The Amusement Machine Show in Japan has been chosen by SNK as the perfect venue to present The King of Fighters XII to the public that will, hopefully, be interested in playing the game.

Game producer Masaaki Kukino says that the game will first appear in the Japanese arcades in April 2009 and that versions for gaming consoles and for the PC are also in the works.

The theme of the new game in the King of Fighters series is Rebirth and it is pretty much a homage to the fact that the franchise has managed to run for 15 years. The game will be 2D and will maintain an old school look but Kukino mentioned that the characters would be created in a traditional, hand-dotted pixel art which is pretty much standard for the King of Fighters games.

Kukino talked about the process of character creation, saying that “Overall, it's a very hard process that could take 16 months even for an experienced designer to do alone. In terms of data, the character size is about four times larger. But when considering the extra errors that come about in doing the pixel art, the trouble is more than four times what it used to be”.

The developers decided to get rid of the old and complicated multishift system from King of Fighters XI which was based on changing characters; thus, they will adopt again the simple 3 on 3 elimination mechanic that made the series famous.

The game will feature 20 characters with 11 of them being demoed at the Amusement Machine Show. Kukino says that “We are aiming for the ultimate 2D fighting game and ultimate 2D pixel graphics. I've been working in this industry since the pixel-art days, so I know the importance of a single pixel. A single pixel can vitally change the expression on a face. We've taken that skill to an ultimate level”.