I love the post-apocalyptic feeling of SVC Chaos! Breathtaking stages.

The stages on this game felt like depressing and calming at the same time.

ecstatic to find out that we've still got birds AND mars people to look forward to in purgatory

Wow, that plot is WILD.

The nude place is a reference of one standing before God in his house and baring their soul to him. One's soul need no clothing.

I never stopped to think and realize all the stages were post apocalyptic...no wonder everything felt lifeless. Also in the sanctuary, the crystal reminds me of the stone-like from Radiant silvergun/ikaruga

12:58 Damn, this stage & song are my favorite in the game! A gigantic generator room created for purposes unknown, and an energetic song that gets me pumped to continue the fight, while still keeping that sense of grandiose mystery.

Maybe the best collection of stages in fighting game history. They look so cool. But that's all I knew about the game before you covered its backstory and plot. Really good video.

Great analysis! When I'm explaining why I like fighting game backgrounds, I often win people over by showing them the waterfall and church stages from this game. And if that doesn't work, the waterfall and church stages from Garou usually do the trick.

The Silent Hill of fighting games

14:07 Guardian Dogs Temple👹 The final boss battle.....i agree with you. It is the best stage. Boss stages are always the best stages because the background & music have a dark, dangerous, menacing & scary vibe letting you know you are about to face the ultimate threat.

I remember playing this game long ago in mexico with zero. I even read some of those comics in midtown comics years ago. The stages look very different and out of place. The hell stage gives off berserk vibes if you know a certain imfamous event in the anime. I do hope snk and capcom work together again and make another attempt to really showcase more cool stages from both companies!

The lore of this game simultaneously blew my mind and underwhelmed me, it's incredible. Knowing this takes place in a purgatory apocalypse explains so much, but doesn't excuse the random collection of empty lots that barely hint at this and... why is a fighting game crossover dealing with afterlife concepts anyway? The stages and music remind me of KOF Neowave a lot, just a soulless blur that you'll never be able to recall from memory. SNK was so all over the place with stages, sometime you'd get pure art like most Samurai Showdown stages, other times you'd get the lame beach where everyone's sleeping in KOF 11. I'm really mixed on the game, I played it a lot back in the day since the gameplay was still pretty good, but even without knowing the company history, it felt empty. There were more modes in Mugen, and the arcade rom hack had more features somehow. But it also had midnight bliss, animal, and demon forms for every character, effort was put in, just in the strangest of places. One last thing: On that plot to capture Iori, I remember in Capcom Vs Snk, Bison has an intro against Iori where he is getting too close, and Iori throws a fireball to get Bison away. It seemed pretty random, I wonder if it was always an unspoken plotline that Bison was after him?

The blockade space stage looked very dangerous. You are battling Orochi Iori or Violent Ken in a cage full of mirrors & cameras which is headed toward a bright light

The inspiration behind Red Arremer's stage is Caspar David Friedrich, Abbey in the Oak Forest, 1809-10. You can find different painting of this subject by the artist!

This video was fantastic and was hyped af to find out how fighting game centered this channel is! Subbed and excited for more 👍🏿

The SF stage music loop was priceless XD

Great job you really went the extra mile with buying the comic and explaining the plot. I always thought they were in the afterlife or another dimension based on the endings ,bosses and stages but damn was that plot just so out there

As someone who's dug into many HK manhua, I can tell you for certain that these adaptations aren't officially recognized as Canon. They're more or less made to hype the game up and allow for some serious creative liberties. Besides, some of the stuff they put into these would never be a licensing nightmare to deal with. For example: -In the KOF 96 series, there's a Tekken team with Kazuya, Anna and King. Jin shows up for a quick cameo in the following 97 comic by the same team who were working on a Tekken 3 series at the time. -Staying with 96-97 (I forgot which series this happened in), Baki shows up in a Ryo flashback -Street Fighter 3's first series features characters who weren't in the game like Skullomania and even characters from an HK original, Dragon Tiger Gate -In the Battle Arena Toshinden 3 series, there's an issue where Eiji fights Kyo, which I'msure they got the OK from SNK for. Ironically that series was also made by the guys who worked on the manhua for 96-98 -The 4 issue Buriki One series turned the story into a Ryo centric tale that apes some story beats from Baki I think you get the idea, lol. Oh and those two random characters who show up in the SVC comic? They're the Capcom and SNK avatars from the original Card Fighters game!

