Deep Dive: Why Is Mexico So Good At King of Fighters?

there's a few absolutes in the fgc that nobody would dare dispute to name a few Korea and Pakistan host the kings of Tekken especially if you guys aren't familiar for the best machinas in the world Japan is home to the strongest players in Street Fighter [Applause] and nobody loves King of Fighters more than Mexico [Music] [Applause] [Music] the last idea was introduced to me pretty much as a meme and I had no idea that it held as much truth as it did but as I've gotten into King of Fighters I've seen time and time again the Mexican flag dominating top baits of pretty much every tournament from locals to majors and then I had to ask myself why Mexico was home to top players of many fighting games but what exactly made them so dominant and in love with King of Fighters specifically before we get into the video I just want to say thank you to everyone who's been supporting the channel so far there's lots of great stuff to come and I can't wait to share it with you guys that said if you're new to the channel or you just like my deep Dives I'd like to ask you to please consider subscribing and dropping a like as it helps the channel so much more than you might realize so with that out of the way let's get back into it the answer to why kof boils down to pretty much one thing Logistics arcades around the world were immensely popular in the 90s and early 2000s kids would go after or even during class and salary men frequented them as a means to escape the stress of work and family there was a much higher demand for arcades back in the 90s as well because of how expensive a Home console was if you want to play Street Fighter 2 when it came out in 1992 you'd need a Super Nintendo which costs 450 in today's money as well as seventy dollars for Street Fighter 2 which would be a hundred and sixty dollars today video games were expensive and only a few could afford them which explains the success of arcades so in countries like America where there was money to be had and in Japan the motherland of video games arcades were a great way to make money and provide a social scene for Youth and members of the community but the same couldn't be said about countries with less money like Mexico for those arcades dedicated machines were much riskier to take gone as games would go out of style and repairs weren't cheap this meant they needed to find some sort of alternative that would mitigate risk on investment could fill the spots of multiple games and wouldn't put too much strain on the owners of the arcades enter the Neo Geo [Music] name that stick released in 1990 the Neo Geo came around just in time to capitalize on the boom arcades were having and it offered a solid alternative for arcade owners around the world the Neo Geo was a cartridge-based arcade system board that also doubled as a Home console so now arcades could afford to buy more of these cheaper machines but also not having to dedicate machines to one single game the owners could literally switch out cartridges for more popular games or let their customers decide how to spend their money this situation led to a pretty much win-win-win for the owners customers and Publishers it was a win for the Publishers because it meant they could release some new updates for their games in the forms of cartridges instead of expensive new machines for the games which was a model games like Street Fighter used for pretty much all of the 90s the Neo Geo was extremely popular in Mexico for these reasons sporting games like metal slug fatal Fury and of course King of Fighters now why would kof specifically grow so big when there are plenty of other games competing for the Player's money well there's two reasons for that reason One cost fighting games at arcades for the uninitiated are usually a good amount cheaper than other games this was because you could put some money in tackle the arcade mode and at any point someone could join and challenge you to a match if you won the match you got to stay on the cabinet and fight the next in line or continue whatever you were doing before the Challenger arrived such an approach bolsters a sense of competition and community that makes the cost of the game seem much more worth it than if you were playing in a single player mode or cooperating with a stranger you also got more bang for your buck in Street Fighter for example you pick one character to fight a few rounds but in kof you could play three characters at that point the choice was obvious reason 2 updates the next reason is that KO have received yearly updates from 1994 to 2003 incentivizing arcade owners to buy the new version keeping things fresh to attract players back for more in the days before training mode and consoles being common in homes a year was not even close to enough time to really learn and master a fighting game so players basically never ran out of things to try and learn before the next update what's even more wild is that these machines and games weren't just limited to arcades they were everywhere corner stores restaurants and anything in between it became common for Mexican children to go out run errands and then use the change to play a few rounds of kof before returning home the widespread popularity of the games cultivated a competitive Spirit across almost all of Latin America that continues to grow more and more to this day decades later King of Fighters United so many people in and outside of Mexico under a single idea the community was so strong that SNK recognized their love for the franchise and introduced many Mexican characters to the series such as Ramon Angel and Tisa they'd also communicate directly with the Latino communities for certain events and reveals and that sharing of ideas didn't just go one way lots of different parts of Mexican pop culture started to be influenced by kof as well for example this move is known to most of the world as a flare named for the dancer who popularized the move to many Spanish-speaking dancers it's known as El yashiro after his iconic sweep many choose to wear costumes of characters from the games and the memes oh man the memes memes are funny yes but