The King of Fighters

The MMXCIV King of Fighters Tournament semifinal battle between Sun Tzu Kusanagi and Chow Yun Fat Yagami.

The King of Fighters (KOF for short <Hebrew for monkey, קוף>) is a very ancient fighting tournament, dated from the year 1 in the Jewish calendar. It was created to determine who is the second best fighter to Bruce Lee in a determined year.

This tournament is usually sponsored by the local/actual world fighting badass. The sponsor has the role of organizing the rules and providing fighting sites. However, mostly the tournaments are also sponsored by Buddha and the legendary Kung Fu Man.

The tournament used to be secret, but all was messed up in 1991, when Terry Bogard threw Geese Howard from the roof of his building. A kingpin being thrown 122 floors down to where Mr. T and Pai Mei were playing Go is an impossible fact to hide.

Prizes

Besides all the money and fame gained with the tournament, every classified fighter gains a discount of one to two years in his/her age. The finalists gains a extra one-year discount, and the winner can choose between minus five years in age or a spellbind that ensures them to support up to two knife wounds in the face without dying. Most people chooses the second alternative, since Yamazaki is a well-known fighter in these contests.

This is why in 1994 Athena Asamiya looks like a 21-years girl, back up to 1998 she looked more like 18 and in 2003 she looks like a slutty 15-year-old chick.

Rules

The rules are changed almost every year, but always keeping the basic rules:

• This is NOT Street Fighter. This rule means the 'one-to-one' fighting best-of-three rounds with time to regain all stamina lost is for Pussies. Usually the rules tell how many people are permitted in each team, but is known that amount will never be smaller than 3 and bigger than 8.
• This is NOT Mortal Kombat. This means that isn't obligatory the use of gimmiks, but mainly this means you aren't restricted to render your enemy senseless and dazed without stamina to perform a killing move. You can - and you MUST if you want to keep fighting - to perform those any time, once you get enough power to do so. One thing to keep in mind is that since you are using killing moves in a 'still-moving foe', if you are a used-to-MK-pansy, you will notice your enemy will not blast in a zillion pieces of flesh, nor break a bone or anything gruesome (but they still can bleed gallons of blood without dying). This is due to a known fact, the The King of Fighter's fighters are ways stronger than the Mortal Kombat warriors. Even a KOF rookie will find the Rayden's Thrashing Uppercut too weak to deserve the title of "punch". In fact, Outworld is a weaker dimension. Any KOF fighter in Outworld is confused with Omega Tom Hanks, who is, in fact, invincible.
• This is NOT Fight Club. Because Rugal Bernstein didn't say so.

And the most important of all rules:

• THIS IS NOT MARIO (Or Luigi). Every KOF fighter receives a detailed manual of rules, since the first tournament. Initially people didn't acknowledged the meaning of a sign of "don't do" with a Italian plumber jumping on a hapless living mushroom. But later, when Ramsés IV accidentally broke this rule, it was known its meaning: Never, in any way people will be authorized to hit/kill any opponent with a plain jump over the head (If you have to do a jump onto enemy's head, at least do something there to deal damage). Eating mushrooms or using star power-ups (Like Athena Asamiya) is permitted, but you must do something that deals decent damage instead of just touching and expecting the enemy to disappear. You can fly, but if you don't return to the floor in less than 8 seconds, Red Baron will shoot you down. For some reason, fireballs are enabled without boundaries.

An additional rule was added in 1987:

• THIS IS NOT DRAGON BALL. You must use carefully your energy beams and take care to do not abuse them, or you will be roundhouse-kicked. Beam clashes are terminally banished, and isn't permitted to fly out of the screen or both players fighting on the air defying the gravity. Sponsors found that so boring. To prevent sudden death, the KOF staff suggests all goku-esque entries to watch all the Dragon Ball series UNTIL the moment Goku learns how to fly. That will make them used to the "who shoots first, hits first", "flying is for bitches" and "fight like a man and kick that grenade" concepts.

Violence and American Blood

Even though the tournament does not involves evisceration, it keeps censored on some countries, especially in the United States. The censors there are very cocky, and tends to think if a child sees a tear of blood or eat a grain of sugar, they will be addicted and will be driven into berserk.

It is more than proved that does not happens as seen in Russia, Brazil and Japan. But censors keep doing it.

Because of that, when the fights happen to be made in American sites, all the fighters must be ready with the American Blood kit:

• Several gallons of Milk
• Wooden powder
• Flour
• Metal-Spark fireworks
• Sleeves to conceal stuff
• A patented American Blood Concealer

This device makes every act of violence looking just a sparked hit (Like being hit by a badooken), every blood hit just spurts milk (sometimes it looks like something, er, different...) and teeth-breaking uppercuts just drops wooden splinters and powder or flour.

Rugal had a big problem with this, since his Gigantic Pressure usually spurts about three cubical meters of blood, and he usually ends a battle taking a bloodied hand. In USA, it looks more like a milk fountain and a pos-masturbation hand.

Not to mention, up to 93 most fighters were forced to say "Don't eat sugar, keep eating your vegetables and drinking soy milk" while in American soil.

