The Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves Beta Has Me Worried for the Full Release

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The Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves beta has flopped terribly, which is disappointing. Despite the core gameplay appearing quite enjoyable with its intricate, rich mechanics, there’s a chance SNK’s newest fighting game could become a blockbuster hit. Regrettably, various aspects associated with this beta have dampened my excitement and raised concerns about the final product’s release.

In this game titled “City of Wolves”, players were given an opportunity to interact with a total of eight characters from the initial roster. Characters like Rock Howard, Terry Bogard, and Mai Shiranui, long-standing series favorites, as well as the widely appreciated newcomer Preecha, were included. To facilitate gameplay, they provided online, ranked, and custom lobbies, along with a helpful tutorial mode for beginners.

Instead of being one large failure, the COTW beta struggled due to multiple issues. To start, finding a suitable match took an excessively long time, ranging from mere seconds if fortunate, to several minutes. This delay was often followed by a match with a player who appeared to be on another continent, resulting in a lag of over 250ms, making the game nearly unplayable.

In simpler terms, your backup plan was to participate in a personalized game room (it’s true that regular matches were almost non-existent from the start). For the most part, these rooms functioned great if you could get into them. However, I encountered at least two instances where I couldn’t join a room for no clear reason. This might have been an isolated incident or perhaps not a common issue, but it happened to me.

An incident happened when I attempted to enter streamer Brian_F’s lobby for a game, as I found myself matched frequently with the same player and their 300ms connection during ranked queueing, leading to this situation.

Critics found navigating the user interface to be another point of contention. As a person with Street Fighter 6 as my recent experience in fighting games, even I find Capcom’s intricate and complex menu system for its genre-leading title hard to navigate. Thus, I echo the complaints about COTW’s user interface.

Although City of the Wolves initially appears sleek and stylish, it seems cumbersome and sluggish to maneuver. Beyond the main menu, the overall feel of the menus appears uninspired, as if you’re viewing draft designs rather than the final product. Given its release date is just around the corner in less than two months, one wouldn’t expect such a perception.

As a gamer, it’s hard to ignore the glaring absence of a training room in this setup. For example, when Capcom released the Street Fighter 6 betas, they provided an online training mode while players waited for a cabinet match in the Battle Hub. It would be great if something similar could be implemented here.

Users decided to join an underpopulated game server for uninterrupted practice. Regrettably, enabling the training room feature allowed some mischievous players to break into the beta version, thereby gaining early and extended access to the mode and all beta characters, well ahead of the official release.

It’s possible that SNK didn’t include a specific training mode for reasons that are still unconfirmed. However, it’s worth noting that some players have managed to access training features even during the beta phase.

In simpler terms, SNK has expressed readiness for another open beta test prior to the game’s launch in late April. This means they need to organize the test within the coming weeks, allowing developers only a brief period to address the problems players have pointed out.

Indeed, despite the challenges we’ve encountered so far, I am convinced that City of the Wolves is fundamentally an outstanding combat game. The beta has sparked my curiosity, leaving me eager to delve deeper into the defensive and offensive techniques this game offers.

Moving from feints and stops to create more effective combination moves, as well as adjusting my defense strategically using Just Defense and Hyper Defense, there are numerous tactics at my disposal that make me yearn for SNK to address the remaining issues in the game City of the Wolves.

On April 21st coming up, Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves is set to launch! You’ll find it on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, or your computer through Steam.

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2025-02-24 21:13