NeoGeo Battle Coliseum Sequel Reportedly In The Works

Here’s an exciting rumor for SNK fans: a sequel to 2005’s NeoGeo Battle Coliseum is reportedly in the works.

This rumor was first reported by King of Fighters World, who says information about the alleged title was detailed in a series of images and Japanese text. There isn’t much to go on thus far, but here is what some of what the site had to say on the matter:

“…the game will feature cell shaded graphics similar to Guilty Gear Xrd, or the upcoming Dragon Ball Fighter Z. From the story side, it seem SNK is trying to come up with a coherent story, something that the first game lacked. [In this rumored sequel], a mysterious character is trying to gather powers from all the famous SNK characters throughout history, and so warriors from different times and locations will gather to fight this unknown force.”

This should clearly be taken with a grain of salt, but its hard not to be at least be a little excited about it — especially if you’re a fan of any of SNK’s franchises.

To those of you unaware, NeoGeo Battle Coliseum is essentially SNK’s version of Capcom Fighting Evolution (known as Capcom Fighting Jam in the West), originally debuting on arcades in Japan in 2005 before being released worldwide on the PlayStation 2 between 2005 and 2007. The game’s roster is made up of characters from titles such as The King of Fighters, Samurai Shodown and Fatal Fury, and battles are done in a 2-on-2 tag format with the curious stipulation of only needing to defeat one member of the opponents team when doing single player.

Right now, the one thing that stands out is the artistic style shifting once again from the traditional 2D. Up until The King of Fighters XIV, all of SNK’s fighters featured essentially the same art style (with obvious improvements as time went on). However, it appears that this game will adopt the cel-shaded graphics that’s typically used by Arc System Works in titles such as BlazBlue and Guilty Gear.

Of course, this artistic shift doesn’t necessarily hurt the validity of the rumor, especially when SNK already stated it was looking into making other games from its Neo Geo library, but it is a bit eye-catching.

In any case, there isn’t much else to say about this potential development until SNK chimes in. As for when it might choose to do so? PlayStation Experience in December would be the time for a potential reveal. KOF XIV was featured heavily at past Experience events, so there’s not much reason why it wouldn’t do the same with NeoGeo Battle Coliseum.

Here’s to hoping this is real and not just someone playing with our hearts.