The SNK Thread

[Nester the Lark]

According to Nintendo Life, due to good sales of the Neo Geo Mini, SNK is making some kind of new Neo Geo hardware.

Also, a new Metal Slug is in development for that hardware, as well as other unspecified consoles.

Given that SNK is releasing a collection of Samurai Shodown games to go along with the new one, this may give YL some hope of a new Metal Slug collection, as well.

Finally, it was mentioned that SNK Heroines sold 300,000 copies, for whatever that's worth. I was under the impression it flopped, so I guess this is a good number?

[nocturnal YL]

300,000 for SNK Heroines sounds pretty impressive, I'd say. I always thought 200,000 is a good general goal for games of that calibre (physical, commercial (bigger-than-indie) releases that aren't particularly popular).

And yes, I'm glad to hear that a new Metal Slug (of any kind, that's not related to the mobile game) is being in development. I'm interested in both a new game and a collection.

[Nester the Lark]

This is just so weird and funny and random, I had to post it here.

So, I remember hearing that there was a new version of the original Psycho Soldier theme song sung by Athena's current voice actor, Haruna Ikezawa (who has been doing the character since King of Fighters '98), and it was included on a special soundtrack CD for the collector's edition of SNK Heroines. I've been hoping it would eventually get uploaded to YouTube so I could hear it.

I have not yet come across it, but in a recent search, I stumbled upon something else entirely: Ikezawa singing a cover of the punk rock song "Basket Case" by Green Day. In English, no less. (Content warning for lyrics.)



Here's the original for comparison.

Apparently, it comes from an old album full of anime voice actresses singing covers of punk and grung rock songs, which never even occurred to me could be a thing. But hey, we basically get to hear Athena sing lyrics like "Am I just paranoid, or am I just stoned?" XD

[Nester the Lark]

Now the SNK 40th Anniversary Collection is being ported to the Xbox One, and it's going to include the original NES Baseball Stars as an exclusive.

Baseball Stars always seemed like a conspicuous omission to me, so it's nice that they're finally including it, but also frustrating that they're making it a console exclusive. I wonder if they'll eventually make it available to the Switch and PS4 versions later.

[Nester the Lark]

According to Nintendo Life, there's going to be an official book on the history of the Metal Slug series, including interviews with several members of the development team.

This is interesting because the team behind the series has always been very mysterious. It's known that they were ex-Irem employees who founded the company Nazca, then made only two games (Metal Slug and Neo Turf Masters) before being bought out and absorbed into SNK. I remember reading an interview several years ago in an issue of Retro Gamer magazine with Kazuma Kujo on the creation of the original Metal Slug. Kujo was still with Irem at the time, and only worked on the first Metal Slug in an "unofficial" capacity. (He later left Irem and founded Granzella, who has recently been teasing R-Type Final 2.) He declined to identify any other members of the dev team.

Sounds like this will be a very insightful book.

[Nester the Lark]

Here's a spiffy trailer for SamSho. I like the voice over in this one.



More importantly is the part where early adopters get the full first season of DLC for free! I wonder if a similar courtesy will be extended to Switch owners when that version comes out later this year.

Nonetheless, I'm impressed with how hard SNK is pushing this game. They're making a lot of smart decisions, what with the amount of high quality trailers, a spotlight at EVO, and now free DLC for early adopters. Nothing about it feels lazy or phoned-in. They really want mainstream success with this one.

[Nester the Lark]

I have to admit, SNK's live-action ads are usually pretty awesome. Here's a new one for the mobile game The King of Fighters All-Stars with Kyo from KOF and Haohmaru from SamSho.

And Haohmaru is played by Hiroshi Fujioka, the same actor who played Segata Sanshiro in those old Japanese Sega commercials.

[nocturnal YL]

Glad to see Hiroshi Fujioka here. The ad kind of feels like the Segata Sanshiro era too, being live-action without much reliance on the newer post-editing techniques.

I was confused the whole time on what was this supposed to be about, though. It's a KOF mobile game ad with Haohmaru, and it hasn't occurred to me that it's a crossover event.

[Nester the Lark]

Thought this was cool. As the tweet says, here are all of Nakoruru's voice samples translated into English, not just from Japanese, but also from the Ainu language.

Check the twitter thread for more of his comments on how he tried to translate from Ainu. I didn't realize that Nakoruru actually uses Ainu in addition to Japanese. It is actually considered an endangered language, as there are very few people left who speak it.

On a side note, I actually got interested in learning about the Ainu people because of Nakoruru, although it's hard to find many resources about them online.

[Nester the Lark]

Looks like Rimururu, Nakoruru's younger sister, is the first DLC character for SamSho.



Not surprising. She's a popular character. Glad to see her, though. She would've been one of my choices for DLC.

[Nester the Lark]

SamSho comes out today for PS4 and Xbox One, and SNK decided to go ahead and reveal all four DLC characters.

No Shizumaru, unfortunately.

Wan-Fu is interesting. That means that Gen-An is the only character from the original game (aside from the boss, Amakusa) who isn't present. Think I would've rather had him instead, tho.

[Nester the Lark]

I wonder what this will turn out to be...

[Nester the Lark]

Hey! Shizumaru is being added to Samurai Shodown as a free DLC character in September! Woo!



Also, season 2 DLC confirmed, starting with Mina from SamSho 5.

Now, I just need to see how the Switch version turns out. Running on Unreal Engine 4 does make me nervous, given the recent issues with Bloodstained. Apparently, it's not uncommon for UE4 games to have trouble running well on Switch.

And also at EVO, they confirmed development on The King of Fighters XV, which we kinda already knew, but I guess now it's officially official.

EDIT: Replaced the video with the full trailer.

EDIT 2: And it looks like Haohmaru will be a DLC guest character in Soul Calibur VI.

Almost seems redundant considering that Mitsurugi is already like Soul Calibur's version of Haohmaru.

[Nester the Lark]

According to GoNintendo, Samurai Shodown will be released on Switch in Japan on December 12. It runs at 60 fps and supports a single joy-con for multiplayer. Also, early purchases will include a copy of Samurai Shodown! 2 (the Neo Geo Pocket Color game).

I was getting worried about this game, but this gives me some confidence. Now, if only they'd throw in the season 1 DLC for free...

Also, the SamSho Neo Geo collection was mentioned in Famitsu, but only in that it was scheduled for a winter 2019 release.

EDIT: Japanese Switch trailer:

[Nester the Lark]

I don't want to pay too much lip service to a rumor, but I like the fact that this is a rumor.

According to GoNintendo, the next DLC character for Smash Ultimate could be an SNK character due to a random copyright to SNK Corporation on the Nintendo UK page for challenger pack 4.

Of course, this could just be a weird mistake. However, it would not be unprecedented since SNK has been lending their characters out to several other fighting games in recent years.

One might also wonder if/how ths meshes with the other recent rumor that the next Smash DLC character would be an unrequested female character that would confuse and upset people.

And if it is an SNK character, could this mean my joke request for Takamaru in the Switch version of SamSho is just a bit less farfetched?