King of Fighters Encounter [iPhone]

SNKPlaymore has just released a new free social gaming app for the iPhone called The King Of Fighters Encounter (developed by Kayac), unfortunately though so far it seems to be limited to the US and Japanese iTunes stores...

From what i have read about it so far it seems to have some kind of streetpass functionality (kind of similar to some games on the 3DS) where if you walk past another person who also has the app it will engage in a battle between both systems.

It looks somewhat like an updated version of Battle Festa which was released earlier in the year for the Japanese mobile phone services.

I'll see if i can figure out some way to work around getting it from the Japanese iTunes tonight, if i can get it to work i'll follow up with a write up. If not then i'll just have to wait until a UK version pops up on iTunes (if ever...).

For now if like me you are based outside of the US or Japan check out these articles/websites for more details:

Siliconera
AndriaSang
Kayac Inc. Website

Or if you are one of the lucky people who live in the States and has an iPhone you can grab it for free here from iTunes.

KOF-i - K' Dialogue Versus Team Japan

I think this is the last of the K' dialogues that i currently have, i'll have to double check later whether i have his dialogues against the Yagami Team and Elisabeth Team.

As i already covered his dialogue against Kyo this post only covers Benimaru and Daimon.

Some amusing undertones in the conversation between K' and Benimaru if you read it in a certain way. xD

K' Versus Benimaru Nikaido:

K' Versus Goro Daimon:

KOFXIII Blog Update - Character Changes

The official KOFXIII blog has updated with a video and list (listed as 1 so more to come) of some of the changes to the console version of KOFXIII.



Some of the changes are fairly easy to understand without any knowledge of Japanese others not so much, but not to worry since Professor over on MMCafe has kindly translated the blog entry.

KOF-i - Esaka Stage - Then And Now

Much like my post last night i'd thought it would be interesting to take a look at the Esaka stage from KOF-i and compare it to the original version(s) from KOF96. As Team Japan and the Psycho Soldiers team both shared the Esaka stage i uploaded both versions i found from Google Image just for the sake of completion.

Much like the Factory stage this stage also has cameos from other SNK characters in the form of Haohmaru sitting atop a rock/stone in the left corner of the stage.

Since i figured out a way to get both versions of KOF-i on my iPod i also included screenshots of the original version of the Esaka stage.

As you can see in the image below Haohmaru's cameo was only added to the 1.01 version of the stage, as well as Mai Shiranui appearing on the TV screen.

Also since i only managed to get back version 1.00 today i decided i might as well do a screenshot for Iori's Factory stage again so you can see the stage without the cameos (of the USA Sports Team, Rocky, and Candy).

The changes between the Esaka stages are fairly small, the biggest change would be the steps on the right hand side of the stage of the original has been changed into a similar kind of seating area similar to what appears on the left side.

I'm guessing that it was easier for them to reuse sprites on both sides of the screen to save time.

One thing i did find kind of interesting was that the SNK building's sign was not updated as SNKP, though i'm not actually sure whether SNK did actually change their sign.

Old SNK Goods From Japan S.2 - The Art Of SNK World II

It's been a while since i've done one of these write ups.

Amongst the things that my friend brought back from Japan for me were both books from The Art Of SNK World series, since i previously covered the first book i will only be mentioning the second book in this post.

The book starts with a small fold out image of Kyo and a title page featuring Chibi versions of various SNK characters, probably one of the few (maybe first) times that i've seen Shinkiro draw in this kind of style. 

Unlike the first book which had clear seperate sections for each game this one organises them into two major sections of 'Fighting Spirits' (coloured images) and 'Monochrome World' (black and white images, mainly sketches).

If you've collected a few different SNK/KOF artbooks by now you would have seen much of the Shinkiro artwork which is shown in this book for KOF so i didn't take any photos of those ones.

For KOF95 it also has full page profile images of the teams, which i felt took up needless amounts of space...You can kind of see an example of this with the bosses on the page on the right hand side. I quite liked the sketch type drawings of Iori though. 

Savage Reign is also featured in this book, which i personally liked just due to not seeing much artwork around for that game, there isn't that much though sadly.

Although i'm not too fond of the game itself i quite like these charcoal'esque images from Fatal Fury 3.

The above image i took because i found the proportions of King's chest pretty amusing, not quite sure what's going on there.

The Monochrome World section of the book was my favourite section of the book due to the range of things shown, which include 4koma (4 panel comic strips) and artwork from instruction manuals amongst other things.

The King Of The Monsters artwork was quite refreshing to see, partially because it's something i don't see much of and also because it's a game i have very fond memories of playing when i was a bit younger.

The book then ends with a Conversation section, which i skimmed over due to not knowing enough Japanese to read it, and a History Of Neo Geo sections which shows much of the games released up to the point of this book.

Overall this book is a nice addition to my growing collection of SNK artbooks, although personally not my favourite, though i think if you had the choice of choosing either the first or the second i personally preferred the first one more.

Mai Shiranui Cosplay - Giorgia

Going through my daily morning web browse routine before work i came across the above image on Kotaku of this Italian Mai Shiranui Cosplayer.

From Kotaku's page i was then directed towards her DeviantArt Page, and then from her DeviantArt Page i was directed to her main website. (Check out those two links for more images)

KOF-i - Iori Stage (Factory) - A Quick Look

This is just going to be a quick post before i go off to sleep (almost 4am here!).

When i read the notes from the translation of the recent KOFXIII blog entry about Iori over on Orochinagi's forums, i went off to Youtube to have a look at some high quality videos of the stage to see if i could spot any of these 'details' that were going to be in his stage.

A little while ago i got the idea to have a look at the original 95 stage and compare it to the KOF-i version just to see if there were any differences or how close it was to the original.

So i've taken a few screenshots and stuck them together using Photoshop.

As i mentioned i had previously looked up the stage on Youtube to see if i could spot anything and although at the time i wasn't too sure i just managed to confirm by looking at one of my screenshots more clearly that Rocky from Robo Army is also on the scrap heap near Candy Diamond.

As for the stages themselves, at first glance they seem pretty similar. After studying them a bit more i've started to notice the subtle changes like the buildings off in the distance have changed, and various parts of the factory are different.

I'm not sure if i remember correctly but i vaguely remember there being stages in the Gallery section for KOFXII, hopefully you can view the stages in the console version of XIII so i can take a better look without life bars and characters blocking the view.