KOF98 Ultimate Match

Official Site (Japanese)

Yay, I finally got to play this game earlier today after I bought tickets for Forbidden Kingdom (review comes tmr) and was waiting for WK to join me. Haha, I was quite surprised that Dhoby Ghaut Zone X actually have this game wor. In fact it’s the only Zone X outlet that currently has this game. Being a weekday (that’s not a school holiday), I could actually play 2 rounds of uninterrupted tries and of course completed twice.

In this entry, I will include some of my observations and opinions, which of course, be lacking in depth, and probably be labelled “wols” for those who actually went to read up more about the game either through jap sites (most updated liao) or various kof forums. I actually didn’t bother much cos I thought perhaps Zone X won’t really bring this in after looking at the sale price for the game. It’s rather high because they have to buy the new hardware (Taito Type X-2) as well, so the cost is there. Hence I thought probably only places like Bugis will get this in, and of course being a noob like myself, I won’t really get a chance to play properly at bugis. Haha.

Though there are many new additions to the character roster, I didn’t manage to fight against Eiji, Kasumi, Orochi, Orochi Iori and Orochi Leona. I’m not sure what are the possible bosses to fight, but both times I ended up fighting Goenitz, which I happily completed the game twice. Thank goodness the AI difficulty isn’t that high. Lol, so it’s 100% completion rate for me so far, for KOF98UM. HEH.

As for the modes, there is now the Ultimate mode, where you can customise the characteristics of advanced/extra to suit your playing style. Apparently there’s something else about the Ultimate mode that allows for some new strings of combos to take place but I didn’t do my homework prior to today so… I couldn’t really go do hands-on test. Haha. Theoretically I think Kim can now stomp his way to infinite without worrying about power stocks building up. But of course, I’m not skilled enough to test it out even though I do have a theory in mind. =P As such, with customisable traits, it’s not trivial to figure out the settings of the AI if u see “Ult” mode until you spar with it for a while. As for VS it’s possible to observe their selection choice bah. Haha.

Okok, time for some real observations and comments. In no particular order though:

1) I really ought to study how to use EIji. Of the times I random-ed and got him, I was kinda lost as to how to use him. Ah well, I’m not in touch with the old school since Eiji only appeared in KOF95 and AOF2. Heh. Didn’t get to random the Boss Team (geese, krauser, mr big) but I guess they should be somewhat similar to their KOF96 counterparts, which again I’m not too familiar with. LOL.

2) About the random system - now when you random, it’s actually possible to get the characters that require you to press the start button while selecting under normal conditions. Previously in the non-UM version, this was not possible. Not a bad feature for players like me, when playing against the AI… LOL

3) Players that are selected using the start button for a different version, will have their names displayed with a different colour while in-game and waiting for their turn to appear. Normal characters are in white font, while “started” characters are in red font (at least I think it’s red).

4) At order select screen, you will be able to see some new “portraits”. It’s kinda obvious u need some new ones for the new characters who join in, but for those who have an alternate version will look different, at least for Mary. Not sure about the rest since I didn’t really get a chance to random all of them.

5) Regarding taunts - (normal) Shermie’s taunt seems to make her invincible, or at least my Chizuru couldn’t really hit her. Not sure about O.Shermie though. As for Kensou’s taunt, his hand moving out is actually BLOCKABLE?! I wonder if it really does damage if I wasn’t blocking =S

6) The general AI has changed a little, probably needed to accommodate the new Ult system so the AI was tweaked or something. Can’t be that a lower level AI is actually smarter to counter my abuses used in the older kof98 version. Haha, so probably they fixed a bit here and there to make it less abusable. Or perhaps there are new ways to abuse them! MIehaha.

7) Now for modes that use Ex-mode style of power bar doesn’t make the character “glow” when the gauge is max. Must open eyes bigger liao. Haha.

8) Mr Big has a new DM. And it’s a grab DM… So yea watch out. Geese seems to be a pain. As well as Krauser. Maybe it’s just because I’m not used to fighting them =P =P Goenitz’s vertical hurricane wall is OTG!!! Ouch man ><

9) To be honest, the life bars and the character intro (doing pose part) screen before the round starts look a bit mugen-ish rather than KOF-ish. Maybe they got some ideas from there. Shrugs. Haha, but I’m not really that concerned all that also lah.

10) Most characters still behave they were back then, though I think there’s some minor differences in the frames for each move for some people, like Iori. It feels somewhat different lehz… Haiz, time to tune internal timing again…

On a side note, ps2 owners can look forward to a console version sometime in late June if there are no further delays from SNK, which they are known for postponing quite a few times one… Haha… Sigh. ps2… Blehx. I don’t think I’ll be playing much of this if only the DG outlet has this. Hardly go to town these days. Ah wellz. Maybe it’s about time I retire liaoz…