The Retrospective 05.31.07 SNK Season: Garou Densetsu/Fatal Fury (Part 2/3)

Posted by Sean McCabe on 05.31.2007

Real Bout? Since when?

Unfortunately although I had hoped to go a while without interruption, last week my Mother had to go to hospital, and a brain scan found that she needed surgery. So as a result I've more or less been too distracted to finish writing the column last week. Oh well, guess it's catch up time now.

The Introspective

Well, another week, another column, I said I'd be here and so here I am. The Hype machines for Halo 3 and Starcraft 2 conspire to irritate the hell out of me, but what can you do? At least the PS2 is getting King of Fighters: Maximum Impact Regulation A. Blue Mary in 3D, yay!

I actually decided to do the Judgement Day roundtable and guessed around half the matches right. Go, me?

Also, it's a well known fact I was looking forward to Card Fighters DS, but thanks to some incredibly mediocre reviews, and a mess of a glitch forcing the game to be recalled, things don't really look good. However, I am going to remain positive. The card collection in the game is incredible, I've heard enough decent words from regular people who bought the game (and whom I will generally trust over journalists since these people have no false sense of omniscience) to balance out most of the trashing the game has received. The PAL release will be glitch free, so I'm looking ahead to that.

And the Smash Bros Brawl site is now up, and will apparently be updated regularly. That listof musicians is scary shit, you could conquer a country with that much talent.

This week on the whole has been quite slow though, I wish I had much more to say, but past me picking up a couple of anime DVDs and a Kasumi statue, and finding Cooking Mama on the Wii to be criminally fun and far better than any of the reviews suggested, I guess we can move on.

Sega Classics Collection



This week my shill is for a classic set of arcade games remade in some basic 3D graphics, but made on the whole very fun. I originally played the American version of this collection, which I prefer to the European release. Why? Because of Alien Syndrome, which was replaced by Bonanza Bros. for some inexplicable, and completely fail, reason. I had never played the original Alien Syndrome, but I completed this version with a friend and had an absolute blast doing it to. Great old school co-op blasting. The remakes of Outrun, Space Harrier, and Golden Axe are quite fun to, but Alien Syndrome is definitely the star of this collection, and thinking about it makes me really hope the new Wii version coming out turns out good.

VG Babe of the Week: Whip



One of the things I love about Whip is the class she exudes. No cut aways for her, she's fully clothed, yet still extremely sexy.

The Breakdown

Garou Densetsu 3/Fatal Fury 3: Road to the Final Victory




Developer: SNK
Format: Neo Geo
Release: 1995
Notes: Fatal Fury 3 would introduce two very popular characters into SNK's fighting games: Blue Mary and Ryuji Yamazaki.

Fatal Fury 3 is an important title in the Fatal Fury series as it links the two halves of its story together. The first half saw Terry Bogard, his brother Andy and friend Jo Higashi put a stop to the criminal antics of Geese Howard in Southtown, but they simply crippled his organisation. Geese himself, and for the first time a regular roster character in this game, is intent on obtaining immortality through three sacred scrolls, protected by the twins Jin Chonsu, and Jin Chonrei, and their bodyguard, a sadistic former Yakuza named Ryuji Yamazaki.

The game still utilised the two-plane system although it was more refined. The graphics also took a significant leap and SNK did not bother trying to port the game to the SNES and Genesis.

In Retrospect: Quite the enjoyable arcade game and one I remember fondly. It was like any SNK game, hard as a brick though.

And now time for a name change.

Real Bout: Garou Densetsu/Real Bout: Fatal Fury



Developer: SNK
Format: Neo Geo
Release: 1995
Notes: The series gets a name change to continue its story.

Ah, Real Bout Fatal Fury. The game where Geese Howard finally met his end at the hands of Terry Bogard and a long drop off a bridge. Despite that little issue, he would be in many games after this. Many. Like every other KoF game. God, haven't these games ever heard of finality?

Anyway, this game would further develop Fatal Fury as a series. It added more characters including the legendary Kim Kaphwan, and Duck King, who would join Terry to make the Fatal Fury team in the eleventh King of Fighters tournament. The plane system was expanded by adding a plane in the foreground, allowing for more evasion options, and a ring out was added for an instant KO win.

In Retrospect: The series continued quite strongly with this entry, though of course it would, like Fatal Fury 2 before it, see…

Real Bout: Garou Densetsu Special/Real Bout: Fatal Fury Special



Developer: SNK
Format: Neo Geo/PSX
Release: 1997/1998
Notes: The PSX edition was given the subtitle "Dominated Mind"

This game would basically just add a few more characters onto the roster, and a new boss, Wolfgang Krauser, who was also the boss of Fatal Fury 2 and the just-released King of Fighters 96. Not much else to say, this was more of a dream match title collecting every fighter from the previous games and the new rules introduced in the original Real Bout.

In Retrospect: Another upgrade, nothing new in fighters.

Real Bout: Garou Densetsu 2/Real Bout Fatal Fury: The Newcomers



Developer: SNK
Format: Neo Geo
Release: 1998
Notes: The events and story of this game are considered to be uncanon, and therefore really is another dream match game, but with new characters and sequences.

The main addition character wise to this game was Li Xangfei who would become a KoF regular. The game further refined the gameplay elements of the series, spruced up the graphics and presentation a little more. In truth it's getting hard to say more because at the end of the day, you can only refine a fighting game so much… unless the series is called King of Figters anyway.

In Retrospect: The game that came before Mark of the Wolves. That's really the best thing I could say about it, other than it being a decent entry into the series. Garou Densetsu, the series with four names, is still to have its finest hour.

And that is it for this week, next week we will finish this series, and top it off with one of my favourite games of all time. Keep things in perspective, and goodbye.