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Farewell to SNK
pliew writes: "There's a good article over at classic gaming with a reader's digest version of the history of SNK. I'm sure all readers here have at one point experienced video games on the neogeo console."
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See you at the crossroads...
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
I mean... Osama wars???
karma capped
Will all the SNK games be public domain, legally emulated on M.A.M.E?
Will we be seeing more Mai Shiranui Hentai ?
YESSS!!
Oh, I meant, how sad!, no really!
Kilroy was here!
what is TBFD?
This is just one more nail in the coffin of quality, hand-drawn, 2D arcarde style games. Many generes have benefited or even spawned from the switch to 3D, but I'll take Samurai Spirits (2-4) over Soul Caliber any day of the week.
Takahashi Rumiko made beats! DON, taku, DON, taku. . .
Neo Geo came out with the first version of the famous Bomber Man. I will miss that game.
________________
All my sig are fjdklafjkldafjkldafdaklf
Had it been priced at a more reasonable price, say $200, they would have taken a huge financial loss on the systems, but more than made up for it by beating the SNES and Genesis in the market at the time.
My $.02.
My favorite SNK product was a NES game called 'Athena'. I used to call their customer support line and get tips for the game.
No mention of Crystalis, one of the best (only?) action RPGs for the NES. Zelda was good, but Crystalis was different in that it actually had a storyline with dialogue, something USA gamers wouldn't really see again until Final Fantasy 2 for SNES. At the time, it was surprising to see the game coming from SNK, whose past games were nothing like it (read: Ikari Warriors).
I was always hoping SNK might do a follow-up version for Neo-geo.. oh well.
If you had actually played games *other than* the ones on your Atari, you may have heard of them. :)
Back when I was 10 or so, everytime I was in the local game store which had a NeoGeo on display we'd always oogle the thing. It was the system every kid wanted, but could never afford. Sometimes there would be that rich kid in school who you would hear rumors like "I hear he's got a NeoGeo"..
-
SNK survived mostly because of their arcade business. With the fall of the arcades, companies whos business relies on the arcades are dying.
SNK made very good arcade games, but good games arent enough to by profitable when you compete with Sonys and Microsofts.
Sega seems to be in the same situation SNK was in, and that Atari was in before SNK.
Can Sega survive on games alone? SNK couldnt do it, Atari managed to do it just barely, while Sega has good games, will people buy them?
IF people didnt buy them for Dreamcast Segas own system, will they buy them for PSX, Xbox, or Gamecube?
I dont know
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
what is TBFD?
Sure, all companies - like all organizations, teams, governments, clans, and so forth - are ultimately temporary, no matter how long they do last. It is sad to see the good ones go, but like (current) people, they do eventually die. But that does not mean their lives must be in vain.
Support the ones you like. Let the lessons they demonstrated be applied to new forms. Find out why they died, and if you are ever in a similar position, learn from their mistakes and their sucesses.
Celebrate the dead, perhaps. Does anyone know the legal status of SNK's games now? If they are now abandonware, then play those and encourage others to do likewise instead of playing the worst of what's new, such that SNK's products may set an eternal minimum quality bar for all future games of that nature. (No, I'm not advocating ripping them off to drive them out of business, just saying what we should do now that they are. If they were still in business, they could keep improving. It's kind of like harvesting fruit and wood from a tree that has been knocked down.)
Death is a part of the cycle of life. But make sure it is a cycle, and not just a one-shot: recycle its bits into new births; don't let its death erase the good in it from existance. The degree to which it can live on is the degree to which it will have mattered, and the degree to which it is immortal...
Do any of you remember the old NES game Athena.
Was there an end to that game? I could never figure it out. I even tried using the game genie but I couldn't figure out any form of an ending.
And Ikari Warriors! Wasn't that SNK? ABBA select start or something like that to continue as many times as you wanted. I'd always get a couple hours into the game and get stuck in a wall or something (multiplayer mode).
They had a lot of great games on both consoles and arcade machines. Most of them can be emulated, but it's sad to see a fun company die.
