Score |
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Computer and Video Games | (Neo Geo) 94%[5] (Mega Drive) 85%[6] |
GameFan | (Genesis) 348/400[7] |
GamePro | (Neo Geo) 5/5[8] |
Maximum | (Neo Geo) ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Mega Guide | (Neo Geo) Positive[10] |
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In Japan, Game Machine listed Fatal Fury: King of Fighters on their January 1, 1992 issue as being the third most-successful table arcade unit of the month.[11] It went on to be Japan's fourth highest-grossing arcade game of 1992, below Street Fighter II (two versions) and Captain Commando.[12] In North America, RePlay reported Fatal Fury to be the second most-popular arcade game in February 1992.[13]
The game received positive reviews upon release. Paul Rand of Computer and Video Games called it one of the best Neo Geo games available in 1992 and compared it favorably with Street Fighter II, stating Fatal Fury was a "brilliant feast of fighting" with "huge and excellently drawn" character sprites, "lots of great" animation, and unique special attacks "giving the game more variety."[5]
In a retrospective review, Maximum commented in 1996 that the game failed to offer any real competition for Street Fighter II in either playability or character selection. They concluded: "The only main point in this game's favor is that two of the characters may team together to take on a computer opponent in a three-player frenzy, and the game also tries to offer something else new with a two-tier playing arena, but the slow action and the disgracefully difficult fireball motions make special moves something of a rare occurrence".[9] In 2018, Complex rated the game 74th on their "The Best Super Nintendo Games of All Time". They praised the combat and the ability to jump in and out of the backgrounds concluding: "One of the best fighters on the SNES, by far."[14]
西山 SNKで仕事するようになっても、 「ストリートファイター(1)」で実現できなかっ た、より感情移入しやすいストーリー性とキャラクター作りに挑戦したかったんですよ。 そうして作ったのが 『餓狼伝説』 なんですが、 リリースしたときにはすでに『ストリート ファイターII」が大人気でしてね。両者の発売タイミングは5ヵ月しか間が空いておら ず、リリースされてから開発しても時間が足りないし、そもそも僕らが 「ストリートファイ ター(I)」 を作ったのに、 パクリとかずいぶん言われました(笑)。[Nishiyama: Even when I started working at SNK, I wanted to challenge myself to create a storyline and characters that were easier to empathize with, something I couldn't achieve with "Street Fighter (1)". That's how I made "Fatal Fury", but when it was released, "Street Fighter II" was already very popular. There was only a 5-month gap between the release timings for both games, and there would not be enough time to develop it after it was released. Even though we made “Street Fighter (I)” in the first place, it was often called a ripoff (laughs).]
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