I love Killer Instinct, my childhood in gaming revolves around KI 1 and KI2/Gold.
In my youth when i happened across the first game on the Snes it blew my little world wide open. Through KI's theme and dark tone i was introduced to the type of music i'd come to love and enjoy and the style of tone that i'd come to feel most comfortable with. KI one was the first 'dark' and 'edgy' game i played. I could only play it during the day at first, the music would creep me out on the character select menu and the fights would feel a bit too violent with characters like Riptor tearing into you (his stage music freaked me out too). I was never any good at it, it never came with a manual or the CD when i bought it, but i came to learn the moves myself with the amount of playing and experimenting i did with it.
Years later i'd go on holiday with my grandparents and i still remember seeing the KI2 arcade machine for the first time. I never left that thing, i'd play it every day, my grandparents were happy to play the 2p machines and i was happy to spend of all of my money and all of their winning playing KI2, the new theme blew me away, the graphics made the characters i had come to love truly feel alive, its was darker, more violent, more scary and extreme in every way, in the time since playing KI1 i had played Mortal Kombat and Street fighter and Tekken and none of them had matched the fuzzy love i had for KI1, and after playing KI2 i knew that no other fighting game would ever approach it for me in my opinion.
I continued to play it and every holiday my grandparents took every other month would see me going with them to play KI2 at the arcade, Orchid would become the second female game character that i'd become attracted to (first being Rinoa of FF8 fame) and i'd use her religiously followed by Fulgore and Spinal, i really truly came to love these characters and they took on their own lives in my head as they continued to inspire me.
Then i got an n64 and hunted out KI Gold, while it was a massively downgraded version of the Arcade version with less violence and polish i still loved it more than i'd loved any other game in the past.... then as the years went on, and the consoles changed and Rare left nintendo i swore that if KI ever showed up again i'd buy that console to play that game. As the era of DLC crept in i would think of KI and that if it were ever to be released it'd be the only game i'd ever hunt the DLc out for just to have all of it, to continue my love life in gaming... i had all but given up hope when former Rare workers said that KI3 would most likely never happen and that very few of the people who worked on KI 1 and Gold under nintendo were left under Microsoft's ironfist.
My hope died and i gave up on ever seeing KI3, but when i heard the announcement of an historic Rare IP coming to Xbone my mind instantly flashed the KI letters, i said no and moved on thinking it'd be another banjo-kazooie game or maybe even Perfect Dark, either way, it wouldn't be KI3... and then it was.
I've done some reading on the production of the game and those responsible for bringing KI back stress that KI3 is a tribute to the series for the fans...
There is a problem with that though, because if you want to make a tribute to a video game that had its own identity, you dont let the morons at Netherealms (responsible for Mortal Kombat) try to clone Street fighter 4.
When i saw Not-Jago, i said 'that isn't Jago, he looks like a reject from Mortal Kombat' then the credits rolled on the devs... whatever is left of Rare really didnt feel present in the KI3 announcement and the fight screened at E3 left a lot to be desired. I never thought that KI would return as a clunky looking 2D fighter since KI2/Gold had very strong leanings towards 3D.
Its kind of sad that after so long and so many halcyon memories of being truly happy with a game that i never thought would return, that its big return has resulted in it being a clone of both of its rivals in Mortal Kombat and Street fighter. I'll recognise portions of characters i used to love, i'll remember the music and the announcer and recognise versions of them in KIXbone but it wont be KI, it'll be a title stuck on a clone game that others who wish they'd made that original game have made to keep themselves happy.
Essentially to me; Rare let netherrealms have a title and characters that vaguely resemble something they used to be to make street fighter 4 with... all i want from KIXbone is the music, at least the main theme, which is the only thing that seems to have survived.
And all of this is before i start to talk about the console it is actually on, one of the creepiest, most expensive and demanding consoles there will ever likely be in the Xbox One, perhaps i'd have bought KIXbone were it on the 360, in fact, i know i would have, would i have enjoyed it considering netherrealms and what is left of Rare made it? Probably not, sheer loyalty to a title would have urged me to buy it and hunt out the dlc even if that meant dragging my 360 to a friend's house to get it. i'd have felt disappointed in the game for being nothing more than SF4 with a vague KI skin by the muppets who make MK but i'd have given it its chance. the Xbone though, will not be getting any money even if it has the one title ive ever truly loved in gaming, bad timing, bad console, bad game... probably.
... and then there is the business model release tactic theyre going after.... good luck with that guys, you killed KI for those slight few that still cared. C-c-c-c-c-combo breaker indeed. :-/
Ah, what the hell, let's have one for the road; as i always used to say 'that is really gonna hurt... when he wakes up form his coma'
[video=youtube;Ae0OzQ5hbJE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ae0OzQ5hbJE[/video]