Ok people, lets get off the Capcom bandwagon and support someone who is actually trying! so underrated! Lets hope a new Magician lord or samurai showdown get the same treatment!
Capcom u fail! start taking notes!

oh jesus,
i think i just released some semen in my pants.

Looks really good. I'm not huge on fighting games these days (other than SSBB, of course.), but King of Fighters XII and Street Fighter IV are both potential buys for me.

Ill buy this game possibly for k, he's black (enough for me) so i gotta support him! (to whoever is going to say he is a tanned japanese guy, do you reall want to kill this retarded little boys dreams?!?!!?)

WOW. Now THATS how you make a sequel! Hope it plays as good as it looks. Hope SF4 plays better than it looks. :P

@dmitsuki: As long as Iori is in (sans his UFS outfit...WTF was that?!) I'll be happy. But lets be serious, this is KoF. Is their really a chance Iori WONT be in it?

All these screen shots look like shit, to be honest. I don't really see anything remotely impressive.

@KaneTaker: I dont remember who lori is *cool face* but yeah if its one of those generic black fighters in games that do bad fighting styles and stuff ill pass, i mean come on in street fighter the black guy doesnt have a kick?!?! As a black martial artist i would like to say i prefer kicking over punching, black people can fight with real styles to, and screw you capcom! Now please bring street fighter to a console near me : D

@TK423:

[cache.kotaku.com]

That looks like shit huh?

Oh.. what about this one?:

[www.famitsu.com]

@dmitsuki: iori is the red headed guy with a black jacket over an oversized white dress shirt and a belt connecting his knees together...and he's not black at all

on topic: damn these look nice, can't wait to see more of it in motion.

man, this is the ultimate 2d game, a f*cking dream come true T_T

@wana10: Man we need to make a game ourseleves then that has black people in it that can fight good and stuffs like that, ill be lead programer, whoever helps gets part of the pay, and dont forget theres free chicken : D hmm i think i totaly forgot that i want ot play this game lol

@dmitsuki: If you want an empowering black character, I wouldn't reccommend King of Fighters. Ever seen "Duck King"?
On topic, this game looks gorgeous, I really hope this comes to PS3. I wonder how fluid the animation will be, KoF Quality of Garou Quality...
I'm hoping for the latter.

@TheCleaningGuy: Kenzan!: speaking of garou(and i know this is sacrilegious to say) but i always preferred terry's garou outfit to the the standard kof outfit.

Honestly, theres only a few screens that I can tell the difference in thanks to the obvious downscaling, and jpg nastiness.

This and the "Now" Compilation albums have the same effect of me.

"What?! 27? Weren't they on 13 last week?!"

When you can't keep track of game or album compilation numbers, you're past your prime.

Hate to see mine go at 19.

@TheCleaningGuy: Kenzan!: To be fair, he's really, really damn hard to use. Actually...I don't know how thats helping. XD

I can't even touch another Kyo if he doesn't have the same moveset as in Neo Geo Battle Coliseum. So fun to use there. D:

This... this...

so beautiful.

man, along with blazblue it's going to be a great year for fighting games.

Looks way better than SF4 and SF2 HD Remix. I think they need to tone done Kyo's flame effects though. They don't seem to fit in well.

Speaking of empowering black characters, anyone remember Team USA though? hehe

Doesn't look bad, but it's hard to get a good feel for all the detail put into the game with these small, blurry images.

Kotaku staff! Please get SNK Playmore to send you guys hi-res screenshots, stat!

@henhowc: That's a matter of opinion. SFIV looks quite a bit better to me, especially in motion.

[www.gametrailers.com]

[www.gametrailers.com]

@KaneTaker:

Actually, Iori has his Orochi powers stolen by Ash after KOFXI so if they actually follow the story, Iori should have no powers and be on level with Shingo (or is it Kensou? It's late), who, last I saw, can now randomly create Orochi-like flame, which should be impossible. It'd be awesome if Iori had to train with him for a game.