I heard from somewhere that the stages in SVC were apparently from some other canned SNK… thing, fighting game or whatever, and Playmore just wound up slapping it on this game calling it a day. That storyline is completely insane

I like the dark tone of this game I honestly thought it takes place after capcom vs snk 2 ending where akuma and rugul gain insane power and because of that the world is now a post apocalypse

Ngl, these stages are kind of a vibe to me, like I could see a video of that train station with some Techno lo-fi songs for an hour, or that forrest lake with some soothing, they are just so serene to me, gives me that sensation of going home on a empty road next to a river or a forrest.

SF = sci-fi stage. Sometimes it's just that simple, the devs put an obvious placeholder and never get around to replacing it with meaningful context :p Love the concept for this video btw. It's cool to see someone doing something different with the genre. There's so many interesting things to talk about that... Well, don't get talked about. Keep it up 👍

The overall macabre look of the hell stage would fit in very well in a game like Blasphemous. I really dig these stage analyses. Very fascinating stuff!

It's def not a style for everybody, and a weird choice for a crossover like this, but I'm honestly a big fan of some of these stages. I don't know why SNK ever decided to go this route, but its such a weird vibe you don't get in any other fighters. Ones like the violent ken stage or the crystal shrine just have this weird imposing feel. Guardian Dogs is absolutely one of the best! But even as a fan of some of the music though, I have to agree most tracks put me to sleep lmao

4:53 after seeing how crazy the Orochi Saga of King of Fighters was and the way they were originally going to end it, this story very SnK like

The railway station music is the literal meaning of SVC's catchphrase "Not a match. Struggle!". A desperate life and death moment.

SF is surely "sci-fi". It looks like a space station, hence the rotation of the background.

S.F...Like science fiction ? It wouldn't be a wild guess

Incredible analysis and video, thank you so much!

Amazing video, liked and subbed. The research you did was amazing, the creative direction SNK went in was so bizarre. The vibe honestly reminds me of the Dark Stalkers anime.

I truly love the cherub's (baby angels) faces in the heaven stage. It reminds me of church art everywhere here in Italy and especially the massive painting in my own church with this baby angel front and center that lives rent free in my nightmares

trivia: megaman zero's appearance in snk vs capcom is one of only two outside of his franchise. to clarify, megaman zero and megaman x zero are completely different from each other in appearance and story.

Another excellent vid! Happy you’re not done talking about stages yet!

I will spend sleepless nights wondering why the church is called the nude place, thank you

I was waiting for this thanks

OMG I'm so glad you did this! SVC chaos is one of my favorite fighting games, despite its many shortcomings, and I've been hoping you would talk about it

I love that the SF Stage song only starts at the very end of the video.

"Red Arremer's stage is much scarier than any Darkstalkers stage" Of course it is. Because it is literally HELL

Wooooah. Now this is an INTENSE one you are going for. A topic that is definitely worth talking about though, so I'm glad you are doing so! :D

One of my favorite things to do is explain to people the plot of this game and see their minds explode. SNK tried to do some cool things but sadly it just wasn’t the time for a game like this. Awesome content as always!!

I imagine someone already asked this, but I would've loved to see you disect ugly stages from the disaster known as Capcom Fighting Jam. As for the video itself - it was mind blowing. Your channel is quite a find!

I like how the moment you showed Manwha, it was The Devil Wants to Hug. I LOVE that manwha but it was going on so long and I had lost where I was in the chapters…But baberuthless, that’s a verryyyy specific choice of all manwha to show.

Awesome video and investigation! this is the video I didn't knew I wanted haha, thank you! it was really interesting, I also want another collab between them it would be great!

Fighting game stages being analised? Thats rare. Nice! Got yourself a sub here.

When i saw this game for the first time, i appreciate the huge improvements in pixel-art, and i chalked all the substance-less oddities as, "all energy and resources were put in the sheer flexing, nobody gave a cent about impact" Leaves, water, clouds, fans, not to mention heads weaving laterally in a 2d raster game, fists sliiiighly rotating on 3 axis during animations, tension on muscles... as i said, a huge flex.

Thank you for doing this. I learned so much

interesting fact about the hell stage, in Dante's Inferno, those who committed suicide were sentenced to be melded inside of trees for eternity. that could explain the array of emotions present in the 'tree people.'

