They always did impress. They showed that you could make a cool intro without flashy polygons.

That also happens on the PS1, only it's even worse than on the Saturn. It seems like they've reduced the sample rate of character voices and other sound effects to save RAM. Even with the 1MB RAM cartridge the Saturn still didn't have enough RAM to load all assets at once with the same quality as the original arcade version.

96 came in last week 👍 team Japan all day of course

You're welcome.

The Saturn and Neo CD are also using redbook CD audio :)

Oh man, I may just do KOF '98 for next week. May as well. Thanks for the likes too :)

Hahaha Totally agree Mark Jones!!! KOF 98 is my favorite all time KOF!!!

I'll be doing 97 & 98 for sure.

I do like the clicky feel to the Neo CD pads.

That controller is perfect for fighting games. That is one of my reasons to buy a NEO GEO CD (Japanese NEO GEO CD).

SNES Fan89 PlayStation missed frame rate! The animation is not smooth as NG & Saturn !

Errr, why do people forget about the Japanese Orochi Hen compilation, which is pretty much bug and glitch free, plus load free. Yes the western version is gimped, but the Japanese one is spot on with the AES version. Japanese PS2 Orochi Hen is the best home port this side of the AES versions of 95-97.

no worries. Most likely KOF '97 will be here next week.

I agree. I had so much fun playing this back in the day. The copy I have now is the same one I bought back in December 1996 (Saturn version).

Thanks and congratulations on being the first to comment.

Cool. Next week will probably be a Neo Geo day too :)

Thanks for watching, Marc. Glad you liked the Iori opening :D

Retro Core I'm Patron now ! I'll send you 1$ each month. It's not a lot, but, I hope it will help you anyway. I really apreciate what you're doing on this channel.

Looks like KOF '97 is coming next week.

Make sure you get the 1mb ram cartridge with the Saturn game as SNK Fighters tend not to work so well with the 4mb ram cartridge.

You mean the ps1, the saturn sounded much better

It does, I meant to say that many Neo Geo fighting games ported to the Saturn and PlayStation have this issue with the voices.

Yeah, the sample rates on the PlayStation port are really low.

PlayStaion in most cases however the Saturn sounds pretty good in many cases such as this game. Fatal Fury 3 on the Saturn is an awful mess though.

@@NeoTurboManiac78 how have you been man? You planning to review Samurai shodown V perfect when it comes out since it's the true final neogeo game

Absolutely!

As always.

Japanese PS2 Orochi Hen for the ultimate win, the best version besides the AES to have and play. I know because I have 96 on PS1, Saturn, Wii Orochi Saga, and PS2 Orochi Hen, and the latter pretty much wipes the floor with the former. One thing Mark forgot to mention is the sound effects of punches and kicks on the Saturn version, they sound extremely weak, unlike any other version of the game, besides the Gameboy port. And 95-97 on Saturn does suffer from character voices that are slightly too highly pitched. I know this because I have played 95 in emulation, and do own 96 and 97 for my Saturn, these issues have always bugged me about the Saturn versions. I don't own 95 because I have a US Saturn, and constant cart swapping will eventually kill the console, not to mention an Action Replay Plus 4 MB in 1 cart being pulled out and put in constantly will result in your cart slot being stretched, a big no no to me, though I can still buy the game and play it in SSF, with the ROM cart emulated for it on the emulator.

Owning a Saturn meant you had to mod it if it wasn't Japanese. So many great games stayed in Japan.

Rob Toohey low sample rate , bit depth and compression will do that.

I may just do KOF '97 next week but leave it there before moving on to '98.

I'm glad you liked the video. 96 is also one of my favourites in th KOF series.

I always though that was so cool back in 1996.

Who knows, maybe in the future I'll cover KOF '98 :)

I wonder how it would have looked on the SFC? That would have been interesting to see.

Sounds like you have a good 4 in 1 cart. Some of them have issues playing the SNK 1Mbit games.

Retro Core Action replay 4m plus with pseudo Saturn added is what I run.

Will do. KOF 98 will be next.

There are loads of SNK / Play more games on the Dreamcast. There's 4 King Of Fighters games, 2 last blade games and I'm sure other stuff too.

@@RetroCore The only other one you didn't name was Garou MotW.

The Neo CD is really slow. It wouldn't make for great viewing to be honest. Just imagine looking at a loading screen for 40 seconds.

Hah :D I have Real Bout Fatal Fury Special for my NGCD, it never gets played, and I don't even think that's half as bad as this would be :( A shame that they didn't went with the NGZ from the beginning, though it's not perfect it would have been a million times better for the consumers.

