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Screenshots courtesy of Capcom.

A Losing Battle

By Jennie Sue

Take a nostalgic stroll with me down coin-op video gameland. One of my fondest memories is Street Fighter 2. Next in line, King of Fighters. For Street Fighter and KoF fans (of the cult-ish type), Capcom vs. SNK Pro for the PlayStation One has been a highly anticipated release, mainly for its retro gameplay and characters. Capcom created its most famous and long-playing fighter game back in the 80’s, and continually revives it through various evolutions of graphics, gameplay and character specials. That seems to be the problem. If the graphics aren’t great, then the gameplay and characters better make up for it. Well, this one lost.

Some of the features that CvS Pro includes are the cast of more than 30 fighters, two different fighting styles, a variable team system (in which the number of characters on a team is dependent on each character’s strength level, which varies from 1 to 4), and a color edit mode (which allows you to change the colors of the characters’ clothes and skin color).

The Capcom characters include classics like Ryu, Ken and Chun Li, and Alpha characters as well. The SNK characters, taken from the King of Fighters series and Fatal Fury, include Kyo Kusanagi, Iori Yagami and Terry Bogard.

Because the graphics are a downgrade from any more recent machine and the features on CvS Pro are not complicated compared to Capcom vs. SNK 2 (available for the PS2), I expected the game to load quickly and smoothly. Wrong! The load time from beginning to end really makes you want to chuck the machine out the window. From choosing your characters, picking the groove and waiting for the battle scene to load, I was ready to turn the game off and fire up my Dreamcast instead.

I can’t seem to recall the graphics and load time ever being so bad — maybe it’s just Alzheimer’s kicking me in the butt. Having been spoiled by much smoother engines and graphics on the PS2 or even the Dreamcast, purchasing a downgrade version of Capcom vs. SNK Pro is a sure loss. Though I must admit that I do love the Street Fighter Alpha series, and King of Fighters series, CvS Pro ±n the PS One platform is a nauseating nostalgic trip that I would much rather forget. It’s unfortunate to see such a highly anticipated semi-sequel so visually unstimulating.

Rating: 55%
Developer: Capcom
Price: $19.95