A video about svc chaos stage and music. such an unexpected content and an unique approach to fg contents. subscribed.

Now knowing what happened in terms of lore, makes me feel that sense of hopeless edge of insanity with only thinking that the characters are in the purgatory and they're trying to make their way out of there and then just getting into the heaven that doesn't feel like the right place to be called heaven (also reminds me that thing in Darkstalkers when you activate Dark Force and the stage change for a moment)

Another banger! This game is another that was prominent in my circle of friends back in high school, alongside CVS1 and 2. Never did we get to the secret stages or play as Athena or Red Arremer, but we found out about them a while ago. Also, you finally broke the loop to the SF stage theme at the end lmao

12:08 The character in the back is Cap from SNK vs. Capcom Card Fighters Clash... a card game lol The other character in 4:32 next to Athena and Cap is Shin, from the same game. Pretty cool that the manhua added those obscure characters lol

Love this game for its grittiness and enjoy head-cannoning what's going on. The Heaven and Hell stages are so eerie too.

Very nice video !

Love your content found you few days ago, your opinions are really relaxing for me 🙂, didn't know anything about this game aside of giving some playing a little bit with friends. The story behind this world is fun!

A girl who talk about something as niche as the stages of a niche fighting game is, in and on itself ,already very cool .. but her name is Baberuthless !? Ha! love it !

Nailed on the head every thought and opinion I have on the game. One thing about the music that makes it worse is the odd soundfont that Playmore started using in KOF 02, which was then reused in this game and KOF 03. It makes everything sound tinny and lacks punch compared to what they've used in the past, especially with KOF 99. The music would have been more tolerable if they had stuck with that. Gotta say though, the Hell stage is my favorite. Its the darkest, creepiest thing that was ever made on the Neo-Geo.

Man, I have such a soft spot/fascination with this game. Loved to remember it through this video!

Mabye it's personal bias, considering this is my favorite fighting game to watch, but personally I love this game's atmosphere. And I'm glad to see someone talk about it Normally I really hate desaturated, Xbox 360 era FPS color palettes, but I actually quite like how it's implemented in this game. The music, stages, and general presentation really give off a vibe of "it's the end, and it's do or die" without feeling bland or soulless (to me at least.) It's really unique, and something uncommon in fighting games. It kinda reminds me of SMT III now that of think about it. Also the city and industrial levels really remind me Rain World, which I quite like. I would definitely hide a slugcat in some of these stages if I had the skill to do so Honestly, I think this games aesthetic would have been much more accepted if it was made for an original IP. Considering how much it contrasts with the previous games' celebrational feel. I really hope more games get made with a similar style. Closest example I can think of is the game "Daraku Tenshi - The Fallen Angels" Also: not to be rude, but for future videos would it be possible to -emulate- run these game with integer scaling, and without stretching the image to wide screen? It kinda tarnishes the picture quality a bit. The video is still really nice regardless, and I'm really happy to see people talk about this game for more than a simple "it sucks"

Love your channel

The Lone dude in the temple stage looks like Jesus. He looks like the only sclground character in any of these stages

11:15 iirc the rumor mill was SNK wanted to add another sub/boss character and this was going to be their stage but since something happened where the character got scrapped but they wanted to keep th stage in

Yo that’s Jesus in the sky sanctuary lmao 😂😂😂

I love these video essays! I'm glad I picked this game up a while ago. I do like some of the art, almost Bob Ross-esque and not your typical SNK and Capcom stage designs.

It’s insane the “story” of the game. I actually quite love this game , especially the new bootleg characters as well as zero . I definitely can see why this game wasn’t popular , though to me the darker setting and for some reason I quite like these stages and can remember them ( not sure why). I think my favorite song from the game is from the mechanical area, the forest stage theme is quite nice if not fitting. I feel the mechanical stage music is very distinct to me and memorable, its whole vibe is kinda sorrowful which I quite like.I Also I don’t know if you noticed this but I think sodoms stage in alpha 1 is similar to this train stage. Edit: after watching the video I have to say hell is probably my favorite place in the game. I love how grotesque and disturbing it is

damn, the way you ripped into this game broke my heart. I was like 14 or 15 when this came out- I played it at a time where I had been playing fighitng games for about 5 or 6 years and I loved CVS too, I mean all fighting games were dope- but I was always rooting for SNK, even when it got shakey and they were bought out by playmore and started making games for the Atomiswave- anyways I'm rambling- but dude I thought SVC was soo dope- it felt like, "it finally happened!! they did it!!" I had soo much fun playing that game and reading all the chracters' dfferent interactions, and yeah- anyways. I haven't really played that game since- but I'm sure nostalgia would take me back. I love SNK and Neo Geo. Anyways, you put the video together very well and did alot of research, so while your video was for sure cool, at the same time it was hard to hear your critique on it. I wanna read those comics now, man!

