Killer Instinct Gold Added To Nintendo Switch Online
Get ready to Ultra Combo like you’ve never Ultra Comboed before — Nintendo Switch Online’s latest offering is Killer Instinct Gold for the Nintendo 64.
KI Gold represents a promise both kept and broken. When the original Killer Instinct hit arcades in the fall of 1994, the first thing anyone heard out of it when it turned on was a voice saying “COMING IN 1995, FOR THE NINTENDO ULTRA 64!!!” But as 1995 came and went without an N64 (or an Ultra 64, for that matter), fighting game enthusiasts had to make do with a Super NES port designed to fill the gap. It wouldn’t be long before Killer Instinct 2 cabinets started appearing in early 1996…would THIS be the game new N64 owners would get instead?
Not exactly. While Killer Instinct Gold would be similar to KI2 in its roster of characters, there’s a reason it didn’t call itself KI2. The final specs of the N64 turned out to be less than the arcade, and sacrifices still had to be made…the characters had less animation frames and their special endings were all changed. The truth is, both KI and its sequel employed a larger version of the trickery shown off in Donkey Kong Country…not only were the sprites rendered, but the backgrounds were actually video footage played frame by frame. Video, as you know, was not what the N64 was built for.
The tradeoff however is that due to what the N64 COULD do, Killer Instinct Gold could for the first time have real-time 3D backgrounds instead of fake ones. The fighters were still sprites, but now they could pick up parts of the arena and throw them, whereas before it was all static.
KI Gold was a very early release for the N64, back when it had less than ten titles to its name and its future was still vague. Would its library be full of mascot platformers (Super Mario 64) and racers (Cruis’n USA), or would it embrace 90s grit like its rival Playstation and churn out more fighters like this one? The answer would be the former. In the end the N64 did not receive very many fighting games, but this one wasn’t a bad entry.