At least, I remember that being the case...

@burningranger01:

-Probably- one of the most ignorant things I've read at this site lol.

Also, only reason people are comparing SFIV and this is cause they are fighters and have been regarded as rivals, but it's apples and oranges.

I don't want to sound as an un-believer, but I'd like to understand why this is great and SF4 is not.
Motion-less, I can hardly diferentiate it from recent KOF 2dn games
(besides, I personally never liked the "manga characters, real fire and explosions" style a la MVC2, I see it unfitting.)

Other than that, sounds like a great game for KOF hardcore fans! too unfriendly for begginers and too common for casual gamer-fighter

@burningranger01: That's a really stupid thing to say. Capcom's take on the matter is actually a little bit more of a novelty. KoF's new stuff? Pretty new drawings! Soooo innovative. I mean, it's a great effort, but Guilty Gear beat them to it a long time ago.

Who's the girl in [kotaku.com] ?

@Ruglia: That girl looks like Athena Asamiya on a serafuku.

I demand to see K'! And I want Chris back :0

@Ruglia: Athena, she changes clothes every game. At least I think it's her.
Please tell me what's so innovative in SFIV that isn't new graphics? And KOF has new stuff. The new gameplay mechanics were listed in the last post about it.

Next time I see SNK down the street, I am totally buying him a Coke.

@Yin: K'? You mean Dante?

If Capcom had any sense in them, they'd buy SNK...SNK have some awesome IP, and Capcom could throw wads of cash at the KoF series to make it even better...

Not sayin KoF is bad as it is, but it is arguably made on a small budget - just imagine what they'd do on a bigger budget...throw in better marketing, and you'd finally have mass market acceptance of arguably the finest fighting series around...

@ArgentAngel: Do you realize that K' was introduced in kof99 and dmc was released in 2001?

@pendruo: Lol. It's just that I have a super hard time telling them apart when just looking at one of them.

@Yin: The main changes to both may be graphics, but the update to SF just seems much more dramatic than the update to KOF. Check out some of the HD videos at gametrailers and you'll see how smooth SF runs. The video of KOF actually goes from the previous game right into the new game and the biggest difference looks to be a widescreen view. The frames are nowhere nearly as smooth. It appears this is intentional, but it just reminds me of older fighting games like SF2 where the frames slow as the fighters come into contact w/each other or perform special moves.

@Spartan1308: KOF XII is pretty smooth for a 2D game... All 3D games are naturally super smooth unless the animtor really sucks. To make a smooth 2d games takes a lot, a lot, of more work. And really, I don't find SFIV's graphics that amazing, compared to other 3D games (which is more fair to compare too). In fact, I would have prefered a 2D SFIV, more like SF3.
I'm not bashing SFIV here, I'm going to buy it and play it... But KOF XII is big. It went from being a slightly dated 2D fighter, graphics wise, to the best looking one. Besides, KOF already did the 3D thing with Maximum Impact. It didn't turn out that good, but they did it.

@Spartan1308:

I've seen all of the videos. I just don't like the direction they've taken with the art. I'm pretty sure that I'm not the only one that thinks that everyone in the game looks like a muscle-bound freak. It takes more than goofy facial expressions to win me over. ;)

With all the information that's been released about both HD Remix and SF4, doesn't it make you kind of wonder why SF4 is even being made? So far SF4 looks like a vastly improved SF EX and it looks and sounds like it plays like SF2 w/ EX specials.

I heard rumors that Iori won't be in this one,it has something to do with Ash Crimson.

@TheCleaningGuy: Kenzan!:

"I wouldn't reccommend King of Fighters. Ever seen "Duck King"?"

