SNES Version
Good lord this game sucks.
I've gotten a fair amount from this game, but I'm not entirely sure it's everything. However, there's only so much I can force myself to play the worst version of an already janky game, so please content yourself with more obsessive picking into the FF1 SNES port than anyone ever asked for in the first place.
US-Japan Differences
Most of these aren't super interesting, but here you go:
- Takara Amusement Co logo screen in the Japanese version, the pictured backstory spiel in the US. There's some neat bits in there - "Southtown City" is something the place gets called occasionally in the first few years in English and Japanese, and they got "deadly combat" past Nintendo. It's a nice little touch for kids that didn't read the manual.
- Different title screens. Interestingly, the US one loses the "The King of Fighters" subtitle, while the Japanese one keeps "The Battle of Destiny".
- Both menu screens are in English, but the US version adds (1P) and (1P vs 2P) comments to Champion Battle and Street Fight, respectively.
- US version adds a simple "WAITING!" screen in the round start/end font during the load times. Yes, the load times.
- Michael Max doesn't cross himself in the US version, which is kind of bizarre considering how many references to killing the game got away with. Murder: good. Catholicism: bad.
- The Japanese version has transparent portraits on the vs screen like the arcade version. The US version uses the boxed black background portraits from the win screen. 7.A non-difference: every region uses the Japanese arcade special move motions.
Neo Geo-SNES Win Quote Differences
These are on a different page than the rest because, uh...they get weird. Weird in a way that's hard to just add to a table.
| Neo Geo | SNES |
|---|---|
| I won't lose until I avenge my father's death. | I cannot lose until I take revenge for my father's death. |
| He was not much of a fighter despite his ugly face. | He was not much of a fighter despite his mean face. |
| Did you think you could beat me? Go home! | Did you think you could beat me?! Go home! |
| I'll beat Geese easily with my skill and technique! | I will beat Geese easily with my skills & techniques. |
| I got you! Sleep forever! Ha,ha! | I got you!! Sleep there forever!! Ha ha ha... |
Like, for instance, Terry stealing Joe's line. And it's straight up stolen, I never saw this line out of Joe. It's there in English and Japanese, suggesting whatever went wrong happened at the source. I considered it might be that Takara jammed all the main character's quotes into one pool, but given I consistently saw all of them pick from a set, that seems unlikely.
It's also interesting that I never saw the first or third lines out of Terry in the English version, but I did see them in Japanese. Since I saw every other mixed-up line in both, I'm just going to assume I got unlucky and they are in Terry's set somewhere, but I could be wrong. I did see the lines eventually...but not out of Terry.
Otherwise, we see the usual SNES light editing. Most of the lines are cleaned up slightly to sound a bit better in English. One and four sound a bit more formal than I'd expect out of Terry, but that's some nitpicking.
| Neo Geo | SNES |
|---|---|
| Where on earth is GEESE HOWARD? | Where on earth is Geese Howard?! |
| OK! Now it's my turn. I'll knock out the next guy with one punch!! | OK! Now it's my turn. I'll knock out the next guy with one punch!! |
| I won't lose until I avenge my father's death. | I cannot lose until I take revenge for my father's death. |
| I wanna be the strongest guy in the world like my dad by becoming the winner of this tournament. | I wanna be the strongest guy in the world like my dad by becoming the winner of this tournament. |
Andy really steals? No dignity.
Line three is stolen from Terry, line 4 is stolen from Joe. It's lucky that Jeff also won a KoF, though I don't know if anyone besides Terry ever considered him "strongest in the world".
Andy's remaining two lines don't change much. The all-caps is dropped in the first one, but the other is untouched.
| Neo Geo | SNES |
|---|---|
| All right, I'll be champ if I can keep up this rhythm. Ha ha! | All right, I'll be champ if I can keep up this rhythm. Ha ha! |
| Hmm....you're strong, the strongest of all the guys I've beaten. | Whew...You are strong! You are the strongest man among all of the guys who I have beaten. |
| Did you think you could beat me? Go home! | Did you think you could beat me?! Go home! |
| Darn, I almost lost. It was a good experience to fight against you. | Whew!! I almost lost. It was a good experience for me to fight |
Joe nabs line three from Terry and line four from Andy. Line four is cuts off at the end and it doesn't look like character limits...copy-paste error? It also gets edited to remove a very mild swear, which continues to be weird considering how much they talk about Geese killing Jeff in this game. Murder: good. Minced oaths: bad.
The second line gets expanded and I'm not sure why. Perhaps someone thought just saying "the strongest" sounded weird and wanted to attach it to a noun?
| My translation | Official translation |
|---|---|
| It sounds like you're looking for Geese, kid, so you should be real careful... He's strong! | Hey man, I hear you're looking for GEESE. Be careful, I hear he's real strong! |
Raiden gets a completely new win quote in English and Japanese, which is very strange. Most opponents completely lost one of their unique quotes moving to the SNES, but Raiden lost his "I enjoy the sound of cracking bones." quote but then replaced it with this. (I assume, since I never saw it out of anyone else)
It's a pretty straight translation, though the English oddly brings back the all-caps GEESE. I wonder why and how that happened.
SNES Endings
The SNES version adds extra character-specific endings for all the mains. It's a nice touch.
| My translation | Official translation |
|---|---|
| F-Finally I avenged my father... | I've finally avenged by father's death. |
| From now on, I'll follow in my father's footsteps to become the strongest man in the world!! | From now on, I'm aiming to become the most powerful fighter,something my father could not achieve. |
Terry's is the most changed of the endings. The first line is pretty much the same, but Japanese Terry thinks Jeff was the strongest and wants to be just like him, but English Terry wants to surpass Jeff and expresses this with a hella burn on the dead. This seems to be an error mixing the the Super Famicom script up with the Megadrive script, because it is a good translation for that ending. I suspect the Genesis version got translated first and the SNES version was based off that.
| My translation | Official translation |
|---|---|
| I did it! I avenged my father! | I did it! I've taken my father's revenge! |
| Next, beating Terry!! Terry, where are you!? | I'm going to beat Terry next! Terry, where are you? |
Can beat Geese, but not Terry: Andy Bogard's story of failure.
Anyway, in contrast to Terry's ending Andy's is so straight everything ended up basically the same. There's just not that many ways to handle simple lines like this. "I've taken my father's revenge" is super literal, that's all I got.
| My translation | Official translation |
|---|---|
| This means I'm the world's strongest!? | So this is the strongest fighter in the world hah,no way! |
| No way! There's gotta be a stronger guy out there! | There's gotta be someone stronger who can challenge me! |
Meanwhile Joe heads out to look for Krauser.
So my emulator kind of messed up on Joe's ending. I got the second line from the wonderful VG Museum, which has been an absolutely invaluable resource when I don't feel like playing a game to see the English ending.
Joe's ending shows some neat rephrasing across the lines, but changes the first one a bit. He's not talking about Geese in Japanese, just himself. It works, though.