You wanna see real bad load times for the NGCD? Try KoF 99 and both Last Blades. The latter will have you wanting to pull your hair out, unless you own a NGCDZ, which knocks some of the load times down to more manageable levels.

Yep, that's the one.

Err, thanks. Maybe I had a cold in the previous video? I think I did.,

Yes but like psx has two or three parts of the son splitted in tracks so It changes anyway. Not a perfect solution, but better that starting all over again like many 16bit fighters.

98, 98UM, 2K2, 2k2UM and XIII

The Saturn port isn't darker but it does look darker on my video because of the RGB cable I'm using. All Saturn games look darker on my videos unfortunately. The game will glitch when using the official 4MB cart and some 4 in 1 carts too. This is what makes it difficult to play on anything but a Japanese Saturn.

Aye, definitely true on that one Mark. It's why I play to get my NA Model 2 system eventually modded with a region switch, like my friend Chad did 15 or so years back. Also to play KoF'95. I'm still wondering what is up with the design decision Sega made when making the Saturn's VDP? With it being such a 2D powerhouse, it not being able to do many of the resolutions the PS1 could (384x224, 256x240, etc.) just strikes me as odd to this day. One could easily tell if you look at previous BotP episodes where you used Capcom Generations for the Saturn and PS1 ports.

I guess because it was based upon arcade hardware (the STV) so it didn't occur to them? The Saturn can even out put a really hi-resolution that no game has ever used. Apparently it needs some sort of special cable. Still at least it could output 704 X 480 at 480i which is still higher than anything until the Dreamcast came along.

Retro Core don’t forget the widescreen mode (maybe what you mentioned?) used for ten player mode in Saturn Bomberman.

I personally run my Saturn SNK fighters through an Action Replay Plus, the only time I get any graphical glitches is when I need to clean the contacts on the cart. Since it has a built in 1MB option supposedly, the games run just fine.

eh? really? It shouldn't be. The music is redbook streamed audio which is in stereo. I'll have to check this.

I wonder if it's a hardware revision? I have to admit that I never actually noticed which is strange for me. I'm going to have to boot up Golden Axe the Duel now too to check that. It is very odd since both games use redbook CD audio which is in Stereo on the disc. The end and opening music I used for this video come from the Saturn game disc.

Did you find that the Japanese PS2 release has a softer image than the Saturn via RGB or the original arcade? Even with the smoothing switched off it seem a little too soft. That could be because I'm running my PS2 via D-Terminal (Component) .

Lucas Milani, like me you know how good the Japanese compilation is, it's everyone else that has played the US Orochi Saga on PS2 that seems to have a hard time understanding this.

It is softer, but its a hardware limitation, because de source art for this game is designed for a 240p signal (like the neo geo/cd and saturn versions do), but the ps2 can only display 480i and above resolutions. So the developers have to use some kind of interpolation to strech the source art to fill the screen

I have the saturn version and since my ps2 is modded, i downloaded and burned the jp orochi saga to test kof96 ps2 version. Its a good version indeed, but just like the saturn version, the audio (voices and sfx) sounds muffed compared to the clear audio effects of the mvs aes and neocd versions, and it bugs me alot.

They're Arcade emulated versions which is why I didn't feature them on the show.

lightdark28 Very true gameboy version looks and plays infinite better then snes

lightdark28 nicer than any other fighting game I've seen on gameboy or gameboy colour

Geo Belmont killer instinct mk2 they wore decent as well

The Japanese one is. No idea about the western release, if there is a western release.

Both good games but no ports. I'll try y and feature them on another video some time.

Ahahahaha, AHAHAHAHAHAHA. :) I hoped some people would like that. I had a stupid smile on my face when I added it.

I'm pretty sure all Gameboy games are region free.

Ha I bet you did. I spent last night playing kof95 thanks to your recent videos, my god I forgot about snk bosses, damn cheap lol, I just gave up in the end, but it was fun anyway, onto 96 for today.

That's good to know, yeah I figured they would be more relaxed about that stuff back then, as importing games/anime etc was far harder back in the day.

That was the main downside with SNK Fighters. The bosses were stupidly cheap.

Some time in the future I will cover mortal Kombat 3

Retro Core thanks all your battle of the ports are really cool I like the way when you switch the version it has really nice flowing in and out effect.

Thanks, Shadow Mewtwo Gaming HD.

Retro Core it’s quite alright

Play the US version next to the Japanese one and you'll see how different they are. The US version is awful in every possible way.

I don't doubt that at all, I'm just curious how you determine one is a port and one is emulation...