Magician lord was one of my first arcade games that I really got into.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
They didn't mention KOF throughout that whole articles, I think this is what SNK was known by in the last few years? I actually didn't like KOF as a game, but the characters, environments, music and general feel are unparalleled in any other fighter....you can feel it in Capcom vs. SNK (although it plays much like a Street Fighter).
That game would have to be one of SNK's worst.
Their port to the NES of this rather classic arcade game was messed up. IIRC, you had a gun, four lives, and baddies ambushing you from everywhere. Sure, you could get into a tank - until it ran out of fuel. It was nearly impossible to dodge the flying bullets and IIRC, you died with one shot.
You thought CONTRA was hard? Ikari Warriors makes Contra look like Barney's Hide 'n' Seek in terms of difficulty. Levels are ridiculously long, to the point where the music is like sandpaper to your ears. If you didn't know the continue code, the game was IMPOSSIBLE to beat on a normal NES. And, to further insult the player, they made the continue code 'ABBA'
I actually slogged through this game. I fought through wave after wave of pallet-swapped enemies, entrenched machine guns, grenades..
I got to the third level, which consisted of cyan platforms and black water or oil. I slogged through it, and as I approached the end, I took a wrong turn and wound up at a dead end. See, SNK's programmers had learned how to make the screen scroll UP, but not how to scroll the screen DOWN.
so I was stuck there.
I still have the cartridge. It glows with an evil red aura.
cheap-ass arcade hardware that tended to snap off in my hands
Maybe you are just a ham-handed oaf. I bet you threw your controllers around in frustration when you couldn't beat E. Honda in the home version of SF-II.
Takahashi Rumiko made beats! DON, taku, DON, taku. . .
I think SNK was a dream for a lot of people back when it came out late 80s. Unfortunately, 500 bucks for a home system and up to 250 dollars per game was waaay out of many people's budget mine included. However, SNK built the system to last, and last it did. I just bought Mark of the Wolves for DC, one of the greatest, last, and largest of the SNK games. The mvs cartridge will still run on hardware that is 13 years old. I found one of my really old gamepro magazines, and they have a picture of the old home system. (right next to a pic of the 'new' sega genesis) I'll never forget how I felt looking at that machine, and that feeling never went away.
Goodbye SNK, goodbye terry bogard
Ikari Warriors- Cool game, until the one time my friend ruined an attempt to finish the game by advancing the screen and trapping me when no enemies were left. :-(
Samurai Shodown- One of the reasons I bought a 3DO.
Their ridiculous home system- Way overpriced when it was new (I seem to remember seeing it for sale in a Babbage's, for ~$600-$700), friggin' gigantic cartridges you could kill someone with, and great controllers. Too bad you couldn't make a game last for more than a minute, unless you were normally as twitchy as Beavis on a sugar-high. I kept my Neo Geo system for about 2 months, before re-selling the entire package back on eBay where I bought it from-- the games were just too ridiculously fast-paced to be enjoyable.
~Philly
http://www.gameshark.com/community/articles/315642 p1.html
Gameshark reports that they died a month ago, so you may have just found out about it but they've already been dead a while.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
Who can forget Baseball Stars, which took place in "SNK Stadium", featuring the classic scrolling scoreboard cheer "Hooray Hooray!"
And of course, the bottom feeders of the league were the SNK Crushers. Boy did they ever suck. Even worse than the Lovely Ladies....
grep -ri 'should work'
My friends had nintendo's or sega's. I had a turbografx, then the really really luck ones (rich) got a neo-geo for christmas. Those bastards.
I remember walking into my 7-11 (yes kids in those days 7-11's had games in them) and seeing the neo geo for the first time. There was 4 games on it, magician lord, King of fighters, Nam75, and Super Baseball. My buds and I loved vids the way some kids loved baseball. We would buy every game magazine out there, hang out at the flea market trading games and then go home to play games. Games games games. We allways reminised about the good old days when America was the console king with Atari and the 2600/5200/7200. The great debate at the time was nintendo's decision to check games content before we here in america got them. We didn't care if there was a cross in the graveyard in castlevania.
