The King of Fighters '94 (NEO4ALL) Review

Original release:

1994 (!)

Game details:

Standard controller

1-2 players

VGA box

The following game was not officially released for Sega Dreamcast. It is emulated using NEO4ALL RC-4 developed by chui. This is an evaluation of the emulation of the game as well as the game itself.

Using Team RDC's release you can play this game as though it is a commercial game with only a brief loading screen.

Emulation

This is a very well emulated game as far as game speed and sound goes. On a few stages there are issues with background sprites displaying incorrectly. It does NOT affect gameplay in any way.

Gameplay

The first entry in the King of Fighters series, a series that I feel could probably be a lot better if it weren't updated yearly (although recent entries haven't been yearly and it hasn't helped review scores). I could probably just go ahead and say that most of the review of KOF games that are here will most likely be within plus or minus 0.5 points of an 8.0 and that wouldn't be far from the truth at all. That's enough of my feelings for the franchise though; I probably like King of Fighters '94 the most out of all the games I've played in the series. For a casual player, the roster in the KOF games are incredibly daunting, complicated by the fact that you have to pick out three characters. KOF '94 takes a bit of that complication away by only allowing you to pick pre-made teams. The teams seem to be surprisingly well matched considering that this is the first entry in this particular series and balancing is usually fine tuned over multiple iterations. This doesn't mean the game is devoid of a few high tier bruiser characters that you're going to want to be careful around, though.

This game is also hard. Inputs are very precise, even for someone who sits around and plays Third Strike all day. It's manageable at the end of the day, but don't expect to hop in and easily dominate someone who is used to the game.

Graphics

These are not so nice. Characters are very pixelated, and not in a good way either. They end up looking smeared and cramped. The backgrounds are well done though, and there's a lot of references to movies and pop culture in them.

Sound

No comment.

Conclusion

It's a King of Fighters game. I don't think any of the KOF reviews are going to be interesting, because there's not a lot of difference in the games. So, there you have it.

8.0/10