The sound isn't really off, a little muffled, but not as bad as people might claim it to be. I own a copy of it, and it's my preferred way of playing 95-97, much like the Nests one is my way of playing 99-01, and KoF 94 Rebout, my preferred way to play 94 (including keeping the old backgrounds with the cleaned up sprites, an option included in the remake of 94). The PS2 is also my preferred way of playing 02, 03, Neowave, 98 UM, 02 UM, and XI as well.

Yeah, I noticed that too. You'll also notice that the PS2 and Saturn have similar resolutions. More box like than TV like.

That's been around longer than KoF 96. Win with her in Fatal Fury 2, and if you win, she bounces there too. It's all about fanservice.

I love in the Hunt. Such a classic.

Oh yes, the PSX does have really low samples for speed and sound effects. It's so noticeable too on the video. I was going to mention it but didn't in the end.

Anyway it only states the superiority of Sega Saturn ports of these games. Sadly it didn't have a KOF98 or Real Bout 2 ports, they would be great.

It is very strange that the GB KOF games never made it state side considering how popular the Neo Geo was there.

Retro Core Correction: The US didn't get 96 on the gameboy. 95 WAS released here (Published by none other than Nintendo themselves).

That's a shame. '96 is so good.

I checked it on ebay, and I stand corrected. It's not like it was a limited release, either, it's readily available, cart only is usually around $15. I have no excuse, lol.

Takara really did a fantastic job on the GB games, especially this one.

The PS2 Orochi Hen does, it also allows for the arranged soundtracks to be used as well. It's what makes the SNK compilations on PS2 for their fighting games so awesome.

Yeah, that wouldn't do your Saturn cartridge port much good. He should have bought a 4 in 1 cartridge with automatic region protection and the expanded memory included. Mind you they were pretty expensive back in the day.

That happened to a friend of mine who didn't get his Saturn modded. The cartridge port wearing out is something I've heard happening to Saturn consoles.

We didn't even know such a thing existed back at that time :D

It does wear out and its pretty annoying.

There are two versions for the PS2. A Japanese one reprogrammed by SNK and a western release developed by someone else. The western release has all sorts of timing issues, loading, bad screen resolution and other problems. The Japanese version is pretty much perfect, has original or remixed audio and on-line play. May say that the US version is a poor emulation while the Japanese version was reprogrammed. To be honest though I seem to think that the Japanese version is emulated while the US version is reprogrammed. but apparently I'm wrong.

It sad that the Saturn never got 98 and 99. I guess if the Dreamcast wasn't around it mage have done so.

Eventually it will come.

That will be coming along with the special Dreamcast 3D remake.

KoF XI and NGBC play just fine for their US counterparts. I've played their arcade versions and find they perform the exact same on the US PS2 versions. I know Europe got screwed for them, but in the US, we weren't.

@@Bloodreign1 They may seem fine at a casual level, but they're not the exactly same. Back in the day when these games were still relevant tournament games, several competitive players compared all 3 versions and found a lot of issues with the us releases. The japanese versions on the other hand were found to be arcade perfect. The severity of the issues varies from game to game, with some of the compilation discs being the absolute worst. I get this stuff may not be important for casual players but I think it's still important to note for people looking for arcade perfect versions.

They were optimized, they just didn't feature progressive scan support but the game speed was correct

@@SK91NO Speed may be correct on many releases, but there are noticeable framedrops too on many of these. Like I said, quality varies and not all releases exhibit the exact same issues and some releases may be perfectly fine, but still there's a lot of these with issues.

Jon Campos boi St. Anger drums are a meme

I guess they knew it was going to be a yearly thing. The funny part is that KOF '96 came out on the PlayStation in '97.

Probably they cannot keep up with the schedule, making port is hard after all many code need change or compress so port game wont lose to arcade version, after all console motto back in the days is "play game in your home", but now "game in the go" or for short "portable game" aka Switch motto.

I know 2000 is pretty poor for music.

I don't think it has any ports besides the PS2.

The sample rates on the PlayStation are probably 22khtz, half of the other big consoles. I do love the GB music. Excelent stuff.

I have to agree with you there but there are some very nice 2D games on the PlayStation as well.

Hehe, I have popeye on the list. One day I'll get around to it.

The problem is not with the Saturn but the way my video capture card captures image from the Saturn's RGB output. On my TV it looks perfect.

What? They took out Mai? She's a main character. I lost interest aster KOF 2002. I felt the games were becoming boring and to be honest I think it was 2001 which was really crap.

Ah, the music follows the same rule as the Neo CD. It doesn't restart but more often than not skips to another section of the song.

The NGCD and PS1 ports work like that, but the Saturn port of 96 just restarts the song at each round in most stages

That was bad but in many cases it was one long wait then the game was ready.

On the surface they do look the same but look closer and there are differences. This video is more for the real hard core fans of the KOF.