This is the third of Capcom's in-house "fighting collection" releases. It focuses on the late '90s - early 2000s, when development had moved to the NAOMI arcade board. This was a time when general public interest was moving away from the oversaturated fighting game market and into the new and expansive three-dimensional space.
Eight titles comprise the collection;
- Capcom vs SNK Pro (2000)
- Capcom vs SNK 2 (2001)
- Capcom Fighting Jam (2004)
- Street Fighter Alpha 3 Upper (2001)
- Power Stone (1999)
- Power Stone 2 (2000)
- Plasma Sword (1998)
- Project Justice (2000)
The Capcom vs SNK games are the undoubted highlight; the experimental, flawed first game and the massive follow-up still look great and both feature huge rosters of characters, expansive, complex battle systems and hidden secrets.
As with the rest of the CFC run, archive material, training modes, display filters, extra options, modern control considerations and rollback netcode are all great benefits. Also returning are a lack of cross-play and the continuing, baffling decision to only allow one save state for the entire collection. Not even per game!
However it's access to games that have been locked away on long-dead platforms that's the real draw.
This collection also provides a window into what was happening to the fighting game genre at the turn of the century. Games were increasingly niche and specialised and moving away from the mass market. Take Capcom vs SNK 2's 48 characters, 6 unique play styles, multiple meters and zero explanation how any of it actually works. It's deep, it's involved, but it's also totally inaccessible, a far cry from Street Fighter II's 8 characters and single life gauge.
Game-by-game the observant player can also track seismic shifts across the larger industry. User interfaces become slicker, games begin incorporating 3D elements before eventually becoming fully three dimensional. "Simple" one-on-one fighting games buckle under demand for expansive, interactive landscapes, RPG elements and elaborate story modes.
At the same time sprite art and animation talent bleeds away, game-by-game as resource focus and talent shifts away from pixel artists and 2D graphics..
Nowhere is this more obvious than Capcom Fighting Jam's hodgepodge of clashing character assets and play systems mashed together against shockingly poor background art.
While previously this was the only way to play some of these characters outside their original, hard-to-find arcade games, now with other CFC releases filling the gaps the game offers zero reasons to play. Some lovely character art and comic book endings by UDON aren't nearly enough to salvage Capcom's absolute fighting nadir, marking a pitiful retreat from the genre they dominated in the 1990s, and one they wouldn't return to until Street Fighter IV in 2008.
That said, Capcom's first steps into the full 3D world are worth a look. Power Stones 1 and 2 are exciting and creative, if not particularly deep. Project Justice and Plasma Sword are more conventional fighting games, rendered in full 3D, and although are probably the most dated parts of the collection, both are still bursting with great ideas and designs.
Overall this compilation is much more uneven than previous releases. Outside of CvS2 it's unlikely people will still be playing this a few months down the line, so it's harder to recommend. How much the rest of the games appeal lie largely in curiosity and nostalgia.
Now, when's Capcom vs SNK 3?
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