King of Fighters: All Star
THE KING OF COMBOS. Free with IAP
FIGHTING GAMES HAVE been somewhat of a mixed bag on mobile. Some titles have attempted to map actions to swipes or taps, while others have used on screen controls, with both options failing to match the precision of a physical controller. SNK, developers of the extraordinarily popular King of Fighters series, has decided to forgo creating a traditional fighting game, instead introducing its wide character roster into a mission-based beat-em-up.
As a result, punches, kicks and combos have been separated into on-screen buttons – like mobile MOBAs, there’s a button for a standard attack, with combo specials on cooldown timers. Matching up your cooldowns and stringing the right moves and attacks together with your placement is key, with enemies at higher levels tending to swarm you and bosses trapping you if you aren’t paying attention. You can have up to three fighters in your party, and in multiplayer modes you’re fighting in real-time against your opponents.
One of the most obvious things when booting up the game is the sheer, unadulterated polish that’s gone into the experience. If you have a reasonably high-end phone, you can download an extra couple of gigabytes and get one of the smoothest, cleanest and most responsive brawlers on mobile. The graphics are very clean and detailed, the game runs at a very high and consistent framerate, including during the multiplayer modes, where split second response is essential when combos and specials are flying all over the screen.
The structure of the game is like most other “gacha” titles – you get fighters at random, they have special levels and moves, as well as star grades. I’m personally not a fan of this style, mainly because you tend to spend more time in menus and fussing with pointless grading and upgrade systems than enjoying the game. But KOF: AS tends to be a little less fussy than most, and it’s really a lot of fun playing with different fighters and their pros and cons.
If you enjoyed games like Streets of Rage or Final Fight back in the old days, you’ll get a kick out of this one.