I always assumed the stages were references to existing stages, like the railroad stage from KoF98.

fun fact: you can see svc chaos clearly being played in a scene from a this great 2004 hong kong film Throw Down by aaron kwok's character in an arcade, making it his second tangential connection to fighting games that i know of (he was also in that zany 90s street fighter parody film Future Cops)

He estado esperando un video explicando estos escenarios inquietantes desde hace años

Interesting review of the stages & themes.

Absolutely love SvC Chaos, one of my favorite fighting games

Considering where SNK was financially and the limited staff,this game is a lot better than it should of been. It’s not perfect but when all is considered,it’s like people go out their way to pick it apart.

I didn't know that SVC Chaos had an actual plot, I always assumed it operated mostly on vibes and that it was purposefully vague in its setting, like suggesting that it took place in some sort of in-between post-apocalyptic reality, not that it was meant to be a literal purgatory. Considering that it came out during a very tumultuous time for SNK I assumed the project got cut short and what we got was what they managed to salvage. I do love its visual style tho, it's really unique for the series involved in the game. BTW the reason you're struggling to see some of the details in the background is that it was meant to be displayed on a 4:3 screen rather than 16:9, also this game looked significantly better on a traditional CRT because of the color bleeding. Both SVC and KOF 2003 relied on some flaws/features of CRT displays to properly show the pixel art as it was intended, mostly because they made extensive use of dither patterns (sometimes rapidly moving layers) in order to fake transparency and extra shading, by the time the last few Neo Geo games released the hardware was so old that they were using all sort of tricks to try to keep up with the look of 2D graphics that newer boards like CPS 3 or Naomi (which were already a few years old themselves) were capable of.

personally love SVC chaos, i call it "laundromat" game since i found it in a random laundromat in my block but it was a one of kind game since SNK handled this one. appreciate you going in depth and even talking about the wacky story comics! got me a good laugh when it all of a sudden went PURGATORY. did not expect that 😂 but yeah the cryatal shrine and guardian dogs stages were the best. good tracks too

I get how the first 9 seconds of the SF stage theme can live in your head rent free, but the rest of the song is pretty cool. Top 5 tracks in this game for me.

Awesome video! I love SVC Chaos. This and SSV on Xbox was the last straw for me, I was tired of terrible ports and finally invested in a NeoGeo MVS machine. This always seemed rushed to me, so this video filled in some gaps in my brain

That's a pretty bold plot to implement for a game.- Following a failed scheme by M. Bison, a Shadaloo satellite fires a laser at the Earth that wipes out all life on the planet. In purgatory, 30 fighters are drawn into a tournament by Athena and Red Arremer, avatars for the forces of Order and Chaos, who promise that the winner will receive one wish. Now the fighters compete to win the tournament and have their wish granted, with the fate of all life hanging in the balance.

It saddens me that i'm one of the few who liked everything about SVC Chaos 😭 Except the part where you had to beat everything with 1 credit in order to get a true ending

Ah hell yeah the purgatory from svc chaos!

Thanks for the Info

Thanks as always for these interesting videos. I remember being devastatingly disappointed by the lack of cameos and fun references in the backgrounds, considering the context of this being a crossover game as well as (at the time) perceived as possibly SNK’s last major game before what felt like their inevitable bankruptcy. Even more so when juxtaposed with (as you mentioned) how creative SNK had been with the character roster on both sides, compared to Capcom’s slightly boring choices for CVS and CVS2. It would also have been fun to hear classic Capcom themes remixed by SNK’s slightly edgier brand of techno around the time of KOF99 / KOF2000.

Maybe all the vacant backgrounds were a creative way to divert from the fact that the game was produced under lot of constraints, including hardware power? Because the frame rate for the characters is insane, it seems like they choose to prioritise those over music and backdrops.

