Not too great, seems fun in theory to play as a kaiju in a beatemup but the execution is pretty weak, and other reviews seem to indicate this is just an issue with the game itself and not the SNES port specifically. I thought it was fine earlier on but the later bosses get really nasty, would probably have put a 6/10 if they didn't include a boss rush at the end. A boss rush doesn't even make much sense at all with how this game is structured, it's like two steps removed from being a standard fighting game. Imagine playing Street Fighter II but you have to play the entire thing twice before confronting M Bison. That ain't right.

Had the pleasure to fightcade this with C_F, and it was a fun 'time', but not a fun game. Conversation helped mask the fact the whole game was a damage-spongey monstrosity.

This game has the worst boss rush ever made too, cause the whole game is 90% bosses already? Imagine if the 2nd Loop of Ghosts N Goblins replaced all the level tilesets with the last level tileset. Just doing the same thing, but harder and worse, while staring at the same graphics.

Actually now that I say that, the 2nd loop of GnG taking place in the last world would be way more badass than whatever's happening here.

Maybe this is better single-player? Always a chance the damage values got wonky because of 2P, you know how beatemup devs get with this shit

Despite having a premise that seems like an instant classic for SNK, a game about a bunch of giant monsters of varying types fighting each other while destroying plenty of cities, the original King of the Monsters wasn’t really all that special. It was neat for what it was, a wrestling game involving these giant monsters, but plenty of things were holding it back, such as the weird, clunky, and inconsistent methods of attacking and countering your opponent, the unnecessary padding of the game by basically making you play through it twice, and a lack of a satisfying payoff by the end, making it so that I never want to really go back to the game again, unless it is just for a match or two against friends. Even with that though, that is unlikely, because why would I make my friends play that game with me over others? Despite these complaints, it was successful enough at the time to prompt a sequel from SNK, and would you believe me when I tell you that it is actually WORSE than the original? Yeah, that’s what we have to deal with here with King of the Monsters 2: The Next Thing, which is one of the worst titles for a sequel I have ever heard in my life.

Before I completely go into criticizing the hell out of this game, I will say right off the bat that this game does try to change things up from the original game a little bit, and these are some changes that I do believe make for a more entertaining experience… for that brief little window of time. Right after that window of time, you then realize what you are playing retains a lot of the same issues from the original game, and while some of these issues are improved upon, these issues are then paired up with even MORE issues that ultimately make for a more unenjoyable product. So yeah, again, like with the original game, while there is a lot to admire about this game when viewed at from a surface level, especially when compared to the first game, there are a lot of decisions made with this game that I just really didn’t like, ultimately making it so that I didn’t really have a good with it at all.

The story is about, surprisingly, an alien invasion, with three of the monsters from the previous game needing to stop that from happening, so this is basically Monsters vs. Aliens before that movie even existed, the graphics are definitely an improvement over the original, with things being much more colorful and detailed, especially with the designs of the monsters and aliens, which admittedly look fantastic for this kind of game, the music is great, featuring plenty of kick-ass tunes to listen to while destroying alien scum, so the presentation all around is solid, the control is alright, being pretty much the same as the original game, but it still feels just as clunky as before, and the gameplay is very similar to the original, but changed around enough to where it doesn’t feel like a straight copy of the original.

The game combines several elements of a fighter, a beat-’em-up, and the wrestling gameplay of the original, where you take control of one of the monsters that survived from the previous game, take on plenty of stages taking place all around the world rather then just being in Japan, take on plenty of small and big main aliens that will do everything in their power to take you down, gather plenty of points and upgrades to get stronger along your way, while avoiding the powerups that take away your upgrades (fuck you, SNK), and take down these giant opponents with extreme hostility to stand a chance to save the world that you are gonna destroy yourself. So, once again, before I completely go into what is wrong with this game, I do like the approach that it takes when compared to the original. Instead of focusing on pinning your opponent, you just have to deplete their health bar, which is more in line with SNK’s other titles, and it does make things more focused on just dealing damage. Not to mention, I do like the bits of beat-’em-up action involved whenever they do pop up. With that being said though… both of these things could’ve been greatly improved upon.

First things first, in this game, you can only take control of three monsters… ONLY THREE. May I ask, WHY? I mean, I get it, the other monsters ended up dying, but you could’ve made new monsters up for this particular entry, or if you can’t do that, then make the aliens seen in the game playable instead. I swear, I don’t get why SNK does this with a lot of their games, where they only allow you to control a limited selection of characters just because of “pLoT”. Secondly, not only do the beat-’em-up segments barely feel like any challenge whatsoever when you take them on, but they don’t last that long at all, making you wonder why these segments are there whatsoever, other then just to get powerups, even though you can just as easily get them from the main fights.

And in terms of the main fights, they also fall short of being great, because they carry over the same issue from the first game where the fighting feels pretty clunky, especially when most of it still involves grabbing your opponents and slamming them down. It still feels unclear as to what moves do what and how you can get out of a certain combo whenever it happens, which is not the feeling you need to be giving off when it comes to one of these games, especially when it starts even as early as the first boss in the game.

In addition, the padding from the previous game also remains an issue, despite how, at first, it doesn’t seem that bad. There are only seven stages in the game, and for the most part, you do fight new opponents in each of the stages, but then you get to Stage Seven, and all of a sudden, everything falls flat on its face. The first thing you find whenever you get to this stage is a boss rush, where you have to fight all previous six opponents once again, and at this point in the game, each fight with all of the opponents do take a good amount of time to win, so fighting all of them back-to-back here… yeah, it is agonizingly slow, and you can’t help but feel like it is all a waste of time. And after that, you then get to the final boss, who does have an awesome design, but has a GIGANTIC health bar, making it without a doubt the longest fight in the game. You wanna know how long it took me to beat this guy? 30 minutes, at least. I’m not sure how much longer it could’ve gone from that, but it was definitely over 30 minutes. This is not only due to the gigantic health bar the boss has, but the fact that it will constantly be killing you, no matter how you try to hit it, which makes it even more slow then the boss rush, making me want to shut off the game as soon as possible.

And to add insult to injury, right after you defeat this boss, it splits into a lot of small creatures, and you are given 10 seconds to take them all out. Depending on whether or not you manage to do this, you are then given either the good ending or the bad ending. Yes, this game has multiple endings, both of them determined by what you do in the last 10 seconds of the game……………… what the FUCK. I mean, I guess I should give this some credit for it adding some replay value to the game, but who the HELL is actually gonna replay through ALL of that just to try to change your fate in the last 10 seconds of the game? Yeah, no, absolutely not. Fuck these endings, fuck this game, and fuck you, SNK.

Overall, while there are some changes that this game makes that can be seen as an improvement over the original, there are also a lot more changes that end up dragging the game down even more, making it without a doubt the worst of the two, even if the original game wasn’t that good to begin with. I guess I would recommend it for fans of the original, but for everyone else, don’t even bother trying this game out, as it just isn’t worth it for anymore then, like, five minutes with a friend to fight against. Quite frankly, it comes as no surprise that this series never continued any further after this, and considering how many sequels they love to give their other franchises, that is saying something.

Game #348