The King of Fighters: All-Star Review – Gacha of Fighters

Though it contains all the luck-based features of most gacha games on the mobile market, The King of Fighters: All-Star is a fun and easy to pick-up brawler that will make any King of Fighters fan’s commute or downtime much better.

The King of Fighters: All-Star
Developer: Netmarble and SNK
Price: Free to Play 
Platform: iOS, Android
MonsterVine was supplied with a premium currency code (1000 rubies) for review.

King of Fighters never struck me as a franchise that would really fit mobile devices. Rarely have I found any fighting game to feel anything more than uncomfortable when ported to a phone, so I was far more optimistic about All-Star when I found out it was adapting the world of King of Fighters in the more mobile-friendly brawler genre. Throw in plenty of advertising with my guy Terry Bogard, and my follow-up guys Joe Higashi and the dreaded Rugal, and you have me feeling pretty good about All-Star.

The story is one that fans of anime games will likely know like the back of their Genki textbooks. You play as yourself after you’ve been thrust into the world of King of Fighters. Your memories are gone, but an attractive young woman finds you and decides to stick with you until your memories can be recovered, even if it means entering you into the most prestigious fighting tournament in the world. You get to meet plenty of KoF icons as you play through tournaments of varying years, all while a mysterious group of “Tuners” monitor your every move with increasing concern. The narrative is serviceable overall, despite more than a few typos and grammatical errors, as it’s an easily understood story for newcomers that contains quite a few fun moments for fans of the franchise.

All-Star is surprisingly quick and accessible, as it takes the most fun parts of the brawler genre and adds in your standard mobile RPG elements for leveling up and gaining new skills. The brawler sections are quick, and typically have you fight around 10 grunts and a buffed-up boss in each chapter. The buttons for different attacks, blocks, and dodges, as well as the joystick, are all positioned well on the screen, making All-Star fairly easy to control. You unlock Auto-Play pretty early on though, so if you’re pressed for both time and attention, you can just let the A.I. plow through foes in your stead. There are challenges and towers outside of the Story Mode that can be played to obtain evolution items, gold, and experience, in addition to a fun PvP mode, which gives All-Star some early longevity.

“I wouldn’t say you need to spend any money to enjoy All-Star as it is now, though time will tell if that changes with future content updates.“

You use EXP items, equippable Battle Cards (which are also pulled randomly), and stat boosts to make your team tougher. The difficulty isn’t particularly hard though, so a bit of provided level-boosting will let you glide through a decent chunk of the currently-available story. You also get to use another player’s unit as an extra supporter, which can be handy in tougher stages, and provide you with friend points that can be used to pull items. I think there are one or two too many currencies at play, as it can feel a bit messy to collect so many different currencies that can be used to pull specific things, but you catch on pretty quickly regardless.

Most characters are obtained through luck-based pulls, which require the in-game currency known as rubies. I was provided with 1000 rubies (approximately $30) for this review, which is enough for a standard ten-pull or two discounted ones (which are fairly prevalent thanks to ongoing launch sales and campaigns). Having these rubies in addition to the bounty you get for starting the game made obtaining my first dream-team (Terry, Joe, and King) much quicker and naturally made the game more enjoyable from the get-go, though the launch campaigns are certainly providing players with plenty of ways to grab characters early. Currently, players can get a 5-Star select-a-unit pass for logging-in for the first time, which is an amazing item for any player, as it gives you any single character right off the bat. I chose Rugal, naturally, as who you pick is all up to you. With these campaigns, I wouldn’t say you need to spend any money to enjoy All-Star as it is now, though time will tell if that changes with future content updates.

There’s quite a variety of characters to play as, though quite a few of the obtainable units are actually simply different versions of the same character. For example, there are multiple Terry units that all look slightly different and have different movesets, as they’re based on Terry’s many appearances throughout the King of Fighters series. This is some nice attention to detail for series fans who want a specific look or moveset for their favorite fighter, though those uninitiated with the franchise may be frustrated when they pull multiple visually-similar versions of Choi in one ten-pull.

Visually, All-Star is quite impressive for a mobile game (note: I played on an LG V20 from 2016.) The 3D models are simple, but not in a reductive way. Animations are clean and clear, and the slightly-animated illustrations for each character look great. The music can be pretty catchy as well, though most of the tracks are pretty quickly forgotten about while you aren’t playing the game.

The Final Word
The King of Fighters: All-Star is a fast-paced and enjoyable mobile game that uses the iconic roster of the King of Fighters series in a way that will both intrigue series newcomers and please established fans. The luck-based unit collection is always a frustration in gacha games, but the core gameplay is simple and fun enough to make All-Star worth trying for anyone on the fence.

MonsterVine Review Score: 4 out of 5 – Good