What's with me review SNK fighting game one after another? I'm not a huge fans of SNK's fighting game, even. There's fact that there's dozens fighter game made by SNK even more than from bigger company such as Capcom (which i'm fans of due to their Beat em up games) or Konami (who no longer make any fighter game to this date). Imagine: there's several Samurai Shodown games, some Art of Fighting and Fatal Fury. Not to mention we got King of Fighters on roughly every year of 90s and it still goes on until today. Plus some less-famous title such as Last Blade and Savage Reign. But maybe Capcom can compete on the numbers of Fighter games due to Marvel/X-Men Vs series even though they're not Capcom's original and use Marvel comic's property. Where was i? Oh, right. This time i review another SNK's fighting game: Garou - Mark of The Wolves (1999).
Garou - Mark of The Wolves takes time setting in future of Fatal Fury. I think it's iconic Fatal Fury scene (even though i know it from Capcom Vs. SNK) where Geese Howard fell from Geese Tower Rooftop after defeated by player's character. Terry Bogard is the valid perpetrator as he's the main protagonist of Fatal Fury series. But in his defense, he tries to safe Geese but he refuse it because of his pride or something and thus he falls to his death. So after Geese's death, Terry adopts his son: Rock Howard and he treats Rock as his own child/little brother/nephew and after some time later when Rock is grown up, Terry leaves on a train to presumably another fighting tournament and that's the setting of Garou - Mark of The Wolves. What's Garou? I'm not expert at Japanese. My best guess is related to wolf, maybe?
Thank you, Kagerou! If i'm not mistaken Hungry Wolf refers to Terry Bogard himself. It's common term in Japan for plucky young man who's always eager for challenge in martial art or fighting world.
This game no longer use 2 extra layer: outer and inner like in previous Fatal Fury. So it becomes fairly generic Fighting game but there's T.O.P which is special part of your health bar. You can choose to place it on first, middle, or last part of your health bar. Once your health in the T.O.P section, you deal more damage and your health regenerates up to highest part of T.O.P. Also you are able to perform T.O.P attack by pressing both hard punch and kick. If your health doesn't reach or exceed T.O.P area, you are unable to do T.O.P attack. There's also Just Defend which is blocking enemy's special attack in perfect timing which can heals you. Rock and Terry are so kindly to do some demonstration here. But i won't play as one of them even though they're the main protagonist. I have someone else in my mind.
Like when i play the game for material of Fighting Stage #4, i play as the pirate lady B. Jenet. Why my main is B. Jenet? Let's just say sometime i have "mundane" taste on picking character in Fighting Game. Oh, look! Rock Howard himself is willing to be my first opponent. How nice of him.
You probably can guess the basic mechanism of this game. Move joystick left/right to move. Move it to down direction to duck. Move it to up direction to jump. Move joystick backward to block enemy's attack. There's 4 buttons: 2 for punch and 2 for kick. What makes me baffled is the their configuration is jumbled. Let's say that they're A, B, C, and D. A is weak punch and B is weak kick. While C is strong punch and D is strong kick. The configuration in any Capcom game feels more intuitive to me whch is A to C for punch and D to F for kick. But maybe that's just my minor complaint.
Rock Howard's fighting style is kind of mixed Terry's and his father's (indicated by his ability to unleash Reppuken). While B. Jenet is strange one. She has projectile move but not as unintuitive as any shoto because she takes time to crouch and swipe her dress first before the wind projectile come out. On the plus side, it deals multiple hit when connected.
Her anti air move (quarter circle forward + kick) is also not instant to come out. The weak version of this move is most likely the most appropriate on as anti air move which is she hops short distance with her knee forward and then she jump high swiping with her dress. If the first hopping part is deleted, the move will be good anti air move but no. It takes too long to be a response to upcoming jumping kick. So most of the time, her head get kicked before eventually do the anti air part. I know the hopping part is for extra kick but i see it as useless part. The super version of this special move (quarter circle forward X 2 + kick) straight out the high swipe part multiplied which is perfect anti air move but requires a whole super bar.
"Beauty victory" she said as Rock lies unconsciously on parking lot. Good for her. And i get SSS rank. To get the real ending, you have to finish all rounds with average of at least AAA grade and in 1 credit. I believe anyone else is more knowledgeable than me about how to get very good grade. I think it will be easier to get it by putting T.O.P on early part of your health. Finishing enemy with super move most likely contribute to that but only if it's not blocked. Keeping the T.O.P bar maybe takes part too. I doubt finishing round with perfect health. As long as your health is high enough, will do the trick. Maybe your capability to make longs string of hit by combining every moves, is another big factor for grading. Since i'm not [insert name of 1-CC elitist here], i can do so much to achieve that except by shear luck and savestate.
