King Of Fighters XV is out, still doesn't look as good as 24 year-old sprite art

rockpapershotgun.com:

The King Of Fighters made a mostly sucecssful leap to 3D with its last iteration, King Of Fighers XIV. King Of Fighters XV is out now and it looks even better - but I still miss the sprite art of old.

Here's the launch trailer for the new smack-'em-about:

It's been six years since KOF14 and KOFXV sounds like a suitably substantial followup given the wait. It's got 39 playable characters at launch, a story mode which apparently offers the climax of the series, and new Shatter Strike abilities during fights. I'm not expert enough in any fighting game to fully understand the ramifications of the latter, but I have enjoyed reading comments from players that say things like, "I wonder is it possible for Chars like Terry to combo from lights. i.e Cr.A xx Df.C xx Shatter Strike." Fighting games are great.

As I said above, I do like how KOFXV looks in 3D. The characters have bold poses, the backgrounds are atmospheric, and the camera is able to swoop in to make special moves extra impressive. But it's still not as good as this from KOF98:

I like the above image enough that ten years ago I got it professionally printed, but damn, it's hard to get low-res JPGs to look good when printed. The series kept up the high-quality background art into modern versions, too, with Dave (RPS in peace) raving about them in KOF13. I was in London on Thursday yep it looks like this.

Anyway. You probably play fighting games for the fighting, and KOFXV is apparently pretty good. It's out now on Steam and Epic for £50/€60/$60.