Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves

It almost stings a little when I start my first match in Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves. I'd seen the trailers and screenshots, but it's hard to escape the fact that the last time a new Fatal Fury was released, it was Fatal Fury: Mark of the Wolves for the Neo Geo and Dreamcast 25 years ago, and it was the best-looking two-dimensional fighting game I'd ever seen with semi-unreal pixel work... whereas this looks like an AI-designed game.

That may sound harsh, but it doesn't necessarily mean it's ugly, but rather lacks personality and feels generic. Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves feels lifeless, a little sterile, and if you were to ask ChatGPT to create an Xbox One-inspired version of Rock Howard with the right prompts, I think you'd get pretty close to what we get here. And to top it all off, the backgrounds are extremely sparse, which means the characters don't really blend in well.

Aside from this initial impression, it's worth noting that this is still without actually getting to the thing that matters the most: the gameplay. A fighting game stands or falls on its gameplay, so let me state right away that the content and make-up of this fighting package is significantly better than the paper-thin presentation it's wrapped in.

In total, there are 17 characters to choose from and even more levels to fight on. Among these we find a majority from the predecessors, including icons like Mai Shiranui, Rock Howard, and Terry Bogard, but also a couple of newcomers. The latter include Joe Higashi's student Preecha, who naturally reminds us of his master, but also two guest characters of a slightly more unexpected kind. These are Swedish music producer Salvatore Ganacci, who turns out to be a bit of a comic relief fighter who is actually a lot of fun to play, and football legend Cristiano Ronaldo. It's thus more than its predecessor, somewhat fairly comparable to Street Fighter 6, but a big step down from Mortal Kombat 1 and Tekken 8. As usual, SNK is to be commended for the overall design of their profile pictures, which are dripping with cool Japanese stylings.

In 25 years a lot has happened in terms of gaming, and the T.O.P. system (giving your character gameplay advantages when you reach a certain amount of lives) that was introduced then, as well as Just Defence (a response to the extremely prestigious Parry from Street Fighter III: Third Strike) are now pretty standard in the fighting world.

SNK has solved this in a rather unconventional way. In their eagerness to be relevant, they've implemented different systems with a frenzy I've never seen in a major fighting game before. They've added more variants of superblocks, including Hyper Defence, but kept Just Defence while adding Gear meters. This can then be used to fire Ignition Gear, Redline Gear, or Hidden Gear - the latter of which can only be used in conjunction with an activated S.P.G. (which is the new name for T.O.P.).

Then there's the big new Rev System, which provides a plethora of different possibilities, including another new blocking variant called Rev Guard and better tools for keeping a greater distance from your opponent and linking combos together. Just in case, SNK has supplemented this with another gauge to make sure you don't overuse the Rev System, causing you to overheat and no longer be able to make special attacks in the same way. On top of that, there are then several other systems such as two kinds of cancels that allow you to start attacks but not complete them, or just replay the start animation of an attack to feint your opponent.

I've played a lot of fighting games in my day and I'd say it's a top three favourite genre for me, but I might as well be honest and say that during the review period I've only scratched the surface of this game. People are still coming up with new variations on the 34-year-old Street Fighter II, and this has infinitely more combinations to discover. While this is impressive and will surely appeal to some, not least the old Guilty Gear crowd who have found the latest games lacking the depth of the older ones, I have to say that it's definitely not beginner-friendly. Admittedly, there is a tutorial, but even with that it is very difficult to get a good grip on the basics of the game for those who want to dig into what SNK has created.

It doesn't really help that, like most other big games in the genre nowadays, there is a system to make it easier to perform the attacks. That's the least of the problems really, it's how everything is put together and utilised that SNK should spend more time explaining better... Personally, I'm not entirely fond of this approach and feel that the genre is a bit stuck in the fact that new game mechanics and different gauges have to be tacked on, complete with some cheesy gimmicky name, but it's nothing unique to Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves, and more of a trend I hope will disappear.

The fights themselves feel a tad more stylish after playing Street Fighter 6, Mortal Kombat 1, and Tekken 8 in particular. However, it's more of a visual element rather than a gameplay one, and I don't think the generic, slightly AI-like fighters offer any real weight to their punches. However, I appreciate that SNK has chosen significantly shorter animations for its super attacks compared to the other games that like to start an animation that interrupts intense battles with something we've already seen 100 times before. It's never bad, quite the opposite, but I keep finding myself wanting to play Street Fighter 6 instead.

Technically, the game flows well during the fights, but there are a couple of shortcomings that fortunately don't affect the fighting. There are quite a few late-loaded textures and unjustified pauses, especially before and after the fights. Also, as I said, I don't get along at all with how generic the fighters look outside of their profile pictures. Their kind of striped-skin textures are reminiscent of what prominent people look like on banknotes, they don't stand out and feel cheap. A game like Granblue Fantasy Versus clearly shows what a cel-shaded fighting game should look like with lots of detail and a clear 2D look. SNK simply has more work to do here. The genre used to be something of a poster boy for how good graphics can be and SNK beat Capcom to be the very best, which makes me a little sad that I think the 25-year-old Fatal Fury: Mark of the Wolves looks better than this.

Fighting games are primarily to be enjoyed against human opposition, but in addition to offline and online versus modes (with lots of customisation options) there's also an unexpectedly fun single-player mode called Episodes of South Town. It's a little weak from a story perspective admittedly, but allows you to pick battles from a town map whereupon you get a little short preamble before a beating needs to be dealt. Playing this allows you to unlock cosmetics that allow you to modify each characters' appearance. It's a far cry from the well-crafted campaigns that Mortal Kombat 1 and Tekken 8 offer, but the set-up is light-hearted and significantly better than the sad single-player modes the genre often insists on including.

Ultimately, I'd say Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves is a dedicated hardcore game with a lot of mechanics that make it feel like a response to Street Fighter 6, which is a bit of a hilarious thought considering its predecessor 25 years ago was a response of sorts to Street Fighter III: Third Strike. And maybe that's the right way to go, given that the fighting community has been very much on the warpath in recent years, dissatisfied with what the giants of the genre offer, as under the plasticky hood, as mentioned above, there's a well thought-out engine here.

That said, it's not a game for those who don't want to count frames, plug away at different systems to understand how they interact with each other, or for those looking for a mighty and broad fighting experience. If that's you, it's simply better to go for the more established series instead.