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Profile
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Profile
General: The third, and last installment to the AOF series, brings back and highlights all of the aspects and features that made AOF stand out since it's debut. Character sprites are bigger then ever, and now move with very fluid animation, even during the fight (for once). AOF3 definitely wins the title of "the biggest AND most fluid 2D character animation" in any game... Still to this day. Although "big" doesn't necessarily mean better. Capcom later showed us this with SFIII... Definitely "one-upping" AOF3's animation.
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Still, the
game's visuals are something to behold. The new high-res backgrounds look
excellent, and the scrolling effect used in the first two games is back
and also looks smoother. The gameplay was tweaked with brand new combo
system, which is the best gameplay to come from the series thus far. Combos
and such work well, and although many of the moves look great, I noticed
some of the "hit effects" actually don't make much sense. For example,
Robert's spinning backfist actually "launches." That's a technique that
should simply knock down or stagger your opponent, not send them flying
10 feet into the air... 
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Disappointing
to some, including myself, the only two returning AOF characters are (you
guessed it) Ryo and Robert,
as they are joined by an all new cast of colorful characters, which are
supposed to "take the place" of some of the classics; but definitely
don't have the awe or lasting appeal as the originals. This is probably
the biggest downside of AOF3, and the cast has a rather "lonely" feeling.
Where's Yuri? Is she dead? Where's
Takuma... Hell, it would be great
to even see Jack, the drunk from
AOF1. And what about finally bringing back Todoh?
*sniffle*
AOF3 seems
to be concentrated more on good animations and new characters, and it would
appear that SNK "ran out of room" on the good ol' Neo Geo cartridge from
all of that data. Perhaps they simply didn't have any room for any more
characters... And the one's that were stuck with have much to be desired.
I truly think this game would have been better had more classic AOF characters
returned... Or maybe if they threw in a KOF character or two!
Manufacturer: SNK
Platforms: Neo
Geo
Release: 1996
Characters:
Ryo,
Robert,
Rody,
Kasumi,
Wang,
Lenny,
Karman,
Jin
Fuha,
Sinclair,
Wyler
Related Games:
Art of Fighting, Art of Fighting
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Closing Comment:
A step in the right direction for the series... Somewhat. For fans of the
series, that clunky feeling gameplay is still evident, at least
one trait that has been loyal to the series. But for some reason I'd still
prefer going back to AOF or AOF2 for the characters alone, even if the
gameplay engine is older and... slllooowwweeer. ~F.Yagami,
Webmaster
of TFG