Is worthy to say that 1994 and 1995 were kinda free tournaments, since everyone was enabled to drain blood or soul from anyone anywhere, even in USA, and also they could rip off the girl's clothes in the final strikes.

This ended in 1996 when one of the censors watching the tape of the tournaments had a massive boner that perforated his own skull while seeing Chang Koenhan ripping off King and Yuri's clothes. Since then, all the fighters in USA territory has to use the American Blood Kit.

In the broadcasts, the blood is coloured white with the help of Chroma Key effects, and the hits are censored with Batman "POW"s, "SOC"s and "PAFT"s.

Rules and Standards for Moves and Super Moves

To prevent power abuse for some and granting fiercer attacks for others, the DM-System was devised to ensure all the contestants the ability of performing super blows.

Those "specials" relies on guts or rage to supply power to be performed. All entries are trained to learn how to focus his own rage (and how to piss off himself without being taunted) to charge enough energy to do those moves.

However, that energy does not works wonders alone, so every fighter must come with prepared moves to use with that energy boost.

Up to 1996, fighters were able to only charge themselves in the simplest way possible, and when heavily hurt - or really pissed off - they could unleash those super moves indefinitely. Goenitz was known to start the battle already pissed off, so he could make desperation moves any time, anywhere. If someone was dumb enough to hit him enough ("making him going to red") he could make a Twister or Katrina in a wink.

In 1997 a team of Emo scientists started to devise and research a way to override that barrier, and ended by creating the ARMS (Advanced Rage Management System for unshort). Through a chip, bracket, or even through training, a fighter could store three times more energy than before. But at the cost of not being pissed off any more near death, and they couldn't charge by themselves - they had to bruise someone to get such energy.

Another problem of the ARMS was the need to "Crack It Up" the energy cells in order to use. Mostly fighters could achieve that by performing a weak punch, a strong punch and a weak kick on the void at the same time. Recently, only a strong kick and a weak punch are enough to do so.

Please note that this is not like the rage gauge system in Samurai Shodown; meaning that your character cannot lift his/her opponent in the air, split them in half and shower themselves in the opponent's coins and/or blood or whatnot at the end of the match.

Abbreviation	Meaning	Alternative Meaning	What you are expect to see	What to do if you are a fighter doing it	Requirements (Normal Manly Mode)	Requirements (ARMS Weenie Mode)
M	Move	Move on, bastard!	The fighter will perform some action that probably will cause damage to the enemy if near enough	Move on, bastard!	None. Smile, breath and smoke.	You must to do so, everytime, anytime, if you want to keep alive and kicking, bitch.
DM	Desperation Move	Danger Move	Is a super move, where the fighter usually bruises the enemy or heals himself	Perform a special stunt, usually an charged attack	At least one full bar of guts/rage or being pissed off	One full bar - You may need to crack it up.
HDM	Hidden Desperation Move	Hidden Danger Move	Is a hidden super move, that no one expects to see	Do something different, bro! Be funny and not just stupid.	A full bar or piss-off may be required, but sometimes you get a freebie.	One full bar - crack it up and get high on crack. Good luck.
SDM	Super Desperation Move	Super Deadly Move	Is a super move, usually a improved version of one's DM. USUALLY, after one of this, the battle ends due to the enormous amount of damage done, or by the bruise from the enemy after a missed SDM.	Lay full pipe on them, guy! Go, Rocky! Your wife and children depend on it!	You MUST be with the full rage and be really pissed off, near death status.	Expect to make those while on ARMS, weenie? Fill all the three bars (if you ever have a chance to do so) and don't cock it up! Don't crack'em and maybe you have a chance. You will live for it?
HSDM	Hidden Super Desperation Move	Hidden Super Deadly Move	I have no idea, they all are hidden. If you spot one, take photos or tape that, it is a quite rare experience.	Show Time! Show what you prepared to the public, Bozo!	Full Rage bar, must be really pissed off, near death, and have steam shoot from every orifice in your face.	Still trying to outdo the marvelous man-method of rage attacking? If Jesus looks at you and smiles, you have a 2% chance to do so - if you live to tell. Additionally, three full bars are required.
LDM	Last Desperation Move	Leader Desperation Move	You are expected to see the last spark of power from your favorite hero. Watch well, and tape it, to watch it fondly (unless he's using ARMS)	None to day who made this had idea of what the hell they were doing. So don't ask me.	All things said before are required. Throw away the rules booklet, during this last breath you are eligible to break any KOF rule aforementioned. And you will be kicked in the nuts by Cartman if you fail to hit.	You already failed to Life. You can't do so. Find a corner and cry.
HLDM	Hidden Last Desperation Move	Half Life : Death Match (wheres the 2?)	I have no idea. Do you?	Guess what... surprise!	You have to be a real showman to do those.	You can't do those, forgot? But let me tell you a short story... legend says that if someone performs a really astounding, unforgettable, above the perfect and all those nice things, that person is guaranteed to get laid before he/she dies. Sounds neat, huh? Then switch to the manly mode or help to make a decent energy system like that hacked one in 1999!

See also

• Choi Bounge