I think the "SF" would stand for "science fiction". Kind of fits too, considering the stage and what seems to be some background elements in low-g, but it's just a guess.

8:48 In order to get your sins forgiven, you must become 'bare' and confess everything. Add the mistranslation of context of 'bare' and you get 'Nude Place'.

Daaamn you dunked on this game the whole vid lmaaao That being said, beautiful sprite work in this game. I always preferred this one over Mark of the Millennium. The whole grit and vibe is off the charts. The shading on the sprites too 🤌

Very interesting video. I was not know the comics.

The beat drop for Power Generator Room theme was so worth it🤣

For other game manhua that are absolutely buck wild, there's the manhua for Resident Evil 2/3, I believe. I have no idea if I'm remembering this correctly, but at points, it gets to, like, actually shonen battle levels of bonkers (usually involving B.O.W.s, though a few human characters do some crazy shit).

Pity that these amazing sprites weren't used more. Snk really outdid Capcom on this sprite design versus the CvS games.They should have done another where we got the best of both worlds.

Omake really reminds me a lot of the Antartica stage from SFxT as they both have a similar idea of using a platform moving on a path as the stage plus the camera angle. I really think that the reason the SvC games lack notoriety is due to the context of their production, with SNK trying to produce revenue quick and hence their titles not being on par with those of Capcom who were in a much different situation. Although I do like the flare and style for CvS games, 2 in particular with a techno DJ inspired televised event, I do appreciate SNK in putting a game with beautiful sprite work and cohesion with their characters. That's one thing this game does really well and even the choices are more interesting that other vs SNK games. Hopefully we get one new vs SNK soon, Capcom has been teasing us a lot, even dragging TxSF too.

So since I don't see anyone else talking about this, apparently Demitri wasn't going to be in the game, but the spot wasn't going to be for a DS character, instead it was going to be Dante from DMC, I don't know for sure but I remember some people talking about in Maximilan Dood's comment section that Dante was scrapped because his coat would have taken way too much time to animate let alone his entire moveset, (Although considering the time this game came out, it probably would've been specifically DMC1 Dante) so they didn't include him in favor of Demitri.

SF probably stands for Sci-Fi Another little fun fact: in the japanese console ports (PS2 and Xbox) they added dialogue for Athena and Red Arremer fighting each other; but i believe they forgot to translate it in the localized ports, causing them to freeze if the two characters are put against each other

I've always loved these stages, they have this sort of melancholic vibe that I've never seen any other fighting game quite land. But I never knew about the game's batshit story, I actually love it and think it contributes a lot to the atmosphere of these stages.

Capcom VS SNK 0friendly crossover and meet up for the most part SNK VS Capcom- FIGHT IN PURGATORY

The comics doesn't explain how Zero, a Reploid could play in the other side. So it's probably not canon. And he communicates with Ciel in the future. Another example is Goenitz dialogue with Kyo: "Kyo: "You... You're still alive? Hey, I've got nothing to do with the Orochi!" Goenitz: "Kusanagi, young sinner. You will not escape from your destiny." When Reploids die they become Cyber Elves and go to Cyberspace. That's canon.

A game i still enjoy. 🙂 I kinda like the art of the comics.

I played this before in 2017, and while I didn't enjoy it, I adore the pixel art and the soundtrack. I love the way Vega & Chun-Li look here! I'm surprised there were no DMC or Resident Evil characters in the game, such as Leon and Dante. Heck, Setsuna from The Last Blade 2 would have fit well. Or even Duo Lon or Lin! The lore of this game is DARKLY prophetic in hindsight since _no_ new CAPCOM VS. SNK fighting games were made after this!

Can you do a video on the stages in soul caliber 3? They're so cool and have a ton of storytelling going on in the background. Love the vids!

Never realized there were only 10 stages. Even the original Street Fighter 15 years earlier had that many.

Interesting video, but I dig it. My favorite stages are the Nude Place and the Sci-Fi Elevator. Speaking of the Elevator stage, we clearly have different taste in soundtrack because I love that song. To me it has a eerily buildup then start cutting lose which goes with the fighting, but that’s me. Another thing I do like about the game which this video did not touch upon is the sound effect, particularly the hits and blocks sounds, They sound so beefy and impactful, it one of the few times I notice the sounds of combat in fighting games.