"SVC Chaos" vs. "Capcom vs SNK"

[Remilia Scarlet]

Warning...I may be just a tad bit biased. I'm Anti-Capcom when it comes to 2d fighting games.

So today I went down to Fat City (an arcade near DU I sometimes play at...good DDR there), and I finally get a chance to play the SVC Chaos machine they have there. For those of you who don't know, SVC Chaos is the SNK vs. Capcom game that SNK made for their NeoGeo hardware. Capcom vs. SNK, on the otherhand, was made by Capcom. Whoever's name is first is the creator of that game.

Anyway, I own Capcom vs. SNK for my DreamCast and also had a chance to play it in the arcade (at the same Fat City, as it's next to SVC Chaos). It's a great fighting game that's well balanced, looks good, and is great fun. I had a blast beating it with Mai, Yuri, and someone else on my team.

Capcom vs. SNK is a great game partly due to its balance. The idea of having four available character slots is a nice touch to this. Some characters, such as Mai and Terry, take up two of these slots while weakers ones, such as Yuri, take up only one. A few take up three, and I believe two characters take up four. In any case, this helps balance the game out quite well. The gameplay is nice and solid, but I always felt it was too easy to execute a few of the special moves. Graphics in it are nice, fluid, and well animated and generally well detailed.

The bad parts about this game, imo, are a few of the sprites. Mai just doesn't look as good as she did in other games. In fact, the SNK characters in general look a little more plain. Animation is nice, but a few areas it skips. On top of that, the fact that you have to choose a "groove" (SNK style or Capcom style power bars) makes it cumbersom.

In anycase, I used to think this was a pretty good game. Sure, I never touched the Capcom characters, but I still enjoyed it. 'Till today.

To start with the bad points, SVC Chaos doesn't have the resolution that the other one does. The NeoGeo has a 320x224 resolution on its games. This of course does introduce a bit more pixelization to the image (though it isn't noticable in gameplay). The backgrounds are a bit bland, but get the job done. On top of that, the pre-fight text tends to go a bit on the fast side. My friend who was with me had no problem, but I tend to be a slow reader.

So yeah, that's the only bad points I can come up with. The game actually moves more fluidly than CvS, and oddly enough the Capcom characters tend to look better (given the resolution). Backgrounds weren't as detailed as Garou: MOTW (see here), but got the job done as I said above. But character animation is just outstanding. If anything, just look at the standing pose for Kim or Ryu.

The gameplay itself is very solid. It's not nearly as deep as The Last Blade 2 (which earns my respect for being the deepest fighter ever, 2d or 3d), but it's better than most. Gone are the air-blocks and the ability to roll through moves from each side, but what's added are guard cancels. Special moves were executed easily, but not overly easily. Character balance was outstanding. Normally I'm better at fighting games than my friend is, but when I faced him today, he was able to find a few characters to actually beat my ass with, whereas I was able to just pummle people with a few myself. Others we just couldn't play for squat. On top of that, there's no way I can beat this game in a day like I did CvS (or in ~3 minutes 30 seconds like I did Soul Calibur 2 first time). The difficulty is definitely there for hardcore fighting fans. It's easier than, say, Fatal Fury Special (which I own for my NeoGeo at home), but not as easy as other games.

So, sorry Capcom, still haven't converted me back into a fan. SVC is now on my "To buy" list for my home system, especially since Last Blade was sold on neostore.com for the AES. Now to save up $300 for the cartridge.

Agree? Disagree?

[Grimm]

Well, I've always hated all of the "lotsa different cvharacters at da same time and super cool combo hee heee" fighting games, so I can't say much. Too fucking complicated for me.

[Sephiroth]

i got tired of 2d fighting games a while ago. and even then was never into them much.

[Sharessa]

Fighting games are teh suck.

[Mogul]

I prefer straight up Super Street Fighter II. Maybe some alpha here and there.

SNK games I like are Samurai Showdown and King of Fighters 94.

[Ichor]

You've seen one fighting game, you've seen them all.

[jute]

i like marvel vs. capcom 2 because it's the most crazy fucking shit i've ever seen labelled a fighting game. it's like a psychedelic ceizure plus dr. doom. so it's kind of like heaven.