King of Fighters XI - Atomiswave to Dreamcast Port
5I hope you are all healthy and safe wherever you are in the World right now and whatever challenges you are facing.
A special thanks to Megavolt85 and the other developers that made this possible!
I am a huge fan of the Sega Dreamcast and always felt it could have competed on a technical front much longer than it did - Sega discontinuing it for financial reasons in 2001 although games continue to be released long after.
Sammy used the hardware to power their Atomiswave arcade hardware as the power to cost was fantastic. Around 20 to 30 games were released for the Atomiswave hardware, mostly between 2003 and 2005, and many of them remained exclusively locked to the hardware despite the similarity in specs.....until a clever developer called Megavolt85 managed in 2020 to port them to run on Dreamcast meaning around 20-30 new titles for the hardware.
This is King of Fighters XI - the 12th game is the long running fighting game series if you consider King of Fighters NeoWave to be a part of the main series (although it is arguably a remake/re-imagining on 2002 so that would make this one the 11th game - its all very confusing) This was the second King of Fighters game to be released on the Atomiswave hardware.
This is my first play of the game. I pick two characters I'm reasonably familiar with and Momoko who I've never played as - I think she is new?
I'd not played this particular entry in the series before but had played a few of the earlier games (94 to 98 on my AES, 95 to 97 on my Saturn, and 98 to 2002 on my Dreamcast) so am a little familiar with the characters etc Obviously I have played NeoWave now (see my video :-) ). The button lay out on these ports is a little different to the home ports - although the developers who ported these are going to go back and address this I believe.
While the Dreamcast was awash with quality 2D and 3D fighters this would still have been a welcome addition to the library had the system survived longer.
It seems to have a few new characters - well old characters from other games but new to the series or returning after being Missing in Action for a while. One of these is Momoko - who I pick here as I was running out of time trying to find Mai Shiranui (who sadly doesn't appear in this release). She seems to be a dancer or Capoeira fighter perhaps as she has lots of acrobatic moves to link together.
The only slightly odd thing is the character sprites seem to have filtering on them that makes them look a bit "soft" or "blurry". A shame after the pin sharp visuals of NeoWave and especially Samurai Shodown VI. Still - it is still a good looking game with smooth animation & plenty going on.
I believe this was ported to PS2 (like pretty much everything it seems) with additional characters so it would have been a good fit for Dreamcast too. It's a really solid game which I look forward to playing some more. I'm very rusty at King of Fighter in general :-)
I also sourced a new Capture Card which I have started experimenting with.
I'm still getting used to it but hopefully it is decent quality picture wise.
Also - let me know what you think. Would you prefer the load times and screens to be edited out? I kinda like the "full experience" approach and to let the game or promo video or whatever to speak for itself but let me know feedback. I'm keen to experiment.
I'm also sorting my loft and finding all sorts of obscurities, oddities and nice games from my collection so I'll be doing some random vids. Let me know if there is a console or game you'd like to see. Let me know if there are any games or consoles you'd like videos about. Let me know if you like the format (i.e. no voiceover and the addition of short facts). Want End Cards added to point out other similar videos? I'm just trying things really.
As always game is played on original hardware - no emulation etc This is played via Dreamcast via VGA.
As always if you enjoy this video let me know.
As always this is uploaded under the Fair Use Policy - no money is being made from this video.
Stay strong, stay safe and stay healthy - Grey Fox