King Of Fighters '97, The

This game ends the Orochi storyline.

Before choosing their fighters, the player has to choose whether to play in Extra or Advanced mode. Extra is the "classic" mode, featuring the attack dodge from '94 and '95 as well as the ability to manually charge the super meter. When the player's life is low they gained infinite Desperation Moves, and low life along with a full super meter allows a Super Desperation Move.

Advanced mode works a bit more like Street Fighter. As the player lands attacks, the super bar will go up. When the bar is filled, a dot will appear next to the bar. Up to three dots can be stored. The player can then either use a stored dot to perform a Desperation Move or go into Max Mode. While in Max Mode, the player can deal more damage and perform a Super Desperation Move.

There are three boss fights in this game. After beating the other teams, you must face "Riot of Blood" Iori. You will only face RoB Leona if "normal" Iori is in your party. You will then fight the "Orochi" version of the New Faces Team (always in the order of Chris, Shermie, then Yashiro). You then face Orochi himself.

A like/dislike system has been added for Advanced mode. The way it works is you can press C while choosing a character or fighter order to see how that fighter feels about the one just chosen. A yellow smiley face means the fighter likes the other one, and grey/white blank face means they are indifferent, and a red angry face means hatred. If a fighter is defeated the following happens to the super meter depending on the like factor:

• If the next fighter likes the one just defeated, a dot is gained when the next round starts.
• If the next fighter is indifferent towards the one just defeated, nothing happens.
• If the next fighter hates the one just defeated, a dot is taken away when the next round starts.

So for example, if Iori is beaten in a round and Kyo is the next fighter up, the player will lose a dot from the super meter because the two hate each other.

Playing as Orochi Iori: at the character select screen, press and hold Start button, then move the stick Left, Right, Left, Right, Left, Right and then press AC buttons, while holding Start. Orochi Iori's selection frame should appear. Playing as Orochi Leona: after doing the trick for Orochi Iori, still at the character select screen, press and hold Start, then move the joystick Up, Down, Up, Down, Up, Down and then press BD buttons, while holding Start. Orochi Leona's selection frame should appear. Playing as the Orochi New Faces Team: after doing the trick for both Orochi Iori and Leona, at the character select screen, press and hold Start, move the joystick Up, Left, Down, Right, Up, Down and then press BC buttons. The selection frames for Orochi Yashiro, Orochi Chris and Orochi Shermie should appear.

The '97 Team Special was created as a mail-in contest by SNK. Fans were able to vote for what character they would most like to see in the next KOF game, and the three winners would be made into a team. Yamazaki, Mary, and Billy (all from Fatal Fury) won.

The Iori Team and Team Evil are gone. Iori is now a single competitor as is newcomer Shingo. The New Faces Team and the '97 Team Special have been added. Kasumi has left the Ladies team and is replaced by Chizuru (who is now much weaker than in the last game).

Both "normal" and "Orochi" versions of the New Faces Team exist. Each version of the fighters has a completely different set of special and desperation moves.

"Riot of Blood" versions of Iori and Leona exist. Unlike the New Faces, however, they are simply sped-up versions of their normal counterparts.

First appearance of the New Faces (Yashiro Nanakase, Shermie, and Chris both in their "normal" and "Orochi" versions), "Riot of Blood" Iori, "Riot of Blood" Leona, Shingo Yabuki, and Orochi.

Even if the computer mixes up the teams, the New Faces Team will always be together.

NEO-GEO MVS TECHNICAL SPECS

Main ---- CPU: Motorola 68000 at 12 MHz RAM: 64 KB

Sound ----- CPU: Zilog Z80 CPU at 6 MHz FM synthesizer: Yamaha YM2610 at 8 MHz Z80 RAM: 2 KB

Graphics -------- Resolution: 304x224 Colors: 4096 Video RAM: 68 KB