The Killer Instinct Xbox One reboot is being modernized to fit the expectation of gamers today.
Gamers remember Killer Instinct most as an arcade game that was ported exclusively to Nintendo’s consoles of the time, the SNES and the GameBoy. It was simplistic, but at the time fighting games were all trying to compete with Street Fighter II and Mortal Kombat , and everybody thought they could compete (including, unfortunately, whoever made Shaq Fu ). Killer Instinct II gave us more of the same as its predecessor, but the gameplay just didn’t stand the test of time.
This is what Microsoft is aiming for with the Killer Instinct Xbox One reboot. The fighting game will feature many of the characters you knew back in the day, but the developer is aiming to modernize and separate fighting styles more, so it doesn’t play like every character is just a different skin of the rest. This could make Killer Instinct more like the Street Fighter games in that way, making you relearn the game partially if you want to play as another fighter.
Producer Torin Rettig told Polygon that Killer Instinct on Xbox One will be getting a gameplay facelift to compete with current hits like Street Fighter IV and Mortal Kombat . However, they also aim to keep it true to its roots, so the Xbox One reboot doesn’t feel like something completely different this time around.
He added about the original games:
“Most of the characters in the original game, while they had unique moves, tended to play in a rush-down gameplay style. They tended to get in your face, do a lot of big combos and be done. Every character had a projectile; every character had a lot of the same kind of tools. We wanted to make each character a little bit more distinct.”
While this sounds like a winning new approach to the game, we can only hope it makes the Killer Instinct Xbox One reboot something gamers will play for years to come.