Duck King is awesome, you shush :p

@Furious_Liver:

"To be fair, he's really, really damn hard to use. Actually...I don't know how thats helping. XD"

Shit... yea... them QCs and DWMs... those are impossible to pull off *raszzberry*

@dmitsuki:

Western boxing isn't a "real style"? Do you actually fight? One of the best fighters on the freaking earth was Ali, wonder what he trained in, no, not boxing, and he wasn't black either, he was fucking maroon. And oh yea, lets not mention how boxing was one of the most highly praised methods of fighting by none other then Bruce Lee himself, because it ISN'T a "real style".

Wait, WHAT!?! This is an vidja game we talkin bout? well LOL all around then!

@Spartan1308: SF did 3D poorly also, but they've come back to do it right. I understand it's different b/c it's not 2D, but it isn't exactly comparable to 3D games either. I also understand it would take a lot of work to make KOF as smooth, but if they plan to compete against modern games I think they need to go the extra mile or ten maybe. The end result to me is that it just doesn't look as good. That's my opinion though and obviously there are people who prefer pure 2D even if it isn't smooth.
@henhowc: I like a lot of what they've done. I don't think Chun-Li needs to look like a steroid freak, but otherwise it looks nice. I do wish they'd have all of the old characters from Super Street Fighter 2 like T.Hawk and Deejay.

The reason 3D games look smoother is because the computer does all the frames in between the key frames. Since all modern games/movies use 3D we/some are jaded now.

"SFIV is just a glorified version of SF EX series" I firmly believe this.

When we see something that is animated in 2D/hand drawn we tend to appreciate it more. I just hope that they got the animators that worked on Garou: MOTW to animate this new KOF. Garou is the closest SNK came to reaching the quality of animation that Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike held. Just compare the Chun-Li/Hugo animation to any 2D fighter and you will see a huge difference in quality. One thing for sure 2008 will be a big year for fighting games.

looks good..
somehow it reminded me of 'Capcom Vs SNK 2'.
The artwork and animation of SNK characters in CVS2 are superb..

I like the art Style

@Spartan1308: 3D games don't need every frame of animation to be individually created by a human, automation takes care of everything but the keyframes. So of course it's smoother.

Disney 2D animation--still some of the smoothest on the planet, even comparing their oldest films--runs at a grand total of 24 frames per second, in terms of actually animating the characters (IE not the panning). Most anime runs closer to 15-18. Most 2D games run somewhere around 12-15.

This looks like it's at least 18 frames a second, aside from the impacts. That's really smooth for a 2D game. It also means that they have to spend more time creating all the new animations for the characters than Capcom with SF4 (which I intend to play in arcades or buy). So the framerates and animation in the new KOF is frankly a much bigger leap visually than SF4. Also, the game is liable to be much more expensive in terms of pure development, because 2D artists paid by the hour are much more expensive than 3D artists.

Not by pay, mind you, but by the time they have to invest in the animations.

Someone needs to introduce Japanese publishers to higher resolutions. Either that or Japanese game sites need to stop shrinking the images they get...

My favourite console fighting games!! Play this game for hours!

Why so small. ._. I want to see this game in it's full glory. This game is pretty much like a dream come true, only thing better would be full HD 2D Castlevania. If 2D can rise again, there is true justice in this world. And this comes from a man who does 3D art for living. n_n;;

Damn, that LOOKS PRETTY!!!!

Hand-drawn 2D graphics WILL NEVER DIE!!!

(fuck... at least I HOPE SO)

Nowadays, I somehow less and less care about this HYPER-REALISTIC 3D Stuff, cuz it just doesn't give me the "WOW!" factor... With 2D graphics I still get it, though...

It's strange, but I simply don't want everything to look ÜBER-REAL (like in real life). If I wanted to see ÜBER-REALISTIC TREES, I'd rather go out for a walk or something.

Am I the only one who kinda thinks like that?

It really is unfair to compare this to what Capcom is doing with SF now, but life ain't fair. I've always preferred Capcom over SNK but I'm glad that SNK has picked up the ball Capcom dropped.

when is this coming out on console?