My fighting game experience stretches back to the first Street Fighter game with punching pads for buttons. Outside of a badly designed cabinet that made you work, it was also a spark of an idea of what the franchise would eventually turn into in the next iteration. And in case you don’t know, Street Fighter II was an absolute hit in the arcades. Thankfully, Capcom lost the punching pads.
Street Fighter II’s success paved the way for other games of its type. SNK’s Fatal Fury lept in the scrum in 1991. Mortal Kombat crept in with its brutality and gross fatalities in 1992. Everyone and their mother seemed like they were making a fighting game in the 90s. There was no turning back from the fighting genre.
As arcades began to fade, the fighting games started pushing their way onto consoles as a dropping point. One of the fondest memories I have of my first console fighting experience was SNK’s gem of a fighting game King of Fighters ‘97 on the Sega Saturn. It still stands as one of the coolest and most stylish fighting games in my lifetime and was incredibly balanced with its stylish characters. It also introduced, at least in my world, a three-on-three match-up, something that was foreign to the SF series. The three-on-three option allowed players to create a team that gave multiple chances to mix things up as rounds continued. It was clever as hell to me and I never understood why other games didn’t replicate it.
Anyway, with all this wonderful background laid out, here we are today with SNK’s newest contribution to the fighting genre with a remake of the 2003 arcade hit SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos. The game takes the best characters from SNK and Capcom and creates one brutal fighting experience. Now, what it leaves out is the three-on-three, and it takes liberties with Capcom characters and their fighting styles. It also is an absolute beast on balance and difficulty.
There’s a lot to unravel here.
So, sit back, wrap those fists in some tape, get warmed up on the punching bag, and let’s get going with this fighting mayhem.
Old School
If you ever wondered what old-school fighting was like back in the early 2000s, then you’re in for a treat with SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos. Now, when I say ‘treat’, I mean that you’re in for a brutal ride, and it’s SNK brutal. If you’re not familiar with SNK’s style of fighting, it goes like this. It doesn’t pull its punches, the NPC intelligence is generally good enough to catch player patterns, and there is no ‘ramp up’ in the difficulty – it’s just difficult. The ramp is flat. It’s just brutal from the first fight to the last. It’s the complete opposite of how Capcom works, where you’re slowly getting more difficult fights as the matches progress. SNK just throws you in the pit of despair and laughs the entire time.
SNK has always been this way. My first taste of this non-Capcom design was with Samurai Showdown back in the 90s. I was fascinated with the art style, the unique attacks, and their movements, but always had my ass handed to me nearly every single fight. I loved playing as the samurai Genjuro, even if he was slow and traditional with his methods. He was fun to watch.
Anyhoo, the point of all this rambling is that the brutality that came with early SNK fighting games continues its tradition with this one. SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos does not hold back at all. Regardless of computer-led character, the CPU attacks relentlessly and learns player patterns, and will be more than happy to keep handing your ass if you don’t get good.
It’s pure SNK.
The SNK fighting way is a dramatic departure from how the Street Fighter series functions. And I’m okay with that, even though it can be a frustrating and sometimes curse-y experience. Getting beat over and over by the CPU is humbling and it forces you to practice, learn, and then come back and test your skills again. It’s not for the faint of heart and it will not apologize for spilling your character’s blood repeatedly. It will motivate you to get better, which is a great way to show some depth to the experience.
And this, good gamers, is how SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos functions. It was taught on the SNK old-school methods, and it doesn’t break from them. That style carries a unique flavor that doesn’t change. And that is proper.
Balance
Now, while the difficulty and old-school unforgiving nature of the SNK fighting gameplay is spot on what it should be, the balance in the cast of characters seems a bit off. And while it might be me experiencing this because I’m old and my reflexes certainly aren’t what they used to be, I would like to think I’m spot on.
Most of the time, when characters from different games are put together in one place, the developer adjusts or tweaks each character a bit to make the fights seem more balanced. For example, Genjuro should not be a perfect replication of his Samurai Showdown fighting style and pace. He was slow in Showdown and that shouldn’t be too heavy or present during SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos. It shouldn’t be, but it is.
Genjuro’s movements are methodical as they are representative of his style of character. He’s a samurai. He is slow in movement and powerful in strike. Having him fight someone like Ken or Ryu, who are speedy and spazzy, is a process if not an unfair one. He can’t possibly keep up with their pace, even if his sword reach is long and his power is strong. That makes up for some but it doesn’t balance out with other characters. If there was just a bit more speed added to his movements, then the fights would be evenly matched and determined by player skill. As it stands, it simply isn’t that at all.
