Fighting games are in a strange spot. Over the last few weeks, almost every popular name has had an unfortunate event. Tekken 8 received its Season 2,and the result was devastating. Capcom finally announced Elena for Street Fighter 6, but with only two months before its release, this creates doubts about what will happen with balance patches during the professional circuit. Riot announced that2XKO will launch with only ten characters, and NetherRealm Studios has been rather silent in the wake of the rumour thatMortal Kombat 1’s Kombat Pack has been canceled.
However, the game that received the most bizarre news wasFatal Fury: City of the Wolves. A short teaser and a tweet from football legend Cristiano Ronaldo promising something related to the game had fans waiting in anticipation, and months later, on March 26, SNK officially announced CR7 was coming to Fatal Furywith a gameplay trailer.
Why Is A Football Player In My Fatal Fury?
The community response wasn’t pretty, and there was a reason for that: the character design looked out of place, as if he were a custom character doing a cosplay of Cristiano Ronaldo, and his moves looked plain and uninspired. It didn’t help that SNK releaseda short video with a ‘behind-the-scenes interview,’in which the football player gave bland answers about his own character and evidently showed that he doesn’t know the series at all.
Players didn’t fully recover from this before SNK made another strange announcement: DJ Salvatore Ganacci was also coming to the game. The Bosnian musician was showcased a little better, with more flashy moves, but the backlash was inevitable when fans found out that both he and CR7 were part of the game’s base roster. This meant that two spots were occupied for celebrity cameos instead of classic characters from the series.
It’s worth mentioning that the developers have already announced thatthey want to bring every single character from the Fatal Fury seriesto City of the Wolves in the future. Plus, the first season pass is free with the base game.
Wait, Is CR7 Actually Cool?
Surprisingly, the initial negative reactions turned around last week.There was a special tournament at an EVO Showcase, where professional worldwide players teamed up to compete against each other. Diaphone selected Cristiano Ronaldo as his main fighter, and he dominated the competition.
He won 5-2 against ViolentKain and then repeated the results against EVO Champion MenaRD. The fact that he won was anecdotal, though. Viewers were surprised by some of the nasty setups and combos that he achieved with CR7.
Ronaldo can summon a magic football and kick it in different ways to mix up your rival. For example, you can throw it into the air and make it drop into your opponent’s head, while you go for a low kick at the same time. This is a common type of mix-up that makes your opponent decide how to act in the situation.
A hilarious moment happened duringDiaphone and MenaRD’s match, where the former summoned the ball, flipped it, and started heading the ball four times in a row until he hit MenaRD and closed the round. We already knew that Ronaldo could head the ball as part of his basic moveset, but we never saw it done multiple times against a blocking enemy. The commentators burst into laughter.
It’s worth mentioning that all the players in the tournament had access to the game for only a day or two, so we’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg of what these characters are capable of.
Our Guest DJ Showed His Magic Tricks
Ganacci also received some love. Professional player E.T.picked the DJ for some of his battles. While E.T. wasn’t as lucky and didn’t win all the matches, he still gifted us with some funny moments. Ganacci has a floating move where he basically looks like Magneto in Marvel vs Capcom, and most of his attacks summon colorful blocks, while resembling dance moves with his limbs.
Fans watching the stream regained some hope in these unexpected characters. While their slots should have been for iconic figures in the series, at least they showed some cool moves and fun potential. We shouldn’t be surprised to see many CR7s or Salvatore Ganaccis in the upcoming EVO in Las Vegas.
We still have to wait a bit longer to try these characters ourselves, but don’t be surprised if you see clips of players doing sick combos with them when Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves launches on April 24.
