Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves is slated to receive its next big update this week with the release of Nightmare Geese as well as the free Street Fighter 6 collaboration.
We recently had the opportunity to interview Fatal Fury Director Hayato Konya about Geese’s return, the potential for a playable Jeff Bogard, their scrapped original concept for “Geese’s Legacy” and what it means to be an SNK boss among other things.
It appears as though SNK didn’t originally plan to make Nightmare Geese playable and just leave him as a special boss fight, but fan requests made them change their mind — though it sounds like fully reviving him was never an option.
Before the Verse events of The King of Fighters 14, SNK had largely stuck to their guns of leaving villains and other dead characters as they were, so we wanted to ask about the significance of that for the developers.
Considering we’ve seen Nightmare Geese and other “dream match” fighters appear in the past, we of course wanted to poke Konya’s brain about the potential to finally make Terry and Andy’s adoptive father playable in some fashion and what that could look like.
Plus, we were quite curious to see what the Director thought of the popular “SNK boss syndrome” term and what he thinks it means to be a fighting game boss.
Nightmare Geese and the Street Fighter collaboration are scheduled to release in Fatal Fury on February 26.
You can find our full interview with Konya-san below, and please read our previous interview with Fatal Fury’s leads about Season 2 and beyond.
KozPlayer: What changes have been made to turn Nightmare Geese from a boss fight into a playable fighter now to keep him powerful but not overpowered?
Konya: While adjustments have been made to suit this playable version of Geese, the original Geese is a character that features numerous throws, including counter throws, so his performance has been significantly altered to differentiate him from his KOF series iteration.
Regarding the Fudou Ken, as it had come to be perceived primarily as a combo-oriented move in recent KOF iterations, its performance has been revised to enable its use as an offensive tactical element.
KozPlayer: What sort of challenges were there to bring Geese back to Fatal Fury after all this time, and how early was that decided upon?
Konya: We originally intended Nightmare Geese to act as an entity that stood in players’ way, and making him playable was not part of the plan. However, many people from our community expressed a desire for Geese to become playable, so we explored various ways to make this happen, leading to his implementation this time.
There were several challenges. The most significant was that, being dead, he couldn’t be incorporated into the story. While the Arcade Mode story is absent, we’ve placed him within the EOST mode. We hope you’ll enjoy Geese as Nightmare Geese.
KozPlayer: What makes this version of Nightmare Geese different from the Geese we saw in The King of Fighters 15, and were there any past titles that you looked back to for inspiration?
Konya: Originally, we aimed to have the boss character Geese embody the culmination of not only Fatal Fury but the entire series. Therefore, nearly every installment serves as a source of inspiration. As for the differences, I urge you to experience them for yourself.
KozPlayer: Since Geese has been dead for so long in Fatal Fury but is alive in King of Fighters, did you ever consider bringing him back to life? Or were they always set on it being Nightmare Geese or nothing?
Konya: Bringing him back to life isn’t an option for us. If we did that, it would impose various constraints on Terry and Andy’s revenge story and Rock’s inner conflict – or rather, it might leave us wondering, “What was the point of all that?” It is precisely because he’s dead that the Fatal Fury saga can move forward.
KozPlayer: Why bring Krauser back now but keep Geese dead?
Konya: Is it truly correct to say Krauser has returned from the dead?
He originally… actually we’d just like for you to look forward to when Krauser is officially released.
KozPlayer: On a similar note, SNK has a long history of leaving the dead villains deceased and moving on besides dream matches and the Verse events of the last two King of Fighters games. That is quite a bit different than most of the other big fighting game series, so why do you think that is and why is it important?
Konya: A key aspect of SNK titles, including Fatal Fury, is our emphasis on allowing players to enjoy the story and worldview woven from past installments.
The decision not to casually resurrect characters who have died aligns with our concept of valuing the narrative of the works.
KozPlayer: Is there something interesting or surprising about Geese that you think most fans don’t
know about?
Konya: This is about “Geese’s Legacy” that features in the story of CotW, but the original idea was to have a “door only Rock could open.” Behind that door would be several legacies, and the key would be a word or phrase that Rock had heard when he was younger (something that Geese had told him).
KozPlayer: Does Nightmare Geese’s inclusion mean we may see a playable version of Fallen Rock at some point too?
Konya: He is a character we’d like to make playable someday. However, since there are many other characters that fans would like to see, we can’t promise anything at the moment.
KozPlayer: Since we’re getting Nightmare Geese, were there ever any plans to make a ‘Dream Jeff
Bogard’ to bring him into an actual roster, and what do you think that could look like?
Konya: There have been many ideas for Jeff’s inclusion, but we’ve refrained from putting him into the game in a rushed way out of respect for his status as canonically deceased. If we were to add him, it would be after establishing a foundation that allows us to tell a story focused on the past and what makes Jeff important.
His characterization would likely be something close to what everyone expects, rather than us relying on shock value or gimmicks to make him interesting.
KozPlayer: How do you think Geese really felt about Rock and Marie?
Konya: To be honest with you, I don’t think I know his true feelings either.
Since Geese was a man named the “Charismatic Evil,” I think he needed to remain “evil.” On the other hand, perhaps him being “evil” is his “fate,” an inescapable destiny given to him at birth.
If Marie was the only thing that allowed him to resist that fate, to shake it off even for just a moment, then surely, he must have felt something special for her.
I think there was a complex feeling there that could not be expressed with simple words like “love.”
KozPlayer: What do you think of the term ‘SNK boss syndrome’ that’s been part of the community for so long, and what does it mean to be an SNK boss?
Konya: First and foremost, I’m grateful that fans have recognized and are having fun with that “syndrome.”
While preserving those original things which made SNK bosses so great, adapting to modern needs is crucial as well. We want to continue providing ways for fans to enjoy fighting these bosses in a stress-fee way and eliminate some of the more unreasonable parts of these fights. But, we also want to uphold one major part of SNK’s identity: the joy of conquering powerful bosses.
KozPlayer: What does Geese Howard mean for you? As a developer? As a person? As a fighting game character?
Konya: He’s a character that is absolutely irreplaceable for SNK.