Samurai Shodown Anthology
Samurai Shodown Anthology, a compilation of games from the weapon-based fighting series. The complete collection of the Samurai Shodown series includes seven games: Samurai Shodown, I, II, III, IV, V, V Special and VI.
User Ratings and Reviews
5 Stars Oh, the nostalgia…
Upon receiving ‘SSA,’ I told my wife that I can’t begin to imagine how many quarters I pumped into SS and SS2 at the local arcade back in the early 90s. I have copies of SS 1-4 on my modded PS1 and Sega Saturn, but have been hoping that SNK would give this game the treatment the other three were given. Wish granted!
I do have to agree with another review in saying that the games don’t look too hot on an HDTV. As a matter of fact, the games that I play on the PS1 and Sega Saturn actually look better on those respective systems than the PS2, but I digress. I’m just thrilled to be able to not have to jump through all the hoops to play the games on a modified system.
The memories this game brings back for me merits a 5-star rating by itself. The fact that this is hands-down one of the best weapons-based strategy fighting games makes it a shoe-in for a 5-star rating. Thank you, SNK, for giving old-school gamers a blast from the past and give some new schoolers an opportunity to see where present games got their influences.
5 Stars Final Release of Samuria Shodown Anthology: Without V-Special!
PROS: All 6 of the game titles are perfect arcade match with awesome graphics and sweet soundtracks with amazing background 3D graphics on SSVI!
Each game title plays incredibly fast paced and the special abilities of each character are easily executable when attacking your opponent. The edit and spirit select modes are a super addition to the 6th game choosing how you want your Samurai to look and deciding how you want to focus your attack on with 8 separate spirit modes of play.
CONS: I felt that the opening introduction of the game title was a bit poor and cheaply done. They cheaply used EARTHQUAKE audio theme, and it feels like they rushed the Intro scene not giving it the true depth of what the games are really about. Also the ability to perform fatalities are almost impossible to execute on SS-1 through SS-3, and since the handbook that’s included does not have the special commands for it on each game title, you have to surf the internet looking for the special commands, and even then still, the commands may not work to cut your opponent in half. One more thing is some of the game titles after done playing the specific game title, you are unable to go back to the MAN MENU screen when you want to. I had to find myself rebooting my PS-2 because of this, perhaps losing some saved memory as well. One more thing, Samurai Shodown 5 Special is not on the disc, what gives man!? Did they forget something?
OVERALL: A GREAT GAME AND WORTHY OF A COLLECTION OF FIGHTING GAMES!
5 STARS ALL THE WAY!
5 Stars A Blast From The Past!
I was introduced to the Samurai Shodown series back in 1994 on the SNES system. By the time I got this, arcades in my area were being shut down. Now that meant, I had to settle for the SNES home version which I understood had the blood bursts and body halving taken out. I was dealing with a censored game but I still enjoyed it with friends. Like most people, I didn’t want to spend the money to get it for the NEO GEO system since it was so expensive.
Now, I heard that this was coming out and knew I had to get it - the six main titles in the series! When I turned it on, I noticed the BGM and it made me feel that I was watching and old Samurai movie. Gameplay is awesome as well. When you clash weapons there is a pause at times which adds to the realism of combat.
Now the blood bursts, body halving, and fatalities can be seen more in VS Mode than in Single Mode. Not sure why but it may be to keep the Teen rating. For anyone that’s curious about this, I’ll put it here - Blood Bursts only in SS1, Blood Bursts, and Body Halving in SS2 and SS3, Fatality like moves in SS4, SS5 only blood splashes, and SS6 no blood or fatalities at all.
You can see the progression of the series in this anthology. There are different gameplay differences like the BUST/SLASH move lists in SS3 and SS4. You also get the Rage Burst and Concentration One in SS5. In SS6, there is the Spirit system which allows you to customize your character. So, even without the blood and fatalities, the gameplay mechanics are solid. This anthology has plenty of replay value and for 14.99, how can you loose? VICTOLY!
5 Stars possibly the greastest 2d fighter ever
i recieved my copy this past friday.now to start with my only problem,this game looks like crap on hd.i have to switch sets to play and am considering buying a ps2 to save me the trouble.that being said i love the street fighter series but this rivals that game in every way like ryu to ken or hamohmaru to genjuro.as always the setting and atmosphere in all the games on this disc are great,the art,the colors and the music.the variety of fighters and the diffrent styles.and unlike alot of other anthologies i played you may want to go back and actually play the other 5 games even though 6 has everyone on it.i skip around between all 6 titles alot.some may look down on 2d titles as ancient but moving this to a 3d format may work if done right but it`s great this way too.highly highly recommened,esp at this price 14.99 defintion of a steal.
4 Stars It is what I was waiting for!
Lets be clear, Im a Samurai Shodown fan, all games from Samurai Shodown series seem excellent for me, and I think this anthology is aimed to people like me, that loves Shamurai Shodown.
So I will not talk about how cool the games are, if you are looking for this Anthology, you probably know what this games are about, I will talk about the port from arcade to console.
The ports from all games are very well executed, there are some things missing and there is why I have taken one star.
For Samurai Shodown 1 and 2 it seems that some fatalities are or taken out or diminished in the time that they show up, in SS1 you just see the arterial spray fatality, thats it, and in SS2 I haven seen any fatality at all, but I have read in forums that they happen but are very rare to happen, making them more “special” but for to me is just a change from the original game and a flaw to the port.
For SS3 I havent played that game that much in the time they were on arcades and I havent played too much in this anthology, still the game looks like a nice port.
For SS4, that game I played long hours on arcade, use to have a import for the play station 1, and I can say that this port is just perfect, all animations, all fatalities, sound and graphics incredible.
For the SS5 and SS6, I was just not familiar with them, but have read that they where perfectly ported here.
No Samurai Shodown 5 special to be seen in this anthology.
There are some options for arrange and original sound, I just use arrange since is a sound with better quality and is just fine.
There are no graphic option to remove the soft filter games from 1 to 5 have, and thats a shame since I have a HDTV and I prefer to take those filters out, the manual says that there is a option to take the filter out, but is no where to be seen on the final product, so that could be a miss and its annoying given all the time this game took to came into the stores.
There are other option to change characters colors for all the games, and the manual is not very clear on how to call this color variations into the game you are playing, I will try to make it clear, you modify the character colors, save and then in their respective game (lets say you modified Ukio form SS1) you hiightlight the character and whit the SELECT button pressed + any button that selects the character, then you select the character in the color variation you made.
Its fun to have your own colors, since in some of the games the alternate colors are not so cool as the main color.
Well After all there are all those games some in almost perfect port, others in perfect port, they are a lot of fun to play and a life time to master, given the price they have you better get a copy now, even more if you are a Samurai Shodown fan like me.