At the height of KOFXIV popularity, and when all fans were thinking about what next project SNK will tackle, no one could guess that the next game will be a female only tag team fighter. Fast forward to today and we have SNK Heroines Tag Team Frenzy. Those of you who are not familiar with SNK’s back catalogue, SNK Heroines is not the first game to offer an all female cast. Back in early 2000, the Neo Geo Pocket was the home of SNK Gal Fighters. But one thing for sure, SNK Heroines is not the sequel to that title.

I have had the last few days to play the game and try all its little things, to be able to give you a fair taste of what the game is about and whether it is worth getting or not. Those hoping the game is a contender for best fighting game of the year will be disappointed. SNK Heroines is more of Party game than a serious fighter. This does not mean that it can’t be techy at times.

Presentation:

Much like the roster, SNK Heroines’ presentation is quite simple. The game does not offer any sort of intro, instead you are greeted by the game title followed by a selection of the package offers. You have a story Mode, Battle mode which includes versus and training, Online, Customization, Data and Options.

The artwork of SNK Heroines is a beauty. The sexy ladies are well drawn, and the ending artwork is stunning. Something you can always expect from the lead game artist Eisuke Ogura whose resume is full of awesome SNK game art pieces.

SNK Heroines uses the graphics engine of KOFXIV. And if that same engine did not look great in 2016, imagine how it will be received today. Yep! SNK Heroines graphics look way outdated. Even though SNK has tried polishing it and cranking up colors and contrast as well as adding a tiny bit of cel shading, the result still leaves a lot to be desired.

What helps the graphics look acceptable is the tons of items, sparkles, and zany things popping from special moves and hits. These flashy items, while can be too much and distracting, kind of hide the ugly truth about how outdated the engine looks.

The music of SNK Heroines Tag Team Frenzy is a gem! The game offers a number of songs in Japanese, and remakes of character themes that are beautifully done.

Characters:

Unlike SNK Gal Fighters, SNK Heroines does not bring fighters from different SNk franchises but instead focuses solely on The King Of Fighters. All the female fighters, with the exception of Shermie and Female Terry, have been present in KOFXIV. That is about to change when the first DLC character will release later this week. The game offers a selection of 14 sexy looking ladies who are all in some skimpy, over sexualized outfits. A rather small roster for any modern game.

Story:

Whether SNk Heroines has a cannon story remains to be seen. It is implied however that the events of the game take place right after the finale of The King Of Fighters XIV. Various female fighters hav disappeared and find themselves prisoners in Kukri’s dream dimension. The rest of the story is light hearted, quirky, and mostly silly fun. Kukri’s behavior is nothing like his KOF counterpart. He comes here as perverted weirdo who likes to put women in sexy outfits, watch them and takes pictures of them while he sits and drinks his Moroccan tea. His whole intention is to feed his dream world with the little ladies’ despair so that he can take over the real world as well…Yeah i know it doesn’t make sense at all.

As you progress through the game, you get these short cutscenes between each match giving you a look at Kukri’s twisted mind. Once you defeat all the SNK gals, you then take on Kukri (Who looks like he just jumped from KOFXIV for the match). Once Kukri is defeated, you get to watch the ending for your selected characters. The endings are beautifully illustrated images that range from heart warming to just plain zanny. Yet the level of fan service and easter eggs in these endings is beyond anything we have see from SNK which was a great welcome.

You can watch all the endings in our SNK Heroines Endings playlist (Beware Spoilers)

Gameplay:

Here is where things are really interesting. SNK Heroines is a Tag Team game. Meaning you choose two characters that you play with. The attacker, is your first character to start the match with, and you can then tag in your second character and let your attacker rest and recover some spirit. Both characters share the same health and spirit bar. As you use special moves your spirit bar gets depleted (think of it like the early Art of Fighting games). In order to recharge it for a specific character you will need to tag her out and use your second gal fighter.