Ok so I proved how deeply emotionally attatched I am to games, let me go on about the neo geo. So there was only 1 kid in the entire east side of san jose that owned one. He never let anyone near it. Our only recourse was to go down to 7-11 to check it out. 4 buttons, cool. Memory card so you could save your place in a game? whats that and where do I get one? Headphone jack? Why were all arcade cabinets built like this one? In terms of sound and graphics, neo geo was top notch.
For awhile there it seemed the neo-geo was going to die into oblivion, but alas a savior came in the form of metal slug. This side scrolling platform shooter showed just what could be done with the system if the artists were given enough time. The attention to detail is apparent everywhere in the game, especially when it came to animations of the different characters. It wasn't just someones helmet flying off when they got shot, their head, and hair flew back as well.
For a time after that, the fighting games started getting really popular on the NG with the release of samuri showdown. All of the sudden out of nowhere came neo geo (about mid 90's) with fighting games that were on par with rival fighting game producer capcom. Even sega's entry into the foray with the virtua fighters series did not get nearly as much play as the neo geo fighters.
15 years later, after being all grown up and looking back.. One of the big dreams me and my buds use to say as kids was, "Wouldn't it be great if we had a game system that could play ALL THE GAMES?!?!!?" I see that mame icon on my taskbar, begging to be clicked.
Unfortunatly this is the reality for the arcade now. PC's have gotten so fast, and so graphically powerful that any system can be emulated to a near %100 accuracy. What did the arcades do in response? They never really did anything, they went about business the old fashion way thinking that things like game houses and home gaming was just a fad that would pass and soon the children would be coming back eagerly slopping quarters down the chute.
Neo Geo, even though they never released new hardware outside of that newfangled 64 bit system, did everything they could to make games that were pleasing to look at, and pleasing to play. It didn't take a 32bit processor and 63 channel sound. Games like metal slug were "designed" and not just a copycat of some other game that was immensly popular.
Well, at least there is one arcade left, I heard King of Fighters 2000 is pretty popular there.
--toq
...but Fatal Fury being "equal to Street Fighter 2 in playability and character development?" Who knew? First off, "character development?" This was Fatal Fury here, not Warzard/Red Earth. Secondly, it wasn't until Fatal Fury 2 that you could actually perform functional link and cancel combos, two features which were implemented in Street Fighter II from the beginning (although unintended).
SNK eventually got fighters down pat, but the first Fatal Fury is just not as good as they make it out to be. It was interesting and different at the time, but not good.
Personally, I will miss them most for Crystalis, Metal Slug, Samurai Spirits/Shodown, and King of Fighters. (Never played Magician Lord, so I can't comment.) I also have to tip my hat to them for getting me hooked on the NeoGeo version of Puzzle Bobble/Bust a Move.
I propose that everyone go out and buy a copy of Fatal Fury Mark of the Wolves for Dreamcast ($30!) in SNK's honor, and use only SNK characters/grooves in Capcom vs SNK 1, Pro, and 2. ^_^
< tofuhead >
It is still the dark of night.
I'm sure all readers here have at one point experienced video games on the neogeo console.
WTF is this?
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Sega is in a slightly different situation in that they are now (arguably) the world's biggest third party game development company (EA being the other candidate). This will be a great financial move for them. There are a lot of parallels to IBM. IBM started to lose it's dominance over the industry, and what saved them was, in effect, giving up on certain things.
IBM is now a stablizing force in the computer industry. They don't face as many risks as they used to by having all of their eggs in their own baskets. They've got their eggs in various baskets, not siding with the same company all the time. All they have to do is try to make sure no one gains too much power and watch their stock value climb. Let the others take the risks.
Granted, the rewards for them are smaller this way, but so are the risks, since there is less at stake for them.
This works the same way for Sega. Before, they had to try to push their own console, and compete with other companies in this arena. They had to compete in hardware and software. Also, if they made software for other consoles, they're simultaneously generating revenue for their direct competitors (through licensing fees) and making the appeal of their own consoles (great Sega games) smaller. And to top it all off, they were starting to get a bad reputation in terms of supporting their own hardware.