My next opponent is Gato which is Spanish for "Cat". But i don't think his move is related to cat. Or maybe he's cat lover like me. Even so i have to beat him.
One of move that i like to use is this rolling kick. Good for defense and offense. I thought there's no air block but Gato there proves me wrong. I'm not bright.
There's also post-fight quotes and they're specific to the winner and the loser. Bonne Jenet jests Gato serious face. She's schmuck.
Meanwhile some mysterious burly man getting impatient to fight me who only fought 2 opponents.
My next opponent is Kim Jae Hoon which is one of Kim Kaphwa's son. The other is Dong [No giggling please] who's on casino area and not as serious as his brother. Jae Hoon is just straight young Kim Kaphwa who love justice and serious about it. You see he's doing some stretching before upcoming fight while B. Jenet have a toast with her pirate crew and later slam the glass on the floor. Lucky for Kim Jae, the glasses are completely gone otherwise his bare feet will get some sharp shard which can be very bad as Taekwondo practitioner's main weapon are their feet.
The he sets me on fire with his burning anti air move. Medic_autoonfire03.wav
As B. Jenet wins the fight, she's lifted by her pirate crew. The old ones try to catch breath after running along with his peer. Poor old man. I don't know what's the dog doing there. Maybe he likes the smell of Kim's feet?
My next opponent is Hotaru Futaba who's another female character in this game. I blame Street Fighter 2 for being standard of fighting game with only 2 female characters. Why not more than that, huh? well at least better than no female character at all. Anyway, here's me execute a super move. For some reason, Jenet's kick can unleash many torpedo. Demoman_sf12_badmagic11.wav
Here's another special move that i mentioned as perfect for anti air. It ends with Jenet blows a kiss then a heart icon appears and hit her enemy. Why his kiss blow hurt her opponent? I have no idea.
Zangief train by fighting wild bear while Khushnood Butt [Again, no giggling please] sparring with bear that he has trained. Engineer_autodejectedtie02.wav
In Japan version, his name is Marco Rodriguez which is the similar name of mixed martial artist: Ricco Rodriguez. To avoid confusion, SNK rename him into less serious name. I mean seriously. Who can take someone serious when fighting a man named Butt?
Actually, he's quite formidable opponent as expected by Kyogenryu-style Karateka (i heard he's directly studies from Takuma Sakazaki himself). He's clearly shoto with powerful move and obviously he has better anti air move than me. In fact everyone in this game has better anti air move than Jenet.
He wins this round and to show everyone his mighty muscles he rips his karate-gi. Yes. Yes, impressive. But there's still (at least) one more round before you fully win. I will wait for you to change your spare cloth by lying here in this grassy ground injured and humiliated.
Ha! I got you before you do the uppercut anti air. Have you wonder how B. Jenet has good might on her own? Unleashing torpedoes and slashing wind. My best guess is thanks to the power of Jolly Roger that embedded on her dress.
Ok. This guy is totally creep. He must be sick criminal. Raping his victims and then murder them and then raping them again. Absolute Freak!
Remember when i say "Everyone in this game has better anti air move than Jenet"? It seems Freeman here doesn't have any or maybe he doesn't have opportunity to do it. Which mean i can kick him in the face with no worry.
Therefore i can spam my other favorite move: multiple dive kick. Sometime i can use it to make enemy's guard break. Unlike Street Fighter Alpha, there's no guard bar so i have no idea how long enemy can block my attacks. but with this move, i can give them guard break status fairly often.
Eventually, i encounter the mysterious figure. Heavy_meleedare07
Medic_sf12_badmagic05.wav. I make a big discover! This wind projectile can hit enemy on the ground. I didn't know this before. Honest.
As you expect from a man with well-built muscles all over his body, he hits hard like very hard. Like this kick that unleash a huge blast and his tricky anti air. You expect to be able to punish him when he's still in air while in his anti air move, right? But he will perform dive kick immediately after his anti air animation. With that kind of anti air move, he's untouchable shoto clone but fortunately he doesn't have shooting energy move so he's bit balanced.
There's the usual throw enemies by pressing forward + hard punch when close to them in this game. But there's tech hit which can prevent you for throwing them. Well, Grant here always do tech hit whenever i attempt to throw him. On the other hand, he can slam me to the ground easily despite my attempt on doing tech hit by spamming every buttons. He's pretty unfair if you can tell him already and remember that you have to defeat him in at least AAA grade to get real ending.
