Back in December of last year, it was announced that the SNK World Championship circuit would be continuing with SNK World Championship 2026. It was initially said to feature a $4.1 million prize pool split between Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves, The King of Fighters 15, Samurai Shodown and Art of Fighting 3.
Not surprisingly, Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves would feature $2.5 million in prizes, the lion’s share of the prize pool. Of course, King of Fighters 15’s $1 million prize pool was nothing to scoff at either.
Later, in a surprise announcement, it was also revealed that the King of Fighters ’98 would join the SWC 2026. This extended the total prize pool to $4.2 million, obviously signaling that King of Fighters ’98 would have $100,000 in prizes.
At the time, SNK did not announce the number of slots that would be available for the finale of each game. Players seemingly just assumed that Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves and King of Fighters 15 would both feature 32-man brackets while Samurai Shodown would be left with a 16-man bracket since that’s what was featured for the SWC2025 circuit.
However, SNK announced the main tournament qualification slots for the SWC 2026. Unfortunately, it would seem that the number of slots for King of Fighters 15 and Samurai Shodown have been cut in half.
Indeed, there are now only 16 qualification slots for King of Fighters 15 and eight for Samurai Shodown. Needless to say, this could impact the plans of competitors now that we know the number of slots have been cut in half.
Spectators are also claiming that this move could be hurting the hype that has come up for King of Fighters 15 that suddenly emerged with the announcement of the upcoming balance patch that is supposed to be arriving in July 2026.
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