They don't have to worry about any of these things any more. They just have to focus on making great games. Let the other folks sweat that Microsoft is getting into the game industry. Sega's potential user base is huge, now (with all the different consoles they are supporting). As long as one console doesn't win and create a monopoly, they are on a good course. And they can take actions to prevent this from happening.
If all you have are silver bullets, everything looks like a werewolf.
Not NEO GEO. Baseball Stars and Crystalis were two of the very best titles to come out for that system, and rank highly among my all time favorite video games.
Thanks, SNK for hours and hours of childhood fun.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
I remember that neogeo was 32 bit gaming, back when snes and genisis were 16 bit.
the damn thing was so expensive though.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
You got it, although in a somewhat demeaning way towards Capcom players.
You can't really categorize all Capcom fighters together. At the very least, there are the scrub dial-a-games (all flash -- Marvel), the intermediate games (lotsa flash, but mostly meat -- Vampire, Warzard), the upper-intermediate games (lotsa meat, but with some throwbacks like custom combos -- SFZ), the basic games (few gimmicks, awesome gameplay -- SF2, CvS), and the hardcore games (where you are expected to possess moderate to advanced skills in order to enjoy the game, like SF3). I personally have no taste for 3-D fighters of any kind, and I really dislike scrubby 2-D games. According to the categories I used, I pretty much enjoy their upper-intermediate and basic games, and can enjoy the occasional intermediate and hardcore game -- but only in moderation.
SNK's thing was always upper-intermediate and basic stuff too, always leaning much more towards hardcore than scrubby. Almost all of their 2-D fighters since FF2 rock IMO, because of this.
< tofuhead >
It is still the dark of night.
Personally, I couldn't stand any of the SNK games I've ever played. I played a lot at a place called "Gamer's Heaven" that had the console and you paid by the hour to play in the back room on their consoles. I used to try the NeoGeo every once in a while and it was just dull. I hated the colors and the games were not fun for me.
Capcom hired SNK's 80 best people and bought their franchises. So SNK's logo may be dead, but their people and franchises live on.
Capcom hires SNK.
Actually, there's more to it than that. Home console with actual arcade hardware, full arcade perfect versions of arcade games, and a relatively 1:1 relationship between home games and arcade games (most of the home games were actual arcade releases, save for a few RPGs). What's not to like about that? True, they were pricey, but no other company has offered the arcade experience for the home like SNK did. Add to that the very cool and hugely overlooked Neo Geo Pocket, and you can see why many gamers are saddened that the great SNK has faltered. (Of couse their management left too much to be desired, so perhas this is a good thing).
It wasnt the decline of arcades that killed em it's their own propietary games. When you release a console that only 10% of American kids can even consider affording you'll never make the money to become a corporate super power. Nintendo's consoles were like pizza stores in NY... fuckin everywhere, and cheap. They also couldnt sell their systems at a loss like MS does cuz you cant sell licenses to your own company (duh). It's not like they got to see any of my quarters either, the owners of those coin ops kept em all.
When I think of why SNK failed I think of games that were too good to be affordable. Arcades gave their stuff impact but the home market == longevity. They gave it a hell of a go but (IMO) they put their eggs in the wrong basket.
When I found out that their fantastic home system was gonna cost $600 upfront and $300per game I laughed.
BOSTON SUCKS!
Two totally different games.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
The following year they released simple games such as Ozama Wars
;-)
Umm! The "Ozama Wars - The saga continues..."
Now I know where Dubya's inspiration came from
When SNK appeared with the Neo-Geo, they were smack in the middle of the rush to create Street Fighter knockoffs and at the very tail end of the rush to create platform-oriented beat-em-ups that was in full force for the previous five years. Yes, Capcom was doing the same thing, though they get credit for Street Fighter II in the first place. But anyone trying to pick nits about which company was more innovative or original is missing the big picture. Both were just creating the mass market junk of the time.