The imbalance of characters is just dependent on the character of choice. You have 30+ characters to choose from in SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos, so there are plenty of good options to match the balance between characters. But if you’re in love with a set of characters that don’t match that expectation, then you’re not going to have a great time. This is my issue with Genjuro. He is by far my favorite SNK fighting character. It’s frustrating to see him not match up well in the scheme of things.
I do understand that maybe you can find some ways through here and there with each character, which will certainly help, at the very least, tame the balance in fighting and style to make this a skills-based match, but it’s work. Yes, I’m lazy. I want a 1:1 balance between fighters and I need those characters to have all the tools they require to make sure no one lags behind the curve.
As I said before, there are a lot of characters to choose from in SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos, so you’re bound to find someone who just takes off. I just wish they all did.
Capcom Fighters
Let me preface this by saying that I do enjoy this game. I really do enjoy playing some great characters and getting into a no-holds-bar fight between two legendary sets of fighters. It’s cool to have Ryu fight Genjuro. It’s unique and it’s not often that companies, especially these days, lend out their IP to another company to create one cool experience. There are some aspects of what SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos does with the worlds it pushes together that remind me of how fortunate we are to fight with each set of these characters. It almost makes me wish that Capcom would re-release Marvel Super Heroes versus Street Fighter from the Sega Saturn days. Getting multiple fighting worlds a place to go against each other is just brilliant. Of course, if Capcom did re-release that Sega Saturn title, it would have to be the version that features comedian Norimaro. It doesn’t work without him.
Anyway, it’s neat to see fighting worlds collide and to give the world a harmonious moment where everyone’s favorite character goes up against someone else’s. I love that about SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos and it’s a firm reminder of how cool the experience is.
Now, having said that I do not like the changes to the Capcom characters. Their style of play is neat, with more traditional martial arts and less loosy-goosy fighting style intact, but I enjoy familiar controls of familiar characters. SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos doesn’t really retain the visible fighting styles of the Capcom characters outside of the occasional fireball and upside-down twirl of a few. The controls feel a bit off and less rewarding. They also feel like they aren’t pulling off what you’re used to seeing out of the characters. For example, Ken’s high kick usually comes down hard and covers X amount of area when it’s executed from above. With this game, it’s like a small kick that doesn’t really cover the same ground, which changes the expectation of how you should be using that kick. The same with Ryu, Akuma, and even Chun-Li. Those three are my go-to, and they all felt different than what I was used to controlling.
SNK seems to have taken creative liberty with how the Capcom characters work and are executed. The Capcom characters have more SNK to them than they do from their original titles. That’s a problem in my opinion, as this was supposed to be the colliding of two worlds of characters and not bonding and adjusting into one style. Maybe I’m old and traditional, but I do not like how this feels during fighting. It doesn’t feel like a Capcom set of characters, even though it looks like them.
I don’t want the characters to be the same. I want characters to function and work in their own, unique way. I want Ken to fight like Ken from Street Fighter so that I’m familiar with attack distances, defense stances, and pulling off super special moves. At this point, SNK just seems to have taken these characters and run with them in their unique way. People might love how that feels, as it’s new, but as I said, I’m a traditionalist who has expectations of how these characters should function in a fight.
As it stands, this is SNK’s fighting game with Capcom personalities on SNK-designed fighters. That might sound mean, but it’s the truth.
old man yells at sky, then tells kids to get off his grass
Style
With all this criticism firmly intact, let me throw out some goods to you. The first big one is that visually this looks like a classic arcade game. It’s pixelated to its core but that creates some old-school charm with the fighting experience. SNK knew how to pixelate the hell out of its fighting games back in the day, as that style was part of Samurai Showdown’s charm. Zooming in and out of pixelated brutality was something to behold. It still holds that charm and stylishness with SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos, as it is a reminder that SNK had some great things going on in the 90s.
The online component of this game is solid. You have some good online lobbies where you can fight other players and even hold tournaments. It’s not an option I dip into too much, as I don’t like getting my ass handed to me by strangers, I just prefer the CPU to privately do that to me.
If you’re looking for something a bit more beyond pixels and online presence, then the game features extras like artwork and a hitbox viewer (something positively cool for any fighting fan). It just seems like the game gives you a bit more than just fighting.
Anyway, I love the style of the game, appreciate the online component, and the goodies they pack in with it. It’s a great fighting game package when judged on these things.
That said, let’s wrap this review up.
Conclusion
SNK vs. Capcom – SvC Chaos from developer Code Mystics is an SNK-slanted fighting affair that shows off more of SNK’s flavor than it does Capcom’s. If you can accept those terms, then you’re in for a brutal fighting game that doesn’t pull its punches, nor does it apologize for how many times it takes you down, but it does create some good challenges. This is the SNK way and it works more than it doesn’t.