The part that will certainly confuse anyone who is used to fighting games is how you defeat your opponent. Depleting their health bar is not enough. In a very strange turn of event, you can only defeat your oponnent by hitting them with a super move at the end of the match.

Controls are also interesting. First of all, you character cannot duck. Now that we put that out of the way, SNK heroines uses most of your controller pad buttons. You have a punch button, a kick button, a special button, a throw button, and guard button. Supers are also activated by pressing R1, while tagging in/out is done by R2. The R3 stick is also used to use the different items that your character picks during a fight. These little things can help overturn the flow of a match. Items include things like a wooden wall, a bomb, and slippery substance, or even Goro Daimon himself who jumps in shakes the ground and disappears.

Special moves are all done using the circle button and a directional input. For example most fireballs are done by just pressing circle. Dragon punch moves are done by pressing down and circle, etc. While i understand how the easy inputs can be welcoming to new gamers and people looking for some fast action, i can’t help by wonder why did SNK not include an optional normal control mode for old school fighting game fans. We know that SNK will be releasing a day 1 patch with fightstick support, but we are not sure what it includes.

When i started using this new controle scheme i was quickly thrown off by how easy and scrubby it feels. However, after sticking with it for about an hour i quickly realized that i judged the book by its cover, because as as simple as the control are, the game can be quite techy and technique and startegy are reqiured to win the game.

In fact i really appreciate how SNK was able to make the gameplay both incredely easy for new comers but also deep and stretegic for veterans of the genre. But there is still that grumpy feeling i have from being an SNK player since the first Fatal fury, and i still hope we get conventional control option with the Day 1 patch.

Longetivity:

Customization is a huge part of SNK Heroines. As you progress through the game you earn ingame currency which you can spend on new costumes, accessories, or just uncloing artwork and endings. The customzation ranges from having your character wear glasses, or have freckles, up to having her get a cat tail. Check our video below that shows the extent of the customization options available in SNK Heroines.

While customization will clearly let fans try out and test different items and attributes, it really does not add much to the game’s longetivity. As it stands SNK Heroines is quite barebone. The roster is small and the game modes are limited. Once you finish the game with all characters, and unlock, the not so many, pieces of artwork and movies, there is really not much else to do as a single player, which means online life cycle of the game will be the make or break of the game’s longetivity.

Online:

What would a game be in this day and age without online features. Much like all recent fighting games, SNK Heroines Tag Team Frenzy ovver online play. But the options are quite limited. First there is no ranked matches. You can choose between Quick match or Room Search/Creation.

With the limited matches i could find it is diffciult to judge how good or bad the netcode is. But for what i could see it is in similar vein to KOFXIV. Meaning it is good with people relatively close to you, and it is a sl-mo fest when they are a bit far. Time will tell whether Online will be populated enought ot test the netcode properly. But in terms of modern fighting games, SNK Heroines Online is as abrebone as the entire package.

Summary:

SNK Heroines is a strange title to review. It is not a true fighting game, yet it has the depths of one, and it is not a full party game, yet it has the fun, simplicity and look of one. It is a new blend that can bee seen either as newcomers friendly fun game or an in depth strategy heavy one. The small roster is definitely a strange choice, and unfortunately, kinds of show the game was never a priority for SNK, but maybe just a gme to release in between two important titles. Graphics are are disappointing and look quite outdated, and even with an extensive customization capabilities the game still feels barebone and not finished.

It is undeniable that the game can have deep gameplay tech! But with  the small roster, bland graphics, and limited game modes, it will be intersting to see the longetivity of the game online. As it stands now, SNK Heroines seems like a filler game targetting mostly the hardcore SNK fan who wants to own all the company’s games, or curious newcomers who wants to see overly sexualized anime girls throwing candies and sparkles at each other, and just have a fun party game session.

SNK Heroines will be released on September 7th on both PS4 and Nintendo Switch. This review is based on the PS4 Version of the game.