Tell that to politician, buddy. If you just rampaging on modern society with just your muscle's strength. SWAT team and military will most likely gun you down and that's the end of your wisdom along with your life. But i appreciate your thought. I don't know whether this is coincidence or not but his picture here like Phantom of Opera and he said "Phantom".
Everytime you use continue, you will be given assist: 1) you get full super bar 2) Enemy's difficulty is decreased or 3) Enemy's health down to 25%. You can choose not to have any of the service if your honor get the best of you or something. I think the most useful one is health decrease so i choose that.
By choosing the Enemy's health reduction service, the pros: you work less now that enemy is dying. The cons: Grant's T.O.P immediately kicks in so he's more dangerous right of the bat. That's because he always put T.O.P part on last portion of his health.
See that huge damage that he inflicts by using his super move level 2! Devastating, ain't it? I forget to tell you that there's 2 level of super move determined by the strength of attack button that used. The super bar also has 2 level. But it's not marked with level number. S power indicate that your super bar is filled a layer or level and P power indicate that your super bar is filled to 2 layer or level which is the maximum capacity.
Eventually i defeat Grant. He keels over and die. Credit rolls with background of giant skull statue that also exists on the Grant's stage. It reminds me of Curse of Dead Gods so this game deserves another good credit for me.
This happens if you don't qualify to real ending, that is. If you look carefully on pre-fight screen before fighting Butt. Next opponents after him are Freeman and Grant. So I'm short of 1 slot in opponent bar on the bottom. Should you qualify for real ending...
...you get to fight this scum-sucking criminal. I don't know why we move from inside of Mesoamerican temple into this schmuck's sanctuary. Are they miraculously connected like every area in Dark Souls 2? I have no idea.
As per usual, Kain here has better anti air move than me. He also have projectile shooting move that doubled as back hop move. Unusual but i say Kain is still more fair compare to Grant.
Ok, he defeated me but my point stands still he's more enjoyable to fight than that bastard Grant. Why do you think that B. Jenet lacks of feminine? Is it because she's pirate? Woman can also become pirate too, you know.
It's obvious that B. Jenet is sexy female character. But she shows her funny side when she's defeated because of time out and she make that pouting face. She doesn't look as gorgeous as Victoria's Secret model anymore, does she?
I didn't know before that Kain has super move where he conjure energy projectiles from above and they're able to hit me while i'm still on the ground. Totally fair. [Small Sarcasm]
I figure that he's much easier to deal with when we're close so i ditch the "keeping distance with him" strategy. Once he's defeated by one round, he reveals his true nature: he has T.O.P on his entire health bar. That means he can regenerate his health anytime. If you slacking too long he will heal big time so aggressiveness is the key.
He has another super move where he conjure big energy that homing on you slowly. It sure can annoys you but you can still block it. But eventually i can defeat him.
Dude. That's because you look me so sharply. I don't like it. As in villain rule 101 "With thine demise, thine sanctuary will initiate self-destruct automatically". The sanctuary begins to crumble. B. Jenet try to help Kain to get out but he stands still as if he wants to die along with this place with his sister picture on it. What's with SNK Fighter's characters that overly obsessed with their sister anyway? There's Billy Kane, Gato and Kain too. They more look like incest freak than loving brother.
After the screen goes black for awhile, Jenet wakes up surrounded her pirate crew. They save her in last minute but forget to get the treasure. She is mad at them and the crew run away in fear. She's ungrateful jerk.
Then she feels touched as she look at the ruins of the palace. She swings her mood really big. The end. For real this time.
SNK's Garou - Mark of The Wolves (1999) is another SNK FIghting game that i quite like. It ditches the extra 2 layer that i'm not fans of and the boss is overpowered without feeling too unfair. Maybe the only thing that i don't like is: how mysterious to get big rank for every match in order to fight Kain and get real ending. Other than that, the gameplay is fine. You can chain your normal and special move if you're skillful player unlike me. There's also move cancel but i never bothered with it. The T.O.P system is both functional and interesting special feature. The Just Defend (blocking at perfect timing) is good extra but hard to pull out. My personal mistake is probably pick B. Jenet as my main as she lacks of proper anti air move. Compared to other agile fighters in Street Fighter Alpha: Rolento and Guy, she's less intuitive but i still like her. The game can be completed relatively fast especially if you don't aim for real ending. The music is pretty nice. The sound and visual effect is very good.
It's fairly obvious that Garou - Mark of The Wolves (1999) get my recommendation for SNK Fighting game. Even though i'm not some kind of professional fighting game expert. That much is we know. :p
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