VGEsoterica
Member
SNK in the 90's made some weird decisions ; develop the Hyper and release it as weaker hardware than their competitors (Sega, Namco, etc), support three platforms at once (AES/MVS, Hyper, and Pocket), but whatever they did with their Hyper Neo Geo ports is probably the weirdest of all.
Let's start with Samurai Shodown : Warriors Rage. A good to great game depending on how you look at it on the Hyper. Solid gameplay, great pacing of fights, and a solid visual design. So what did SNK do with the game? They "ported" it to the PS1...except it's not even the same game! Yes it shares a title, some assets and some concepts / visual design...but it's a completely different game!? They removed the multi round fights the series always had and replaced it with a life bar that gets "destroyed" as the single round fight goes on. New roster of characters minus one...yet the game shares similar fight arena backgrounds, gameplay mechanics, and visual design. Not sure what SNK was thinking when they made it but so many people think its a straight port of the Hyper Neo Geo 64 original when its "spiritual port" status at best.
Fatal Fury : Wild Ambition is an actual port, albeit one that suffers compared to its Hyper big brother. Not sure how it ended up on PS1 when the Hyper shares the same CPU as the Nintendo 64 (NEC VR4300)...maybe fighters just sold better on PS1 or they didn't want to pay the cost of cart manufacturing to Nintendo? Either way its the same game with the same name. Seems like 9/10 people who have any experience with the game have only played the PS1 version, which is unfortunate since it halves the frame rate, removes all the background animations the arcade had going for it, halves the resolution, and has some of the most muffled sound effects I've ever heard in a game. Not sure if SNK lost the source materials and had to use captures, but it sounds like the game effects are being played through a speakerphone at times...which is a huge bummer!
SNK has always done some odd things, but I am still confused as to their PS1 ports. It's unfortunate that people who played the Playstation version of Wild Ambition view the game as a failure ; I would too if it was my only experience with the game but it just goes to show that if the port is the only way the majority of people ever experience the game it becomes the de-facto "version" the reputation has to depend on...and in this instance that's not a good thing!
Let's start with Samurai Shodown : Warriors Rage. A good to great game depending on how you look at it on the Hyper. Solid gameplay, great pacing of fights, and a solid visual design. So what did SNK do with the game? They "ported" it to the PS1...except it's not even the same game! Yes it shares a title, some assets and some concepts / visual design...but it's a completely different game!? They removed the multi round fights the series always had and replaced it with a life bar that gets "destroyed" as the single round fight goes on. New roster of characters minus one...yet the game shares similar fight arena backgrounds, gameplay mechanics, and visual design. Not sure what SNK was thinking when they made it but so many people think its a straight port of the Hyper Neo Geo 64 original when its "spiritual port" status at best.
Fatal Fury : Wild Ambition is an actual port, albeit one that suffers compared to its Hyper big brother. Not sure how it ended up on PS1 when the Hyper shares the same CPU as the Nintendo 64 (NEC VR4300)...maybe fighters just sold better on PS1 or they didn't want to pay the cost of cart manufacturing to Nintendo? Either way its the same game with the same name. Seems like 9/10 people who have any experience with the game have only played the PS1 version, which is unfortunate since it halves the frame rate, removes all the background animations the arcade had going for it, halves the resolution, and has some of the most muffled sound effects I've ever heard in a game. Not sure if SNK lost the source materials and had to use captures, but it sounds like the game effects are being played through a speakerphone at times...which is a huge bummer!
SNK has always done some odd things, but I am still confused as to their PS1 ports. It's unfortunate that people who played the Playstation version of Wild Ambition view the game as a failure ; I would too if it was my only experience with the game but it just goes to show that if the port is the only way the majority of people ever experience the game it becomes the de-facto "version" the reputation has to depend on...and in this instance that's not a good thing!