they tell us more than just what to laugh at they're indicative of culturally important things whether that be art movies or yeah even a fighting game so with all that said there's a story to be told about the Mexican king of fighter scene and how it's developed the reputation we know it for today a big conversation I've seen floating around in the modern FTC in similar scenes like smash is one of exclusivity nowadays with most fighting games being played online instead of in person there's a belief that new players are missing out on learning from the best teachers and players there really haven't been any facts proposed reinforcing or debasing this claim but for Latin America it couldn't be further from the truth because of the accessibility of King of Fighters machines the prideful culture of the Mexican fgc and the consistent updates to the franchise players formed tightly nicked communities that could mesh with others easily and we see that even to this day in an interview with Kotaku Legendary player kof romance said that he'd host players from Chile Peru Brazil Colombia and Mexico at his home in Las Vegas for tournaments like Evo when these players get together they share literal Decades of knowledge and techniques with each other and it shows now due to the way the fgc handles its records and all that it's hard to tell exactly when Mexico started Standing Tall on an international stage but for me I was made aware of their presence in 2012 with the release of kof13 the main reason for this was because kof13 received a pretty warm welcome in fighting game Esports in fact it was the first time we'd see kof as a main tournament at Evo leading up to that Evo there were plenty of other high-profile King of Fighters 13 events as well and one player Bala was shaking up the world with his Stellar performances left and right introduce himself tell us what is your name and what is your gamer tag uh okay um hi everybody my name is Armando and my camera attack is Bala I actually want to take a second to talk about these performances because they very well could be how Mexico's dominance was first established at the start of that year Bala won final round 15 over another Mexican legend who I mentioned earlier romance I think the true Testament to his dominance however was his performances at the MLG pro circuit events Bala won both events over players who have seats on the fighting game Pantheon players like Justin Wong Lil Majin Reynold and Mr kof with this it was quite obvious that Mexico was the strongest kof region in the Western Hemisphere but how did they stack up against the rest of the world well there was one player who represented the East that year and that was tokido who was defeated by romance so from there things were already looking good but then came Evo the crowd challenge can he be the hero of this tournament from the onslaught of the Koreans the invasion of telling you here's the top eight for the first ever kof Evo tournament while yes Mexico was the second most represented region Korea is obviously dominating with four different players qualifying for top eight and this actually makes a lot of sense but here we go what do you think about the Korean players I think they're very strong they definitely have uh the hunger that's very interesting because there's a Korean killer players are new to the trail of Scene It seems like they start playing seriously together with this game on Console version usually the Korean scene was arcade you know oriented with the other tourists right Korea had a similar situation in Mexico that led to kuf being the more popular fighting game in the early arcade days leading to tons of players clocking in an absurd number of hours and from this a rivalry was born between Asia and Latin America nowadays if you tune into any kof top 8 at an International Event I guarantee you a player from Latin America will be there when met with the rivals from the East the competition has rarely swung in their favor on the grandest of stages but that might not be entirely their fault the best Asian players come from primarily Taiwan China and Korea and are sponsored by pretty big organizations like kanba for xiaohai for many Mexican players such sponsorships aren't as common and they are definitely less lucrative this combined with America making travel from Mexico into the U.S typical means less opportunity for these talented and dedicated players to show what they're made of one of the sickest displays of high-level kof I've ever seen was at Thunderstruck 2022 a tournament held in Monterey Mexico there were players I hardly see on a main stage showing off insane knowledge and awareness that is rare to come by these days [Applause] foreign the region is incredibly strong and I hope in the future they get more chances to show off what they can do and the community only continues to grow the lesson I learned while researching this topic is that the fgc is so much bigger than you or I can even know entire cultures are formed around these games and until some sort of flashlight is shown on that culture it's easy for us to never know about it yeah that format is really cool because all these years there have been all these local events that have been grinding every week and now the dojo really highlights these events and in fact sends players to the events the online era of tournaments gave us alternative tour structures that showed off the prowess of so many regions I've never seen played before regions like Oceania which really showed up to play in Capcom Cup this year or Australia in the dbfc world tour these regions might not be as fully developed as other larger ones with more resources but they deserve a chance to realize their full potential as fighting games grow and resettle into whatever ecosystem we choose down the line I hope these seeds are given the chance to blossom into the flowers they can be with our support thanks for watching and as always see you in the next one foreign [Music]

Channel: Qmanchu

Views: 829,835

Keywords: King of Fighters, Fighting Games, KOF 15

Id: U769xj4gvSk

Length: 12min 54sec (774 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 18 2023