Between 19, SNK produced a grand total of 23 stand-alone arcade games. Riding high on the success of Vanguard, SNK shifted its focus solely toward the development and licensing of video games.
Perhaps SNK should thank Rambo for making Ikari Warriors such a huge hit.
The man chosen to run SNK's American operation was none other than John Rowe, eventual founder of Tradewest and current president and CEO of Sammy Studios. The company established itself in a tiny office in Sunnyvale, California (near San Jose), with the intent of delivering its own unique brand of coin-operated games to arcades all across North America. On October 20, 1981, SNK Corporation of America was born. SNK licensed the game to Centuri for distribution in North America but ultimately started manufacturing and distributing the game itself when profits exceeded expectations. Things took a turn for the better with 1981's Vanguard, a side-scrolling space shoot-'em-up that many people consider the precursor to modern genre staples such as Konami's Gradius and Irem's R-Type. The first two titles out of SNK's coin-op division were Ozma Wars (1979), a vertically scrolling space shoot-'em-up, and Safari Rally (1980), a maze game with little noteworthy value save for the fact that "Shin Nihon Kikaku" was spelled out on the copyright notice. Shortly thereafter, noticing the rapid growth that was occurring in the coin-operated video game sector, Kawasaki expanded the company's endeavors to include the development and marketing of stand-alone coin-operated games.
#SNK ARCADE MACHINE SOFTWARE#
Initially, the company's purpose was to design and produce software and hardware components for a variety of business clients. SNK (short for Shin Nihon Kikaku, or "New Japanese Project") Electronics Corp., the brainchild of Eikichi Kawasaki, set up shop in Osaka, Japan, in July 1978. Without these fine people, the story of SNK could not have been told.īefore all of the name changes, before the NeoGeo, and long before the company became known for its King of Fighters and Metal Slug games, SNK was just another startup trying to gain a foothold in the burgeoning video game craze of the early 1980s. The author would like to give credit to Andrew Alfonso, Chad Okada, Ben Herman, Shawn McCleskey, Kenny Perry Jr., Stuart Reynolds, Michael Shaver, and SnairDogg for their help with and input in this article, as well as to the fans of SNK and the NeoGeo all over the world who continue to show their undying love for the company's systems and games. The following sections document the entire 25-year history of the company-from it's founding in 1978, to the golden era of the early 1990s, through the unfortunate bankruptcy in 2001, and up to the present day. This History of SNK is an attempt to change all of that. Some people aren't aware that SNK actually went out of business in 2001 or that the company is back today as SNK Playmore. The average game player might recognize King of Fighters or Metal Slug or have a vague recollection of the big-budget NeoGeo console, but he or she probably doesn't associate them with SNK. This is how most people came to know of SNK.ĭespite SNK's contributions to our beloved hobby, the company doesn't have the same brand or franchise recognition that these other companies do. These games and their sequels, along with the NeoGeo, have made SNK an innovator in the world of video games and have pushed those other companies-primarily Capcom and Nintendo-to improve and develop their products at a much faster pace and at a much higher level of quality than they would without SNK in the picture. In the span of 25 years, the company has produced games such as Ikari Warriors, Fatal Fury, and King of Fighters, as well as a modular arcade hardware setup called the NeoGeo MVS. Seriously, who doesn't know the names of the companies responsible for Mario, Sonic, PlayStation, and the biggest monopoly this side of board games? When you speak of companies such as Nintendo, Sega, Sony, Microsoft, SquareSoft, Capcom, and Konami, chances are good that the average game player can tell you what games the company makes and what that company's significant contributions are to the world of video games in general. Ah, the original SNK logo that most fans love and adore.
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